And in this corner...(the battle of the fantasies)

There's a lot of attention being given in the to the new movie "The Golden Compass" and its source material: Phillip Pullman's "His Dark Materials" trilogy.

Pullman has famously been quoted as saying of CS Lewis' Narnia series:

"a peevish blend of racist, misogynistic and reactionary prejudice" and "not a trace" of Christian charity.

"It's not the presence of Christian doctrine I object to so much as the absence of Christian virtue," he added.

"The highest virtue - we have on the authority of the New Testament itself - is love, and yet you find not a trace of that in the books."

I don't say that the Narnia series is the greatest literature ever written, but that's just really silly commentary.

Readers may recall that I liked the movie version of The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe very much. I recently watched it again, and my fondness has not diminished. If you dip into the lengthy set of user comments at IMDB, you will see that many folk agree. The public reaction seems to have been even better than a pretty good critical reaction, perhaps because it had a largely self-selecting Christian audience. (Of course, an emotional appreciation of Christianity no doubts helps one to be moved by the story. But hey, I am not stopping your conversion for better movie appreciation!)

Teenage (and older) LOTR tragics complained it was a poor imitation of Tolkien; I say that unlike that interminable writer, Lewis at least had real characters and a point.

So, of course, it gives me some pleasure to see the first movie of anti-Lewis Pullman's series get a lukewarm critical and box office reception.

All the critics say that the movie has largely been stripped of the anti-religion element; most people seem to also say that this will be virtually impossible to maintain if movies are attempted from the subsequent books.

As this article (in The Atlantic, so it must be true) notes, Pullman's stories ultimately have teen sex (or at least sexual awakening) saving the universe. (This reminds of the first Star Trek movie, which Pauline Kael - I think - said was notable as science fiction that ended not with a bang, but with a bang.) For a conservative's rebuttal of such an implausible take on sexuality, see here.

In the meantime, Prince Caspian, the next Narnia movie, is due out in 6 months or so, and its trailer has been released with some fanfare. It sounds as if the movie is not as close to the novel this time, and perhaps has been more Tolkien-ified than I would like, but here's hoping.

UPDATE: here's a very lengthy interview with Pullman, and it turns out we agree on one thing - Tolkien:

"I dislike his Narnia books because of the solution he offers to the great questions of human life: is there a God, what is the purpose, all that stuff, which he really does engage with pretty deeply, unlike Tolkien who doesn't touch it at all. ‘The Lord of the Rings' is essentially trivial. Narnia is essentially serious, though I don't like the answer Lewis comes up with. If I was doing it at all, I was arguing with Narnia. Tolkien is not worth arguing with."