They do such a great job of preserving the spiritual pictures that are painted by C.S. Lewis! In fact, the scenes with Aslan most often make be cry because the words and spiritual applications leap out at me and touched my heart so much. Actor David Suchet (one of my favorite actors from Agatha Christie's Poirot) does a wonderful job portraying the voice of Aslan, and this seems to be a family project for him as his two children joined the cast as extra voices in these stories.
The story which surprised me and touched me the most this time through was The Horse And His Boy. Even though I've read this book I always forget the story line because it's different from the other books. The main characters are talking horses and natives from neighboring countries to Narnia instead of people from our own world. The stories of coming to Aslan are huge in this book. The similarities of how Christ pursues us and uses His Holy Spirit to woo us to Himself, continually calling us to make that decision to come in faith to Christ is very striking. I believe, if I'm not mistaken, that this is also similar to C.S. Lewis' own testimony.
So since this post is in general about all things Narnia I can't end this post without mentioning the film adaptations that have been made of these wonderful books.
As much as I enjoy the newer Narnia films with their lovely special effects, costumes, gorgeous music and talented actors I still love watching the old BBC TV movies. I do like the darker, more stately White Witch in the old The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe. It's hard to capture the vastness and beauty of Narnia in a smaller production but they capture the time period and spirit of fun and adventure.
Probably my favorite of the BBC TV movies is The Voyage Of The Dawn Treader, which stars talented Samuel West as the grown up Prince Caspian. The different adventures they find on the many islands they visit are so extraordinary. I enjoyed reading the book so much and then listening to the radio play was so great. Small mouse Reepicheep shines in his faithfulness to Aslan in this book. He displays the faith of Job "Though he slay me, yet will I trust in him: but I will maintain mine own ways before him." (Job 13:15).
"So they're all great, but which is your favorite?" you may ask. My favorite book/story out of all the Narnia series would be The Silver Chair. This is probably because it is the one I most identify with. I love the characters of Jill and Eustace and especially of Puddleglum the gloomy Marshwiggle (shown in photo above).
In this story the three main characters have to walk by faith following the signs Aslan has set out before them. They have to remember the signs and follow them to the letter even though they might seem to be a complete waste of time or to be leading to failure/discomfort/destruction.
I love this picture of how we are to follow the law of Christ's nature that has been set in our hearts when we believe on Him. Sometimes following His Word may seem foolish to the world and hard to us but we are blessed when we obey!
Below is a music video I created using music and photos from the old BBC TV movies of The Chronicles of Narnia. I hope you enjoy and have a wonderful day!
3 comments:
I love the Narnia books, too. . . in fact they are quite possibly my favourite books (other than the Bible!). They were some of the first chapter books I ever read, so I have very fond memories of reading them 10+ years ago. :-)
I'd never thought about interpreting The Horse and His Boy in that way (God pursuing and wooing us). But then, it's been a couple of years or so since I last read the Narnia Chronicles. . . might be time for me to revisit Narnia once again! ;-)
And it's great to meet someone else who loves The Silver Chair! It's one of my favourites in the series.
~Elise
The folk's son here, leaves in a few weeks for Camp Brookwoods in New Hampshire. He spends to months their reading the Chronicles of Narnia to the kids. He has been reading Narnia to them for more than 40 years. He would have enjoyed this post.
I do so love Narnia :)
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