Upfront, I am an agnostic and haven't seen this movie.
This article is a gag, right? (Or is it just meant to gag?)
Tilda Swinton is the least likely person to be with the Bible bashers? You're kidding, right? After mentioning Derek Jarman, she's the MOST likely. For her to say Lewis' books are anti-religious shows she is either actively working a revisionism campaign, or she's a bloody idiot.
The whole tone of this article is veddy upper crust, oh-we-don't-DO-that-sort-of-thing snobbery.
The idea that a movie having a strong subtext is somehow distasteful is beyond belief. The writer is saying it would be better if this were just mindless entertainment--is this REALLY what he means?
Popular culture has always been best when it pushes a strong subtextual message. The most common of these messages are "Be true to yourself" or "Do the right thing and you'll win". These are not things that turn out to be true all the time in real life, but they are lessons we must learn and relearn as we move through life.
But this boob keeps pushing that tired idea that the absolute worst thing one can do is wear their religion on their sleeve. Would he say this if Narnia pushed a POLITICAL message? Hell no. If Arslan were meant to be Karl Marx, he and the scary looking Swinton (or however she spells it) would be praising Lewis as being an intellectual.
To deny the religious content of these books is simply idiotic.
"Tilda Swinton is the least likely person to be with the Bible bashers?"
I was thrown by that too, but I think you and I are being confused by the down-under slang. I could be wrong, but I think when the author says "bible bashers" she means what we would call "bible belters", folks who agressively advocate the bible, not bashers, as we'd say it, who deplore the bible.
I don't think Swinton was denying the truth in this movie, she was simply denying the religiosity of it. I saw the movie and the faun creature said "Aslan is not a tame Lion but He is Good."
Religions have a tendency over time to attempt to tame "The Lion of the Tribe of Judah" as the Bible calls Jesus. Lewis attempted to show Aslan as an untamed beast, wild and rough with the simple goodness of the Deep Magic! Picture it another way, as Jesus the furious son of God whipping the money changers for desecrating the temple. The truth of God in the end swirls around all man made religions and traditions, death itself could never swallow Him up!
Some would have thought this a bad sign of Character in Jesus, this temper he displayed at the polluting of his Father's house...but consider, with a word Christ could have struck them all dead!(so why didn't he...he certainly would have had the authority too?)
For her to say Lewis' books are anti-religious shows she is either actively working a revisionism campaign, or she's a bloody idiot. >>>
I'm voting for "bloody idiot," and am willing to give the same cheery title to the author of this nose-in-the-air piece of yes, snobbery.
I was looking at the "NArnia" table in the bookstore at Church yesterday, covered with C.s. Lewis' work, and realized it isn't so much the religious "message" in the film as it is that it may get people interested in Lewis' writing again. The secular humaniss should worry about that because he presents Christianity in a way that makes it very difficult to resist.