[NYer]

The tv ads for this film are quite glitzy and appealing.

[Mrs. Don-o]

I just re-read the Golden Compass, and it's just as I remembered it: HIGHLY appealing main character (Lyra), so sympathetically and attractively sketched that she quickly gets the reader's full allegiance, even as her allies shift (Lord Azriel, bad, good, bad again? so bad he's good?)) and her choices become more and more murky.

The stark fact is that Pullman is a far better writer than Joanne Rowling, and the movie, with all it panoramic scale, heart-thumping action and impressive CGI's will undoubtedly be far more enticing than the film version of Narnia.

How are kids going to resist this emotional and visual magic in movies 2 & 3 when Lyra and Will become lovers and save all the worlds by overthrowing the Kingdom of Heaven?

It's a cinematic date rape drug.