The Golden Compass (2007) is being screened as part of a double family event on Sunday 10 May at Dulwich Picture Gallery
Director: Chris Weitz
Starring: Nicole Kidman, Daniel Craig, Ian McKellen, Dakota Blue Richards
Running time: 113 minutes
Trailer below
Synopsis: In a parallel universe, young Lyra Belacqua journeys to the far North to save her best friend and other kidnapped children from terrible experiments by a mysterious organization. Based on the the first novel in Philip Pullman’s trilogy His Dark Materials.
Roger Ebert – Chicago Sun Times – “”The Golden Compass” is a darker, deeper fantasy epic than the “Rings” trilogy, “The Chronicles of Narnia” or the “Potter” films. It springs from the same British world of quasi-philosophical magic, but creates more complex villains and poses more intriguing questions. As a visual experience, it is superb. As an escapist fantasy, it is challenging. Teenagers may be absorbed and younger children may be captivated; some kids in between may be a little conflicted, because its implications are murky”.
“As Lyra, Dakota Blue Richards is a delightful find, a British-American schoolgirl who was 12 when she was discovered in an audition involving 10,000 girls. She is pretty, plucky, forceful, self-possessed, charismatic, and just about plausible as the mistress of an armored bear and the protector of Dust. Nicole Kidman projects a severe beauty in keeping with the sinister Mrs. Coulter, and Daniel Craig and Sam Elliott (with his famous moustache never more formidable) give her refined and rough surfaces to play against”.
“The Golden Compass” is a wonderfully good-looking movie, with exciting passages and a captivating heroine in Lyra.”
James Christopher – The Times Online – “…….Dakota Blue Richards is terrific casting as Lyra, the 12-year-old star of The Golden Compass. A waif who has gifts beyond her ken, she was brought up, half-wild, by stuffy academics in a stodgy Oxford college. Her dashing and dangerous uncle, Lord Asriel (played by Daniel Craig), is too busy tramping around the Arctic to give her the time of day. But their lives are forever in danger. Both heroes are stalked by sinister members of the Magisterium – an outfit that wants to rule the world. Derek Jacobi calls the creepy shots while Nicole Kidman is his fabulously glamorous sidekick, a Cruella de Vil role that Kidman plays to icy perfection”.
Academy Award winner for Best Achievement in Visual Effects! BAFTA winner for Best Special Visual Effects!! Art Director’s Guild winner for Excellence in Production Design!!!
A Magisterium building damaged by Iorek Byrnison features religious imagery.
Controversies: Several key themes of the novels, such as the rejection of religion and the abuse of power in a fictionalised version of the Catholic Church, were diluted in the adaptation. Director Weitz said “in the books the Magisterium is a version of the Catholic Church gone wildly astray from its roots,” but that the organization portrayed in his film would not directly match that of Pullman’s books. Instead, the Magisterium represents all dogmatic organizations. Weitz said that New Line Cinema had feared the story’s anti-religious themes would make the film financially unviable in the U.S., and so religion and God (“the Authority” in the books) would not be referenced directly.
Attempting to reassure fans of the novels, Weitz said that religion would instead appear in euphemistic terms, yet the decision was criticised by some fans, anti-censorship groups, and the National Secular Society (of which Pullman is an honorary associate), which said “they are taking the heart out of it, losing the point of it, castrating it…” and “this is part of a long-term problem over freedom of speech.”
The first part of this Dulwich Festival event is a talk by Visual Effects Supervisor Sue Rowe who created the visual effects for The Golden Compass and many other high profile films. She talks about her work on DOV.
Visual Effects talk 2pm
Refreshments 3-3.15pm
The Golden Compass 3.15-5pm
Tickets £6 from the Dulwich Festival online or Dulwich Picture Gallery
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