Culture

Douglas Gresham: On his stepfather CS Lewis and the new film Prince Caspian

Posted:
Monday, 7 July 2008, 0:10 (MYT)
Font Scale:A A A
DG: I think and I hope he would be thrilled - otherwise I have just wasted the last 20 years of my life! But Jack (as CS Lewis was nicknamed) had a problem with cinema in his day, and I can completely understand that. He saw this wonderful visual technology emerging but was horrified by the uses to which it was being put. I think he would be quite ready to have said that the devil has taken over the cinema. Well I think it is high time that we took it back, and we are.

CT: Not long after The Chronicles of Narnia proved itself at the box office, a cinematic version of Philip Pullman’s “The Golden Compass” was released, an apparent reaction to the Chronicles, a Christian allegory.

DG: Yes and the movie flopped horrendously so I am not the least bit worried about it. But I think the worst thing that Christians can do when something like that, or “The Da Vinci Code” and all that nonsense comes out, is make a huge fuss about it because you’re only publicising it. Look at it, with disgust if you like, but then ignore it. I have not read anything of those books because nothing enticed me to do so, but the movie was greeted by the public with as much aplomb as it probably deserved.

CT: Did CS Lewis ever talk to you about why he had written the books?

DG: Yes, we talked about it a lot. I knew that he wrote these books because he felt he had something valuable to say, and I believe he was right. All the Narnia Chronicles deal with something that is a great tragedy in our times.

Jack was brought up by people who really believed in the great 19th century social mores and qualities that have got lost. Things like social responsibility, personal responsibility, personal commitment, honesty, truth, courage, courtesy, chivalry, all of those great concepts that we tossed out in the 20th century, saying they’re out of date, just last century stuff, without realising that they are the essential lubricant to the societies of man.

The results of us tossing them out are what we see in our newspapers today, young boys stomping young girls to death in the streets and that kind of nonsense. Well, we desperately need to get these things back. And Jack’s books teach us not only that we do need to get them back but how to get them back.

CT: Do you think the audience will grasp that?

DG: With Prince Caspian the message is so clear. It pertains absolutely to today’s world because of what happens in Narnia at the time. The children come back to Narnia at a time when there has been a millennium of corruption and a millennium of veering away from truth, hope, justice, faith and all of the things that we so desperately need to get back in our lives today and into our societies today.

They have veered away from them in Narnia and it is the job of the four children to find a way of bringing them back, but in the children’s own personalities they too have veered away. In the film you see each child, one by one, slowly coming back to faith, truth, justice and all of these great qualities and you see it happening not only in the children but also in the nation itself, very powerfully.

continue to read > 1 | 2 | 3
Copyright © 2006 Christian Today. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.