The Golden Compass

The Golden Compass is a fantasy movie about a young girl and her adventures in a strange world. The world is strange because even though it looks and sounds like early 20th century England, there is magic, fantastic steam-punk contraptions, talking polar bears, and people's souls are on the outside in the form of different animals, which they call daemons. It is that last bit that has created such controversy.

The source material for the movie was the first book in a trilogy referred to as His Dark Materials by Philip Pullman. The books apparently have a very anti-Christian lean to them which becomes more forceful (and less metaphorical) as the books progress. Fortunately, I have not read any of the books, so I was not predisposed in any direction toward the film.

The plot, as mentioned above, basically follows Lyra, the young heroine, as she learns about her world, flees the evil Miss Coulter, and attempts to rescue her friends. Along the way she has various encounters and meets a multitude of interesting characters. Lyra also possesses a precious device called an alethiometer, which allows her to see the truth of things. This is the golden compass of the title, and although it was important and much sought after in this film, I imagine its real significance will come later.

Overall, I found the movie to be surprisingly boring. The dialog was rather stiff, and there seemed to be a great deal of explaining, even though by the end there were still several things which I would have like to have explained. Visually, it was beautiful. The objects and machinery of their world was fascinating to look at. The talking CGI polar bears were interesting, but they never came close to looking like real polar bears. Perhaps that wasn't the intent.

As for the controversial bits, I suppose they were still there but certainly toned down to make them more palatable to a wider audience. The Magisterium, the bad guys in the film, want to suppress the truth and tell everyone what to do and think. Typical goals for evil. But no mention is made of the Magisterium being a religion in general, or Catholicism in particular.

My rating: 2 1/2 stars (out of 4)
Ebert's rating: 4 stars (out of 4)
Tomatometer: 44% - Rotten (as of 12/13/07)

This review needs a lot of work, but I'll post it now anyway just to get it done.