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Chronicles of Narnia, The: Prince Caspian (2008)

Release Date:
Friday, May 16, 2008

MPAA Rating:
PG

Rating Reason:
For epic battle action and violence

Genre:
Adventure, Family, Fantasy

Starring:
Georgie Henley, Skandar Keynes, Anna Popplewell, William Moseley

Written By:
Andrew Adamson, Christopher Markus, Steve McFeeley

Director:
Andrew Adamson

Official Site:

Synopsis:
"Prince Caspian" finds the Pevensie siblings pulled back into the land of Narnia, where a thousand years have passed since they left. The children are once again enlisted to join the colorful creatures of Narnia in combating an evil villain who prevents the rightful Prince from ruling the land. "Prince Caspian" was first published in 1951, and is the fourth book in the seven-book series written by Lewis. It was intended as a continuation of "The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe."

Chronicles of Narnia, The: Prince Caspian (2008) | Review

The Caspian DVD Experience
J. Alan Sharrer

Content Image

I asked him what the most challenging part of the whole film was, and his answer was surprising. It wasn't the battle scenes, but the smaller scenes—specifically those calling for him to say lines such as "We're going that way" in a normal manner. He said that you'd be amazed how difficult that can be!

Ben Barnes walked into our second discussion and immediately exhibited the "cool" factor—similar to Edward Cullen's persona in the movie Twilight. He told the group that shooting for his next film, Dorian Gray, is finished (release in late 2009). When asked about if there's such a thing as a big break, he admitted he wasn't sure, but added that actors need to "invest in the stories that [they] think are worth telling." The publicity and fame from his role as Caspian have been "overwhelming and surreal." The evidence of this came when a reporter asked him what advice he would give to aspiring actors, to which he immediately responded, "Who am I to handle that?"

Barnes did say, however, that actors need to read, since that's what a character is based upon. An example is how he developed his unique voice for Caspian. Barnes was reading the script the evening before his audition when he noticed in small type at the bottom of the script, "Please prepare in a Spanish accent." The first character that came to mind was Inigo Montoya from The Princess Bride, so he went that route, adding that the intonation was his choosing. A week into shooting, director Adam Adamson had him sound more Italian. He felt the most challenging part of his role in the film was remaining faithful to the character in CS Lewis' book.

After the two roundtable discussions, Kenneth Chen from The Christian Post and I were able to interview the two directly. I found both to be extremely intelligent and quite humorous (their decidedly English accents helped). I asked what each enjoyed most about the story of Prince Caspian, whereupon Moseley said the white witch scene; Barnes thought the night raid sequence had lots of emotional high points, similar to Caspian's first encounter with King Miraz.

In the Narnia series by CS Lewis, Moseley's favorite book is The Silver Chair, while Barnes likes Voyage of the Dawn Treader due to its episodic nature and its fictionalized mythology. When asked if they preferred either the film or book version of Prince Caspian, both agreed that they liked the film better. Moseley noted that in film, a person sees one person's mind (he would love to be a director in the future), while in a book, everyone has their own interpretation. Barnes thought the book was more about tension and conflicts and thus played out better on the big screen.

I asked Barnes if he was relieved that nobody had stereotyped him into a specific type of role. He gave an emphatic "Yes!" followed by the revelation that he was offered the role to be princes in two other films before Prince Caspian. To this end, he hopes offers continue for varying roles in the future—he feels "very blessed" with what has happened so far.

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