The two youngest Pevensie children, Edmond and Lucy--who you may know from The Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe or Prince Caspian--find themselves stuck living with their insuffrable cousin, Eustace, during WWII. One afternoon they are magically thrown through a painting back into the world of Narnia, which they ruled as king and queen for a lifetime before being thrown back into wartime England. They are fished out of the sea into a boat to find that their friend and current king, Caspian, is leading a voyage to find his father's 7 friends who were sent to the East before... well, there's a lot of back-story. They are looking for 7 lords. They have a series of adventures in the uncharted lands they encounter, but they discover an evil green mist that they must stop. To do this they must, for some reason, track down the four missing swords sent with the 7 lords and lay them together on Aslan's table on a mysterious island marked by a blue star. They each have to face their deepest insecurities, andEustace has to learn not to be such a dreadful pest.
This film is an adaptation of C. S. Lewis's book from the popular Narnia series. Unfortunately, the films in this series--this is the third installment--seem to be getting worse as they go along. The Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe is the most popular of the books, but, in my opinion, it may be the most accessible, but it is far from being the best. If the films continue like this then I don't think they will do much to promote the discovery of the later-written Narnia books. Dawn Treader, perhaps more than the other books, has a very literary plot that plays out more like a collection of short stories with developing themes than a unified narrative. I think that this film goes wrong in trying to give the work this conventional plot, which not only cheapens the richness of the stories, but also discredits the intelligence of its audience. Lewis wrote the book for children, who can, apparently, accept and enjoy a winding story more than Hollywood gives them credit for. Originally Caspian is driven by a sense of adventure to discover what happens to his father's friends. Finding the 7 lords and racing toward the unknown Eastern edge of the world is enough momentum for the plot. The movie, however, shuffles the encounters, adds the mysterious green mist and the swords, and looses the sweet innocence of each island's lesson as a step along a larger journey.
I found the encounters and driving influences of this film to be flimsy and flat. The growth of the characters feels disingenuous with the exception of Lucy, who embodies all the grace and pluck one could ask of her.
