From my last article, you might have figured out that I don't particularly like when Hollywood decides to remake a movie for many small reasons and many big reasons. However, there are some books-turned-movies that I quite enjoy despite not being completely true to their book counterpart. One of these is The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe. Four children, Lucy, Edmund, Susan, and Peter Pevensie, are moved to the countryside after the Blitz in London during World War II. While playing, Lucy finds a magical wardrobe that brings her to a land called Narnia. She meets a faun named Mr. Tumnus, who tries to turn her in to the evil White Witch, ruler of Narnia, but Tumnus changes his mind and leads her back to her home. When she returns, her siblings don't believe her about Narnia until Edmund, her older brother, enters the wardrobe after Lucy and meets the White Witch, not knowing how evil she is. Edmund denies going to Narnia when they return. The four siblings enter Narnia trying to hide from the housekeeper and meet two talking beavers after finding out that Mr. Tumnus was taken by the White Witch. Edmund sneaks away to find the White Witch and tell her that he brought his siblings, not knowing that she intended to kill them. All at once, the siblings are thrust into a centuries long war in order to get Edmund back. They rely on Aslan, a wise talking lion. To get Edmund back from the White Witch, the two leaders convene and negotiate a trade, Edmund for Aslan. Aslan sneaks off to the Stone Table, a place of great magic, with Lucy and Susan following him, and sacrifices himself to the White Witch in a scene I always tear up at. Luckily, Aslan comes back to life as the White Witch marches on the Narnian army. So, to gain an edge on the White Witch, Aslan, Lucy, and Susan revive all of the White Witch's victims and lead the army to the battle. Aslan kills the White Witch in battle and then the Pevensies are crowned kings and queens of Narnia, living there for fifteen years until they find the door and return to their world.

The movie

The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe stays amazingly true to the book. All of the key plot points are there and, while I am usually extremely nitpicky about books-turned-movies, I love this movie. The only thing I am slightly annoyed at is that they skipped the first book in favor of making the second book as the movie. Had they made the first book into a movie, we would have had more insight into the backstory of how the White Witch entered Narnia because she hasn't always lived there. Also, in the first book, we learn that the Pevensies’ guardian, Digory Kirke, is the one who first discovered Narnia, but in the movies we don't have that. I can understand why they didn't film the first book because they wanted the movies to focus on the Pevensie children, while the books tend to jump between the Pevensies and other Narnian stories. Hollywood turned one of my favorite books into an amazing movie and, while I usually angry at the end of one of these movies, I am so happy they made it and the subsequent movies.