The Last Battle in film

[Esprit]

Ugh, ugh, ugh. I wrote a pretty long reply to your question, Ariel, and then I lost the whole thing. Botheration. I'll see what I can remember.

I was sort of excited by the proposed difficulty of showing a transition into Narnia without showing the train wreck (BRAINSTORM TIME!). I was also struck by the difficulty of letting the viewers appreciate that what was a few minutes for Tirian (between his dream and Jill and Eustace popping up) was a few weeks for the Friends of Narnia-- without cutting away from Tirian and his plight for so long that you forget that was even going on.

Here is the (very unpolished) idea I came up with:

The movie starts with the Friends of Narnia gathering for a dinner together and then the apparition of Tirian appears. They ascertain that something is wrong in Narnia, and a frantic montage ensues of them putting together plans, Peter and Edmund breaking into the back of the Ketterleys' old house and finding the rings, and the others boarding the train to meet them. And... then we cut to the beginning of the story from the Narnians' point of view. I don't really have any ideas for an artful scene transition there; I'm sure you guys can think of some.

Later, when the Narnian story reaches the point of Tirian having his dream, we see the Dinner Visitation scene again, only this time from Tirian's point of view. Somehow this has to be radically different so that you don't feel that you're watching the same scene for a second time. Maybe, for Tirian, the dream is shorter and much more confused, with some blurred colors and garbled, indistinct voices. Some very different music and perhaps Tirian's loud, confused breathing will also help differentiate this scene from the one you saw at the beginning of the movie.

Tirian is thrown back, waking up once more tied to a tree and surrounded by the silent Narnian night. A long moment, in which he and the viewers have a chance to think, "What in the world was THAT?" before, suddenly, there are Jill and Eustace tripping over each other out of thin air and landing with cries of surprise.

So... that's my idea. This setup would allow you to see Eustace and Jill's entrance from Tirian's point of view, which I think would be the more fun and which doesn't reveal the train wreck. I think it semi-decently portrays the strange discontinuity of time between Narnia and England. It also allows the viewer to understand the English side of the story without it being told verbally, as it is in the book (but which is rather boring in film). And, I think the gathering of the Friends of Narnia would be a better opening scene than something in Narnia. I think I would pulled into the story more by characters I'm familiar with and a mysterious apparition than by characters I'm unfamiliar with. Plus, it sets the mood nicely: There's something wrong in Narnia and we have to get there.

Of course, you would still want to show the train wreck somehow... I suppose Jill or Eustace could make a small comment to Tirian about how their transition was very jolting, "I almost thought it was a train wreck," and then actually show snatches of the train wreck much later, nearer the end of the movie. I actually wrote a short fanfiction years ago that showed Jill having a vision of the train crash and her death in England as she was being thrown into the stable. I never posted it on here because, 1) it had some war violence and, of course, some not very nice pictures of death, and 2) it wasn't as well-written as my fourteen year-old self thought it was. I still think it is an interesting idea, though.

Goodness, that was long. I think it's pretty close to my original reply. *sigh of relief*

[marlon]

Ah, but the books themselves are still under copyright, in the United States anyway. Not everywhere. This project could be done in Canada or South Africa where the copyrights have expired.

So it's only a matter of time.

[HermitoftheNorthernMarch]

In a very late reply to Esprit.
I would like to see the English side of the story too - especially a scene where Peter and Edmund sneak into the backyard of the house where Digory grew up and dig up the rings.
I am not sure that they actually have to show the train wreck. I mean, from Jill and Eustace's perspective, they didn't know exactly what had happened until they spoke with Aslan. I think Peter and the others suspected more, but even then, I'm not sure it is necessarily best to cut into the movie at the end with the actual train wreck scene. Not everything in movies has to be seen for viewers to understand, in fact, this is really the trick Doctor Who uses to make the show scary without a lot of special effects since our brains will fill in gaps. The point of the story in that part is for us to realize that the friends of Narnia are going to be okay. Maybe this is just my opinion and showing the train wreck would fill in gaps for other moviegoers, though.

One thing about The Last Battle is that they could make a very effective teaser trailer with the first chapter when Shift convinces Puzzle to pretend to be Aslan. Or maybe, we could have it from Tirian's perspective and be just as worried as he is that Aslan has changed!

Kristi, I didn't know the books were in public domain in some countries. That's surprising! I thought all the copyrights were renewed in the 90's.

[jasmine_tarkheena]

I think The Last Battle would be a really difficult book to adapt to screen, and I think it will take the most risk for Netflix. It deals with a lot of heavy themes on life and death, manipulation, last days, lust (meaning lust for power).

While there is a lot of action scenes, there is opportunity to add tension without just being physical. For instance, there's a scene where Shift tells the Narnians, "Oh, anyone can see Tashlan, but he's not coming out. You have to go in and see him. Oh, you have to go in one at a time." We actually learn later in the book that Rishda placed a Calormene soldier in there to kill any Narnian who went in there.

I'm not saying Netflix should keep it mysterious like in the book, where our heroes are asking, "What's inside the stable?" But if they were to show Rishda placing the Calormene soldier in the stable and giving him orders to kill any Narnian who went in there, that can create a lot of tension. It's like the ticking time bomb. Now you may have seen in movies where people are walking to a restaurant where there's a bomb under the table. Then the bomb goes off. You're only shock for a second. Now imagine different version of that where they actually shows someone putting a bomb under the table. When you see the bomb under the table, you get really tense. It makes you want to go like, "Stop! Don't go in there! There's a bomb under the table!" So showing Rishda placing a Calormene soldier in the stable is the same idea there. If they were to do that, when Shift says, "Oh, anyone can see Tashlan, but he's not coming out! You have to go in and see him!", and when the Narnians rush to the stable door, you will want to go like, "Stop! Stop! Don't go in there! You're dead!"

I'm sure there will be plenty of materials for trailers without giving too much away.

[Ariel.of.Narnia]

Deep and heavy themes can be pulled off with good writing, though a metric of kid-friendly might be the actual difficulty, particularly because film is a visual medium. (Though, at this point, my confidence in actually getting good writing these days is low. Not fair, I know, as I’m sure there are very good writers out there and it’s very possible for Netflix to actually pick one (or multiple), but… eh, “expect the worst and put a bold face on it” is my current attitude, heh-heh.)

I hadn’t thought of playing the tension in the stable differently. It could work, but I think we’d have to have enough of the characters we care about have to face it (and given that Emeth kills the soldier before any of our heroes go in…). I think? Then again, maybe not. My experience writing that sort of thing is nil, so I can only guess!

[jasmine_tarkheena]

I think Tash should also be kind of kept mysterious. It could be a slow set up as well. We hear about him, but we don't know if he's actually real. Then there's a moment where he's slowly coming into Narnia. What is it? Then he'd be fully revealed in the stable. It could all be worth the wait.

How often is there a slow set-up for a character in movies? Some examples I could think of is the way Disney did for Shere Khan in The Jungle Book. They've mentioned his name, but actually don't show him until midway through. There's also Smaug in The Hobbit. We hear about him terrorizing the Lonely Mountains, but we actually don't see him until later. When you hear about Smaug, you have no idea what he's capable of. Even Jurassic Park had a set for the raptors. You hear about the raptors. It makes you go like, "Should I be scared?" Then there's the moment where a raptor makes a sudden appearance.

So Tash having a slow set-up in The Last Battle could be the same idea there. It's like what is he capable of. Oh, is he actually real?

[jasmine_tarkheena]

Wouldn't it be a great reveal in a LB movie that Aravis and Emeth are not the only Calormenes in Aslan's Country?

Caspian X is not the only Telmarine listed; Lord Drinian and Lord Bern are also listed. So I wouldn't see why Aravis and Emeth would be the only Calormenes there.

It could also show that not all Calormenes liked living under Calormene society or under the Tisroc's rule in HHB or even under Rishda's rule in LB (I know he's not the Tisroc, but I think he was in the process of making himself ruler of Narnia).

It would certainly be a big surprise for the audiences that there are some other Calormenes in Aslan Country.

[Ariel.of.Narnia]

*shrugs* I don’t see why there can’t be more, but it’s not a groundbreaking notion (Aravis and Emeth already took care of that). But there’s more to entering Aslan’s country than “not liking the society you live in or under somebody’s rule”: it’s whether one loves Aslan. (Emeth is something of a monkey wrench in that condition, but there’s a whole different thread for that for that discussion.)

[jasmine_tarkheena]

I know there are Narnian fans out there that like to ship Tirian and Jill, but I actually don't ship them. That's actually what I'm kind of worried about in an LB movie.

In the book, there's a moment where Tirian calls Jill "sweetheart", but I think he was doing it in a friendly and protective manner. I don't think it should be misinterpret as a romantic subplot.

I don't want any shipping in Narnia movies, of course. But I am kind of worried about that a movie might end up shipping Tirian and Jill. If they did that, it would be the Caspian and Susan from Walden's PC all over again.

Honestly, I don't know which I'm more worried about: a Tirian and Jill romance or a love triangle with Tirian, Eustace, and Jill.

[Ariel.of.Narnia]

Until such time as there’s a cast, I wouldn’t worry about it. Much of whether that’ll be anything like a remote possibility depends on the portrayed ages of the characters. And until we know what kind of people are developing the stories and whether major studio interference is going to be a thing, there’s also the chance that someone actually sticks to the story.