Soon after the smashing opening weekend of \u201cThe Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe,\u201d the Rev. Bob Beltz had a vision of what his Hollywood colleagues might be doing someday just before his funeral.<\/p>\n\n
\u201cThey could end up holding the first screening of \u2018The Last Battle\u2019 just before my funeral service. That\u2019s about how long it may take us to do the whole series,\u201d quipped the 55-year-old Presbyterian pastor, referring to the seventh and final Narnia novel by the Christian apologist C.S. Lewis.<\/p>\n\n
Pre-production work has begun on \u201cThe Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian\u201d and its creators are shooting for a pre-Christmas 2007 release.<\/p>\n\n
Using a best-case scenario, it would take two years to make each movie, said Beltz, director of special media projects for the billionaire media entrepreneur Philip Anschutz. That would mean 12 more years and the last film would appear in 2017. But what if there are snags?<\/p>\n\n
\u201cSeriously, when we started seeing those first really big numbers roll in at the box office, that\u2019s when it hit me,\u201d said Beltz. \u201cSome of us worked on this first movie for a very long time and now it seems like we may literally get to work on the Chronicles for the rest of our lives.\u201d<\/p>\n\n
Of course, Anschutz and his Walden Media associates were convinced that the Narnia novels \u2014 with 100 million copies sold over the past 55 years \u2014 could turn into the kind of family-friendly franchise that makes Hollywood insiders see visions of \u201cStar Wars,\u201d \u201cLord of the Rings\u201d and \u201cHarry Potter.\u201d That\u2019s why Walt Disney Studios helped pour $180 million into creating \u201cThe Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe.\u201d<\/p>\n\n
Within days of the movie\u2019s release, Beltz and other members of Narnia team knew that they had a green light. At the beginning of this week (Feb.28), the global box office for first Narnia movie was nearing $664 million. And for fantasy fans that are keeping score, \u201cThe Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe\u201d has rung up $288,193,914 at the U.S. box office since its Dec. 9 release, while \u201cHarry Potter and the Goblet of Fire,\u201d which came out three weeks earlier, is a nose ahead at $288,733,970.<\/p>\n\n
Director Adam Adamson of New Zealand will return for the next film, along with the young quartet of British actors at the heart of the first film \u2014 Georgie Henley, 10, Skandar Keynes, 14, Anna Popplewell, 17, and William Moseley, 18. In \u201cPrince Caspian,\u201d the four heroes return to the land of Narnia soon after their first adventure, only to discover that centuries have passed in Narnian time. With the help of the great lion Aslan, the Christ figure in the series, the children fight to bring the young Prince Caspian, the rightful heir, to the throne of Narnia.<\/p>\n\n
The clock is already ticking. With the interconnecting plots, the actors playing the Pevensie siblings cannot look radically different even though they will be two to three years older than they were while filming \u201cThe Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe.\u201d To further complicate matters, the two youngest children \u2014 the characters Lucy and Edmund \u2014 are featured in the next novel, \u201cThe Voyage of the Dawn Treader.\u201d<\/p>\n\n
The key to the whole project is the response of the millions of readers who have shared the novels with their children for decades, said Douglas Gresham, the 61-year-old stepson of Lewis and co-producer of the first film. He stressed that he will work on the Narnia movies as long as he is able to do so.<\/p>\n\n
As important as the movies are, he said, the ultimate goal is to faithfully deliver the author\u2019s stories, symbols and themes. The books must have the last word.<\/p>\n\n
\u201cThe challenge for us as filmmakers, and I have had to become one, is that everyone who has ever read the Chronicles of Narnia \u2026 has a firmly cast picture, a precise visualization, in their mind of what Narnia looks like, what the creatures look like, how they should behave and how they should seem,\u201d said Gresham.<\/p>\n\n
\u201cWe must produce films in which we equal or exceed every single one of those visual imageries. If we do that, then I believe that readers who love the books will keep going to theaters and we\u2019ll be able to complete the series.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Soon after the smashing opening weekend of \u201cThe Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe,\u201d the Rev. Bob Beltz had a vision of what his Hollywood colleagues might be doing someday just before his funeral. \u201cThey could end up holding the first screening of \u2018The Last Battle\u2019 just before my funeral service. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":610,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[149,185,431,1542,583],"class_list":["post-1375","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-cs-lewis","tag-christian-art","tag-hollywood","tag-movies","tag-narnia"],"yoast_head":"\n