I was a fan of the book WAY before the movie was a twinkle in any director's eye.
The story was compelling, I couldn't put the book down. And it even had an introduction from Terry Brooks whom did the Shanara series.
Here's part of what he said about The Golden Compass in the Introduction:
"It is an epic fantasy story in the tradition of such great writers as Lloyd Alexander, Madeleine L'Engle, C.S. Lewis, James Barrie, L. Frank Baum, and, of course J.R.R Tolkien. It sweeps and resounds. It introduces terrific characters of complexity and passion, characters you will care about deeply. It takes you to wondrous new places that are somehow just as familiar enough that you think you might find your way there if you could just puzzle out the directions. It gives you a story line that keeps you turning the pages because you just can't put it down until you find out what happens."
Now, I have seen the trailers. It seems promising but then again a lot of movies have looked promising in the trailers but then they turned out to be a big pile of crap that they just wanna keep shoving into our faces with shameless plugs and trailers making it STILL look cool.
Tell me what you all might think about this new movie. Have you ever heard of it even? Read the book?
Gender: Male Location: Impacting nations and generations
QFT.
Plus, the athiest author has said: "My books are about killing God."
And in the final chapter the little boy and girl, representing Adam and Eve in a way, actually go up to the mountain top and KILL GOD, who is depicted as an old white haired fool, and when he's dead everything is better.
Gender: Male Location: Sailing the seas of cheese.
My friend Tyler Fuqua, The Fook, told me that it's a great book, so I plan on buying it and reading it before the movie comes out. Only problem is that I don't have much reading time anymore... but anyway, I saw a super long ass trailer for it when I rented Ocean's 13. It looks like it will be a really good movie.
In America, it seems, the "anti-religous" sentiment is too much. In the UK, the "anti-religous" sentiment is diluted, according to Daniel Craig. (I'm not gonna call him Bond, because he has done much finer work than that during his career and doesn't he know it)
I'm still not a fan of Phillip Pullman. He writes stories about goblins dragons (well, armoured bears) and doesn't care that his "anti-religious"* works are being read by children. How can you expect children to grow if you just feed them fantastical bollocks with no moral heart.
*Too much there to be discussed, but anti-religious is a blanket term.
And no, the books do not have a "moral heart." Pullman has already said he despises Inkling literature, so what use does he have for its values in his writing? He thinks he's a disciple of Blake or Milton, but yet again, he forgets the very message of those writers and decides to write fantastical fiction which creates "men without chests." He writes against organised religion, which is all well and good, but at the same time forgets to write why people have faith in the first place. Plus, the guy is just an arsehole in the first place.
The cute, cuddly Panda Bear of the World Wildlife Federation is on the web site of the movie, 'The Golden Compass'. That movie, as you may know, and the books it is extracted from is fervently anti-Catholic with select attacks on every Christian branch with the exception of the Church of England, whose Archbishop of Canterbury Dr. Rowan Williams, supports it.
The book the movie was made from was written by an Englishman, you see, and many of the arguments in it support that particular Christian branch. The production company hails from New Zealand, where again, hatred of the Catholic Church and love the Church of England is strong.
The Archbishop was also hotly against the invasion of Iraq and luridly opposes the continued occupation of that country by the United States.
Says the Archbishop of Canterbury, "We are doing all we can to support the Iraqi people."
Recently in a British Muslim magazine the Archbishop of Canterbury called the United States the ‘worst’ imperialist.
He further stated, “We have only one global hegemonic power. It is not accumulating territory: it is trying to accumulate influence and control. That’s not working.”
He then started talking in glowing tones about the British travesties in India, “It is one thing to take over a territory and then pour energy and resources into administering it and normalising it. Rightly or wrongly, that’s what the British Empire did — in India, for example.”
He skipped the part about mass killings, deforestation, the destruction of the countryside, disease and starvation caused by the ignorant and heavy-handed occupation of India which lasted over 200 years.
The movie ’The Golden Compass’ echoes and brings to the modern movie screen centuries of ignorance and hatred. Many of the misguided morals and themes of the movie are the same as those which have pushed many animals to the brink of extinction. Just which way is World Wildlife Federation headed? Towards the light of civilized society or into the darkness of fear and dread? The movie presents half-baked science and twists philosophical ideas until they make no sense - ideas like conservation, love, fidelity and honor. I have no intention of giving any more money to that fund nor even supporting it in public unless they distance from that flickering obscenity of hate that is being circulated in movie theatres as 'entertainment'.
Though I am no religious extremist I will not truck with people whose minds are filled with hate for humanity and the natural world in which we live. Your organization is being exploited by the marketers of the movie who now know beyond a shadow of a doubt that they have a major problem on their hands.
The movie is being advertised as being in line with stories like Narnia or Middle Earth. It is really only a collection of wicked ideas which have led to burning witches, war and the dark ages in centuries and eons past.
Here is what the WWF claims to be doing : “By 2015 WWF will conserve 19 of the world's most important natural places and significantly change global forces to protect the future of nature.”
…protect the future of nature. How? By destroying the United States and attacking the pope with armored polar bears?
Gender: Female Location: every which way but loose
Utterly obnoxious - and do you know him personally?
I enjoyed the books and the controversy is absolute bollocks. The film may turn out to be crap, as I find most adaptations do, but it won't be because of the 'anti-religious sentiment' or whatever obsessives are throwing up. To be quite honest, I relish the idea of religion getting an up middle finger all over again, being an atheist myself. Once again religious arrogance reigns supreme.