The world created by author Philip Pullman in His Dark Materials trilogy is, arguably, the thinking man's Narnia. An inversion of John Milton's Paradise Lost the books have come under much fire by Christian (and inparticularly Catholic) groups as being "written to promote atheism and denigrate Christianity, especially Roman Catholicism." In amongst his blatant criticism of organised religion, the zealots who run it and the lie that is the Chrisitan Heaven, Pullman's story centers on Lyra Belacqua (and later Will Parry) as they run amok cutting rifts between parallel worlds, flying with witches and befriending armoured bears, all so they can ultimately stop the flow of Dust.
The movie version of The Golden Compass, formerly known in the UK as Northern Lights (the title of the novel changed much like that of JK Rowling's first novel, Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone), debuted this past weekend to modest (if a tad disappointing) numbers. Minus the final three chapters of the novel (which having been already filmed will hopefully find light of day at the beginning of the proposed sequel), the film sadly limps to an unsatisfying conclusion. This is unfortunate since Nicole Kidman is delicious as Mrs. Coulter, Daniel Craig ever the stud as Lord Asriel, the polar bear fight is fantastic and little Dakota Blue isn't half as bad as I heard she was.
It's a great story with great effects so let's just hope there's some momentum of word of mouth (as we left the theater an inordinate number of people were of the "that didn't deserve the criticism it got" opinion), and better weather back east, that'll encourage New Line to at least give us part deux!
Now since I alread have my own daemon (my Bentley) the following was simply a fun little exercise to while away the minutes. Try it for yourself.
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