The Golden Compass

Year: 2007
Director: Chris Weitz
Cast: Dakota Blue Richards, Nicole Kidman, Daniel Craig, Sam Elliott, Eva Green

Within the first half hour of watching this flick, I found myself quite confused, for I didn't know what the essence of the story was. I knew that it is yet another story of good and evil, and it's very similar to The Chronicles Of Narnia, and it is based on a literary fantasy. Thankfully the story gets better as it moves along.

The Golden Compass is set in a world of parallel universes, and there is one universe where people have an animal close to them at all times, for it manifests their soul within them. This animal is called a daemon. In this world, the people are governed by an all controlling type body known as The Magisterium.

The main character here is a young and spunky girl named Lyra Belacqua, who stays at the Jordan College. Her daemon is a shape changing animal named Pan, who shifts from cat to bird to squirrel as he requires. She is watched over by the college lords, as well as her uncle, Lord Asriel. Asriel has recently returned from a journey with a discovery of the mysterious Dust, an element that The Magisterium seeks so hard to deny of its existence.

Sensing that The Magisterium will take action concerning Asriel's find, action that may affect all life, one of the college lords hands Lyra an alethiometer, a truth telling device also known as The Golden Compass. The device is vital if free thinkers are to survive the machinations of The Magisterium, and Lyra is the key to it all. The Magisterium sends Mrs Coulter, an influential member of their ranks, to take Lyra under her wing. Lyra finds Mrs Coulter quite charming, but soon discovers her dark and dangerous side, and runs off, with the compass and Pan in tow.

Lyra is on a mission of her own: to save her best friend, who has been kidnapped by mysterious people known as Gobblers. She finds out that they are connected to The Magisterium, and that many children have been taken by them to be experimented on. Along the way, Lyra finds some very useful allies, among them the Gyptians, a race of people who travel on water; Lee Scoresby, an aeronaut; Serafina Pekkala, queen of the witches; and a talking ice bear named Iorek Byrnison.

Lyra brings all of her friends to the place where the kidnapped children are, but can they save them?

The Golden Compass is based on Philip Pullman's novel, which isn't too far removed from stories like Narnia, Eragon and Harry Potter. In fact, you can say that it also shares similarities with Star Wars, since The Magisterium is so much like the Empire. But anyway, director Chris Weitz manages to weave a great film out of the novel, though I heard it differs significantly from each other. Nevertheless, Weitz successfully keeps the audience's interest intact throughout the movie by balancing the pace well and not overdoing the visual effects. The action scenes are also well executed, even a fight scene between two talking bears which is of course completely CGI, is breathtaking.

The star of the film is definitely Dakota Blue Richards, who has us all rooting for Lyra throughout. She has just the right amount of charm, wits and spunk to play a brave and strong young girl. Nicole Kidman is fittingly icy as Mrs Coulter, but personally I'm not impressed too much. This role looks too easy for her. I do like Sam Elliott, playing Lee Scoresby, the only character without a British accent in the film. Daniel Craig and Eva Green get too little screen time as Asriel and Serafina respectively. Oh, do listen out for some well known voices for the animals: Ian McKellen as the bear Iorek Byrnison, Freddie Highmore as Pan and Deadwood's Ian McShane as Iorek's rival Ragnar.

At a little less than two hours, it's a good film that won't bore you with unnecessary details and draggy scenes like Narnia, and it's fun for the whole family. It ends with a cliffhanger of sorts, since the story is a planned trilogy. Let's hope the next one is just as good, if not better. (4/5)