Nowadays it’s so easy to get caught up in just looking for a movie to watch on any streaming service without actually watching a movie. Soon thirty minutes has gone by and you still haven’t found anything. If you need a movie recommendation for your next sit-down and want to get into that snuggly and magical winter feeling, check out The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe which is available on Disney+.
The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe is based on the book of the same name written by C.S. Lewis in 1949. The movie follows four siblings – Peter (William Moseley), Susan (Anna Popplewell), Edmund (Skandar Keynes), and Lucy (Georgie Henley) – after a game of hide-in-seek sends them on a journey in Narnia, a magical place where animals talk and the trees dance. There, they team up with Aslan the lion (voiced by Liam Neeson) to defeat The White Witch (Tilda Swinton) who has raged an eternal winter and time of darkness on the once joyful land.
I love this movie for everything that it is, and I revisit it when I get the chance. Narnia never grows stale. The story is powerful, memorable, and inspiring. The music is incredible. Given the fact that The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe came out in 2005, the CGI effects are amazing. It’s also the care and love that was put into the world of Narnia that makes it so special.
For example, with the exception of one or two wolves in the movie, all of them were real. However, their tails always wagged, and they had to be digitally removed and readded in order for them to seem more aggressive and play the role of some of the main antagonists. While real live wolves were allowed on set to play The White Witch’s secret police, Aslan the lion was entirely CGI. According to the IMDb trivia page for The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe, it took approximately ten hours to create each frame of the CGI Aslan and his “5.2 million individual hairs.”
The IMDb page is a jackpot for interesting facts about the movie and every Narnia fan’s dream come true. There are many trivia facts listed on the IMDb page However, out of all the Narnia trivia I’ve read through the IMDb page or learned from Prop Culture’s Narnia episode (which is also available on Disney+), this one is probably my favorite:
Nine-year-old Georgie Henley didn’t see the wintery wonderland set of Narnia before filming. Her reaction to seeing the snowy world the first time Lucy goes to Narnia is genuine, and this is so clearly conveyed through the authentic surprise and wonder captured on her face.
Whether it’s your first time watching or your twentieth, the experience of watching Narnia is like being a kid again: when you held the world in your hands and your imagination could take you anywhere in your wildest dreams. And when the movie is over, it’ll leave you yearning for more. But hey, good thing all three Narnia movies are available to watch on Disney+, right? Narnia marathon anyone?
