The Golden Compass vs The Golden Compass

The Golden Compass by Phillip Pullman

This, the first of the His Dark Materials trilogy, tells the adventurous story of Lyra, a young girl who has grown up an orphan being raised at Oxford College in a previous era. Only, it’s not – it’s a different world, a world with polar bears who wear armour and fight, with witches and where every human has a daemon – an animal representation of their soul that is spiritually joined to them and has various roles in their lives. Until one hits puberty, their daemon changes depending on the situation, but after puberty it is fixed. In Lyra’s world, children are disappearing and there are all kind of rumours. When Lyra starts investigating, she finds out more about her world and the outside world than she could imagine – including about her uncle Lord Asriel and the mysterious Mrs Coulter.

I quite liked Lyra and the depictions of the characters, but I found that as soon as problems were raised, they seemed to be solved; things just seemed to be quite convenient. I also struggled with the way he wrote the dialogue, representing Lyra’s accent – it really annoyed me. I think possibly because I didn’t feel this was how Lyra spoke, so it felt wrong. Still, despite the things I disliked about the book, I am keen on reading more, and I intend to read the next two books.

The Golden Compass (2007) Film Review

I’m glad I’d read the book before I saw the film, because I suspect that I would not have had such an easy time following it otherwise. There is just so any elements to the story, and the book gives it time to tell the story, but the film rushes through it all. Like the book, I found the dialogue for Lyra and some of the others quite jilting.

It was a beautiful film, although some of the effects already look quite dated. Nicole Kidman was perfect for Mrs Coulter – she conveys coldness very well. It seems at this stage that there is not going to be further film adaptations made.

The Golden Compass won an Oscar for Best Achievement in Visual Effects and was nominated for Best Achievement in Art Direction.

 

Hugo (2011) Film Review

Hugo (Asa Butterfield) is an orphan who lives about the Paris train station, hiding from the evil Station Inspector (Sacha Baron Cohen), watching and stealing small parts from toy booth owner Georges Melies (Ben Kingsley) and rebuilding the automaton his father (Jude Law) was fixing before he died. Before long, Hugo befriends the god-daughter of Georges Melies, Isabelle (Chloe Grace Moretz) and they embark on the adventure of finding what the world hold, and what place they have within it.

It’s a sweet little story, tying in with some of the real history of cinema, but it just didn’t win me over. Why, I wonder? The story and characters were strong, and it was certainly beautiful. Perhaps it was the acting.  I felt that the young lead was doing far too much eyebrow and mouth acting, like Daniel Radcliffe throughout the Harry Potter films. I think when you see films with amazing child actors, you know that there is better than this. I really had very little interest in what happened to Hugo, and I guess that is pretty important to the film. I think there was also the element of brushing over the ugly side of life; yes, the orphans were captured by the evil Station Inspector, but I didn’t feel the fear that they were trying to portray here.

Hugo won Oscars for Best Achievement in Cinematography, Best Achievement in Sound Mixing, Best Achievement in Sound Editing, Best Achievement in Visual Effects and Best Achievement in Art Direction. It was nominated for Oscars for Best Motion Picture of the Year, Best Achievement in Directing (Martin Scorsese) Best Writing, Adapted Screenplay (John Logan), Best Achievement in Film Editing, Best Achievement in Costume Design and Best Achievement in Music Written for Motion Pictures, Original Score.