Remember how, at the beginning of The Lord of the Rings, there was this narrative voiceover, and then there were happy kids frolicking in absurdly well-lit green grassy fields and playing pranks and stuff? Well, the beginning of The Golden Compass is an exact copy of that, except with a much less compelling voiceover. It then continues to copy the worst parts of the Lord of the Rings movies - the cliched script and unrealistic dialog - and combines that with a sort of sparkly-magic-plus-talking-animals vibe. Well, it did for the first 15 minutes at least. I couldn't watch more than that. Actually, I only held out that long because I wanted to see if Nicole Kidman fit her part well. She was OK. Overall the movie was really, really bad - the worst movie I have intentionally started watching.
For context, I think The Lord of the Rings books were great, the Lord of the Rings movies were excellent, the Harry Potter books were excellent, the Harry Potter movies were mediocre to good, and the Golden Compass books were excellent.
You should avoid this movie. I'm worried that if you haven't read the book, which you should, it will ruin it for you; and if you have read the book, watching the movie will make you feel extremely depressed. Like I do now. Yeah, I realize my reaction may be a bit abnormal, but you're really not missing anything by skipping this one.
Cost: 3/5 (+1 if you've read the book. Another +1 if you're me.)
Payoff: 2/5 (-1 if you've read the book. Also, -2 to your future enjoyment of the book if you haven't read it.)
(Rating explanation.)
Die die die die die!
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