Review of The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian (2008) by A L — 06 Oct 2011

The second adventure of the Pevensie kids in the fantasy world of Narnia starts out rather slow. There is a lot of wandering through woods before things finally start moving. The plot is accordingly simple: arrive in Narnia, gather an army, help Caspian become king.

Of course that doesn't exactly create sweaty hands, especially with Barnes not really bringing the charisma to the table to be a convincing hero. Peter Dinklage makes up for that in his scenes as grumpy dwarf.

What safes the film from being a failure are the really cool and spectacular battle scenes in the second half of the film. They are not en par with the Lord of the Rings films of course, and try a little too hard to copy aspects of them, but they are still fun and huge.

The end is also rather sweet and well done, so you come out of the film with the impression it is better than it actually was. Older kids who can handle the violence should really get a kick out of the talking animals, though.