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jazzfishBecause "Everything" is too glib an answer.
The trailer is up on Apple's site if you want to go find it for yourself. I believe the movie is now being called "The Seeker: The Dark is Rising." That's an understandable change, more or less. Makes it look less like the other movies are sequels and more like it's something that they had planned from the start.
Briefly put: 1) they have replaced Will Stanton with a completely different character of the same name; 2) they have replaced the mythical background with everyday life; 3) it looks just plain bad. 1 and 2 are primarily complaints about the adaptation, 3 is about the aesthetics.
1) The Will Stanton of the books barely resembles an eleven-year-old at all. (There's a good reason for this, him being one of the immortal guardians of the human race and all that.) He's constantly being described by other people as a strange boy, very solemn, etc. He occasionally panics; he sometimes jokes around with his brothers. In general he acts a lot like a small adult with a great deal of responsibility. The Will Stanton in the trailer is Just [Hollywood's idea of] An Average Kid, indistinguishable from any other Average Kid except for his ability to throw people across the room. (See point 3.)
2) Christmas Day aside, there's a strong pagan theme running through the book. Old magics and the Gift of Gramarye and the mandalas, and don't get me started on the Wild Hunt or John Wayland Smith. This is even more pronounced in Greenwitch, and ties inextricably to the Arthur myth in the last two books. The whole atmosphere suggests something with an ancient history just outside the edge of vision, even in the "everyday" scenes. That air of mystery and magic made me fall in love with the books in the first place. There are a handful of scenes (the road in the fog, the cathedral) that briefly manage to capture this. Then Will opens his mouth.
3) From the trailer, the plot appears to be "ordinary boy discovers magic powers, saves world, and perhaps gets girl." Nothing distinguishing the boy (Average Kid), the powers ("Can I fly?"), or the world-saving from any other fantasy movie. Nothing to make me think this will be anything other than standard sub-standard fare. Bleh.
The trailer is up on Apple's site if you want to go find it for yourself. I believe the movie is now being called "The Seeker: The Dark is Rising." That's an understandable change, more or less. Makes it look less like the other movies are sequels and more like it's something that they had planned from the start.
Briefly put: 1) they have replaced Will Stanton with a completely different character of the same name; 2) they have replaced the mythical background with everyday life; 3) it looks just plain bad. 1 and 2 are primarily complaints about the adaptation, 3 is about the aesthetics.
1) The Will Stanton of the books barely resembles an eleven-year-old at all. (There's a good reason for this, him being one of the immortal guardians of the human race and all that.) He's constantly being described by other people as a strange boy, very solemn, etc. He occasionally panics; he sometimes jokes around with his brothers. In general he acts a lot like a small adult with a great deal of responsibility. The Will Stanton in the trailer is Just [Hollywood's idea of] An Average Kid, indistinguishable from any other Average Kid except for his ability to throw people across the room. (See point 3.)
2) Christmas Day aside, there's a strong pagan theme running through the book. Old magics and the Gift of Gramarye and the mandalas, and don't get me started on the Wild Hunt or John Wayland Smith. This is even more pronounced in Greenwitch, and ties inextricably to the Arthur myth in the last two books. The whole atmosphere suggests something with an ancient history just outside the edge of vision, even in the "everyday" scenes. That air of mystery and magic made me fall in love with the books in the first place. There are a handful of scenes (the road in the fog, the cathedral) that briefly manage to capture this. Then Will opens his mouth.
3) From the trailer, the plot appears to be "ordinary boy discovers magic powers, saves world, and perhaps gets girl." Nothing distinguishing the boy (Average Kid), the powers ("Can I fly?"), or the world-saving from any other fantasy movie. Nothing to make me think this will be anything other than standard sub-standard fare. Bleh.
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Date: 2007-08-13 04:42 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-08-13 06:30 pm (UTC)(Stardust, on the other hand, rocked.)
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Date: 2007-08-13 04:59 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-08-13 06:38 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-08-13 09:50 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-08-13 10:25 pm (UTC)The badness of this particular adaptation is pretty egregious even by Bedknobs and Broomsticks standards.
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Which makes de-functionalizing Will's family a particularly interesting choice...
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Date: 2007-08-14 01:57 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-08-14 07:58 pm (UTC)Well, at least this gives me an excuse to read them all again. Not that I needed one, but still.