Into the Wardrobe

Guillermo wasn't actually offered the film. He may have been considered, but if a director wants to remove a major event from a story, he doesn't get offered the work.

Glumpuddle, do you plan on opening identical threads here for every one you start on Narniaweb?



The only thing that I found missing, apart from a word-for-word Lewisian dialogue, was the fact that the book required me to imagine all the pictures myself, and the film gave them to me as Andrew and team imagined them.

I had not heard of Mr Guillermo until a few months ago when a rumour reached my eyes that he had "turned down" directing the film.
By then, the film of LWW, its Extended Edition, and a huge amount of media and online journalism was a fait accompli... to box office success and popular acclaim if not literary/academic.
I am aware that some material in the final version was the result of discussions on aspects of its Deep Meaning, but again, I did not hear of this until after the film was released.

It is a difficult challenge to reply to, Stanley. Who knows "what would have happened"?
Perhaps, had Mr Guillermo been offered the work, undertaken it [creating something rather darker than what we have seen], and had issues regarding the return to life via Deeper Magic, the same discussions might have been held to encourage him to understand and include this scene? Could he have then upheld respect for others' beliefs, embraced the true meaning of Sacrifice by an innocent party, and presented the range of feeling in that whole sequence, when its underlying theme was something he had turned away from? Would he have felt too much of a hypocrite to do justice to it?
We are never told What Would Have Happened.

Which is better, an agnostic with respect for the story behind the story or someone who has rejected believing in such things? It would not have been fair to ask the latter person to create this scene, in spite of his having the ability and experience to do so.

All I can conclude is that if major details like that were not discussed in the earlier stages, I am glad that it was resolved well before filming it.

If another director had similar issues or problems with something comparable [not that there IS anything like the Resurrection, which mirrors the crucial event of history!], then I hope it would be addressed with similar urgency.