My Thoughts on The Golden Compass

Taken from my Rotten Tomatoes blog: A 20-Year Old Guy with the Movie Taste of a 14 Year Old Girl.

It finally arrived.

The Golden Compass (44%) hit theaters (or theatres) this weekend and I dragged myself out of my hermit-cave to see it today with next to no idea what the movie was about. I knew there were bears, a little girl, some snow, a Golden Compass, and Nicole Kidman with some very healthy blonde locks mixed together in what I'm sure New Line will hope to be a franchise to follow in the financially successful footsteps of a little series known as The Lord of the Rings.

So after a bevy of previews that all looked like they were for the same movie, which I will call "Harry Potter and the Lord of the Wrinkle in Time Chasing Stardust in Jumanjii Narnia....dot com," it was time for the epic to begin!

He roars to wake you up.

What I didn't know about the film was that I was going to be bored out of my mind for the first half of the movie with a very unclear story, annoyed at animals whose sole purpose was to repeat lines in the script while being not nearly as funny as the Dwarf or Samwise Gamgee from LOTR, and that I was going to be held hostage by the ridiculous repetition of characters' first and last names in hopes of the film making me want to care and remember these characters that I had no attachment to even by the end of the film.

Way better. Even if you can't understand any of it. More The Golden Compass? Nein danke.

Imagine Frodo saying "Oh Samwise Gamgee, isn't it wonderful that we have Gandolf the Grey and Legolas the brave elf here to protect us from the evil red eyeball?" You know why you can't imagine it? Because they didn't have to do it. Why? Because the story made sense!

Be more entertaining so the movie will make money, ok?

After discussing the film with my movie companion for the day, we still didn't really have any idea just what exactly was going on (why do I not care about "dust?"). However, I came to some conclusions and had some questions:

1) Lyra is an effing genius - For her being such a small girl with a little too much 'tude to not get slapped around a little by the baddies, she is quite the genius who comes up with escape plans that put Kevin from Home Alone to shame. Effing. Genius.

2) Daniel Craig doesn't really do a whole lot.

3) Nicole Kidman is a great actress.

4) The Bear sounds like Gandolf. The witches are all Legolases. The hot air balloon guy is the Dwarf from LOTR (but he's not funny). Daniel Craig has a beard like another human hero from LOTR. The little bugger who Lyra wants to rescue is her not cool Samwise Gamgee.

5) The movie is a little Star Wars, a little Wild Wild West, and a LOT of Lord of the Rings. If I saw Narnia, I'm sure it would be like that too, but I didn't see it. However, I'm positive they have tons of similarities.

6) Little kids won't see the holes in the story because they'll be distracted by Coca-Cola bears.

Go see The Golden Compass... Or we'll drink all your soda!

7) How the hell does the bear's armor magically go from place to place when he clearly runs without wearing it? Do the people carry it? Does that make the bear lazy?

8) The bear community is one led by a fascist dictator and the other bears have no thought, like lemmings, or teenagers when their class president is a hot girl.

9) Again, how the hell is this girl so smart??

10) Why did I, a 23 year old with a Master's Degree, have no idea what they were talking about when they were looking at some guy and some "dust" in the film's outset?

11) If you don't want to have blood in your movie, disappearing animals with glittery effects is a good way to go.

12) You want a sequel. We get it.

13) If the compass is so cool, why isn't a REAL bad guy after it?

14) How come the CGI fight scenes are so well done at the end of the film, but the real-life parts with explosions look like they were from an episode of the Original Star Trek series with Captain James T. Kirk? I thought tribbles were going to fall out of the ceiling.

15) I still don't remember anyone's name other than Lyra (who is the girl).

I AM A CGI MONSTER!! BUY THE STUFFED VERSIONS OF ME FOR YOUR CHILDREN THIS HOLIDAY SEASON AT WAL-MART!!!

The movie drags for so much of the beginning that I couldn't even enjoy the subpar finish. While I'm sure bears will come in the second movie to help little Lyra, just like the trees helped Frodo in the second LOTR movie, these little "demon"/Chicken Little/Sonic and Tails/Stuart Little suckers have got to go. Just. Not. Feeling. Them.

After a while, he gets annoying.

If it's an epic, let it be an epic without shoving cats that look like Antonio Banderas' Puss in Boots from Shrek 2 in our face to make us at least like someone (because the main character Lyra is annoying).

Shrek? Or Golden Compass?

It's hard for me to give the splat/booger, but to me, The Golden Compass was two girls one cup rotten. Ugh, I think I'm going to watch Rocky Balboa (Certified Fresh @76%) tonight to get this taste of poorly done bear out of my mouth.