Seeker - Dark is Rising Susan Cooper words/ SPOILERS FOR THE MOVIE SPOILERS

[Eustace_Scrubb]

Alla wrote:
> > Where to start? Oh the good news, I guess. You will not be tempted 
> > to walk out from this movie, especially if you have not read the 
> > book. Or at least I think so. The movie is entertaining enough if 
> > you forget that it has ANY relation to Susan Cooper book IMO,  
> > still nothing special but okay action/fantasy flick.
> > 
> 

marion11111:
> I disagree with you on this one.  I thought it was a rambling and
surprisingly slow movie.  

Eustace_Scrubb:
Not sure what to think about this.  My first impression was like
Alla's, that if one had no knowledge of the books and came to The
Seeker without preconceptions that it might be OK.

But the more I think about, the more holes I see in it on its own
terms, regardless of whether it's supposed to be based on The Dark is
Rising.

marion11111 again: 
> And such a sad HP imitation!  No one will know that the books 
> pre-date Potter and are wonderful because all they'll see is how the
  > story doesn't make sense and in it's best moments copies HP and
I'm > afraid anyone who was considering reading the books, won't 
> now. phooey.

Eustace_Scrubb:  
The HP "references" were weird, because I think for the most part they
were unintentional and might only be picked up by HP readers and
moviegoers...which of course means just about anyone who might have
stumbled in to see The Seeker.  

marion11111:
> Fred and George anyone?

Eustace_Scrubb:
That's what I mean.  Robin and Paul (I had no idea which was which in
the movie) didn't really do anything very Gred-Forge like but there
they were, twins bugging a little brother in a fantasy movie.

marion11111:
> This was one of the most confusing and pretty much pointless parts 
> of the movie.  They set it up with all these hints about dad's 
> involvment with Light and Dark and then it goes 
> nowhere.  If they were going to rewrite the story, that would have 
> been a very interesting direction to go.  I also think they could  
     > have successfully pursued that younger sister holding him to his 
> committment to the Light - kind of an anti-Maggie.

Eustace_Scrubb:
It was the subplot to nowhere.  The only payoff (if you could consider
it such) was that Dad's obsession with Light and Dark led to Tom's
becoming the Lindbergh baby...who come to think of it may still be
trapped in a magical snowglobe somewhere.

marion11111:
> The rook scenes were very well done.  Scary and it looked great. 

Eustace_Scrubb:
Except that when the rooks all started landing outside the houses in
the village, my son and I couldn't help laughing because they reminded
us of the owls outside the Dursleys' house in the HPSS movie.  

Alla: 
> > Um, the Old ones apparently can die. GOT IT guys? They apparently 
> > can die. Turns out Will's ancestor was an old one and he created 
> > signs and he is apparently not among the living anymore, I think.
> > 
> > 
> > They are, well, rather sad in a sense that I did not see any  
> > powers of them manifesting themselves. Except walking through time  
> > and trying to fight with rooks in rather sad way.
> > 
> > 
> > Merryman, godlike being, who is an amasing help to Will in the 
> > battle and does all those scary things? NOPE. Nothing of the such.

marion11111:
> Very badly done.  There is no sense of  this being a timeless battle
> and that the Old Ones don't actually have an immediate stake in the
> outcome since they can't die.  What was cool 
> in the book  was that they fought the battle because it was the 
> right thing to do.  And Will got to see what his life would be like
> and just how far he needed to grow in his power.

Eustace_Scrubb:
Very confusing.  One gets the impression that Old George has been done
in by the rooks, yet he turns up at the end apparently just fine.  Did
Will bring him back by defeating the Dark?  Further, at the end Will
just walks away with Tom to meet the family--who all look like they
were expecting him--apparently Will was the only member of the family
Mom and Dad kept the secret from...but I digress--I get no sense that
movie Will has really changed at all.  We don't sense that he feels
the gulf between his old life and his new life as an Old One at all.

Now, the showing I attended had a number of technical difficulties,
one of which was that just after Will and Tom enter the Stanton house
to meet the rest of the family, the screen went blank.  Was that it? 
Were there credits?  We didn't see them.


Alla:
> > Max is just being I guess Imperioed by Rider, so he is not really 
> > bad.
> 

Marion11111:
> really, I didn't leave to go to the bathroom or get more popcorn,  
 > but I think i missed something.  Did Maggie do that?  Did she slip 
> something into his drink?  Did the Rider do that?  Just by looking 
> at him?  Is that why he had an English accent?

Eustace_Scrubb:
The accents were poorly done overall.  On the school bus at the start,
everyone seemed to have an American accent.  I thought maybe they were
starting the story before the Stantons left for the UK.  But no...

Maggie Barnes didn't have an English accent as far as I could tell. 
Was she an exchange witch?

It was also weird that the mall guards in the trailer spoke with
American accents, but in the actual film they speak the exact same
lines with British accents (although they do say he "nicked" something
and have to explain that means "stole").

And since accents relate to setting, the Romanian village they used
looked, well, Eastern European, not English.  The wide shots they used
of the village shows what looks like an Orthodox-style church steeple.

Oh and trading the fancy watch to a Viking in return for your sister?
Give me a break...

Alla: 
> > Are you sitting guys? There is no Walker. Repeat after me. There is 
> > NO sign of Walker anywhere in the movie, NADA, zilch.

 
marion11111:
> I am seriously confused here.  I came in about 5 or 6 minutes late 
> and assumed I missed the Walker.  Who the heck is the guy in the 
> hooded shirt on the movie poster?  I could have sworn I read an 
> interview where the actor said he was glad to see he was in a later
book.  
> Or was that the guy who played the Rider?  But anyway, who is the
guy in the hoodie?

Eustace_Scrubb:
This was very strange.  I knew I'd seen interviews with Jonathan
Jackson about filming the Walker role.  Actually there were more than
one, but there's one at http://www.superheroflix.com/news/97/23197.php
My only theory is that the extensive change to this character might
have been one of the things Cooper protested in her letter and they
actually listened.  The "guy" in the hoodie was apparently Maggie.

Which reminds me:  not only are the Old Ones rather impotent, but so
is the Rider.  He sits around and berates his hired minions about how
they are not getting the Signs from Will fast enough and they'd better
or else...why doesn't he just take them himself.  Considering that he
keeps saying his strength is growing, it shouldn't be a problem.

Alla:
> > Oh, oh and the sixth sign? It is Will himself. I thought for a 
> > second he would scream to Rider, I am a Horcrux, I got it.

marion11111:
> One of the teens in front of me said at this point "Oh, he's a
horcrux - what a rip-off."  

Eustace_Scrubb:
They also telegraphed way back when Will was reading from the book
that he would turn out to be the 6th Sign.  But Will had no idea until
the last second that this was the case.  Over on the IMDB bulletin
board for the movie, someone posted that they bet the director kicked
himself on this as soon as Deathly Hallows came out.  But the way this
film was edited, I wonder if it isn't just as likely they added it
after July 21?


marion11111:
And did you notice that Bathilda Bagshot makes a cameo in this movie?
 Honestly I nearly cried when I saw that - and not for joy!   She
needs to be careful she doesn't get typecast as  "creepy old lady that
houses snakes."

Eustace_Scrubb:
lol...I was just glad Will didn't yell "Snakes!  I hate snakes!" when
he fell into the crypt.

marion11111:
> Like I said earlier, I'm afraid that anyone who was encouraged to
read the books won't bother now.

Eustace_Scrubb:
I'm not sure you need to worry.  I saw the film on Saturday afternoon
and we shared the theatre with about a dozen others.  Had a better
choice of seats than I can recall.  Apparently the opening weekend
figures for The Seeker are appallingly bad; it will probably be gone
by next week and therefore few potential readers will be affected.

marion11111:
> Hey, so what did happen in the first six minutes?  I came in just as
the Christmas tree was 
> being delivered by Old George and then Harry - no wait, Will - got
one sock from Fred and George.


Eustace_Scrubb:
Mostly just the trip home from school mentioned above; Max's return
from college; and a video link with Steven who is in the US Navy and
has sent Will a present--not the mask from the book but the belt on
which the Signs will go.

Cheers,

Eustace_Scrubb