Every once in a while, a trailer comes along that makes me giddy with delight. A huge grin spreads across my face as I clap like a four-year-old on Christmas morning. The trailer for The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian is one of these trailers, a trailer that reminds me why I love going to the movies.

Prince Caspian, like its predecessor The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, is a faithful adaptation of the saga written by C.S. Lewis. I read The Chronicles of Narnia annually during my dorky childhood, and so far the movies are even better than I had ever imagined in the books. In this installment, the Pevensie kids return to Narnia one year later to find that an eon has passed and their kingdom is in turmoil. The battle scenes alone will be worth my $11.

Prince Caspian is unmissable. For everyone who loves an epic adventure on the big screen, SEE IT. For everyone who wishes there could be another installment of Lord of the Rings, SEE IT. For all you Harry Potter fans in withdrawal, SEE IT. For all the fellow dweebs who still hope to find Narnia waiting behind the next door, SEE IT.

The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian is not yet rated and opens May 16. (official site)

P.S. This installment comes to you from Puerto Iguazú, Argentina. Check Globestompers.com for the latest on my trip around the world.

Feel free to comment on Julie’s post here.

The fact that there are people in Hollywood still green lighting projects like Underdog is what makes me fear for the future of movies. I wish I could have been an observer of the thought process that went into this film. I imagine it went something like this:

Big Hollywood Executive: “Let’s see…we need to come up with the next big family-friendly movie…but let’s ignore the example of successful family film franchises like Harry Potter, Shrek, and the Pixar films and do something totally asinine. Let’s make a movie based off a moderately popular 1960’s cartoon, about a superhero dog, that very few people remember anymore. But it won’t be a cartoon; it’ll be live action! And instead of using an animated dog, we’ll computer animate a real dog so it looks like it’s flying and talking! Never mind that this dog looks nothing like the dog from the cartoon, the American public is obviously too stupid to notice. And instead of finding a voice actor who can recreate the voice of the original Underdog (because his voice is really the most memorable part of the cartoon), let’s get Jason Lee to do the voice in his usual smarmy way. It worked so well for his characters in the Kevin Smith movies, why wouldn’t it work here? Yes, of course Kevin Smith’s films are only for adults, so kids probably have no idea who Jason Lee is, but who cares? It’s a movie about a dog. Who flies! And talks! Why should I put any more thought into a movie that’s for children? Kids will watch anything! This project is a go! Now I’m going to play a round of golf, call me when it’s time for the wrap party.”

SKIP IT. Burn it. Put it in a sack and toss it in the river. Because as long as people are willing to spend money to see movies like this, Hollywood will continue to make them. And the future of family films deserves better than that.

Underdog is rated PG and opens August 3. (Official site)

I’ve been around the block a couple times with the whole writing thing, so I’ve learned a bit about character devices. Indeed, one of my favorite character devices is the one where you use a character’s physical traits to subtly hint at the character’s inner personality.

For example, if your male lead has a very dependent personality, you might have him walking around on crutches for a some part of the story. Or if your female lead is completely oblivious to the realities in her life, it might be fun to fashion her with a really thick pair of eye-glasses.

The thing about this particular character device, though, is that it really does have to be done subtly. The point is that you’re trying to communicate with the audience on a subconscious level, not a conscious one, and if you make the connection too obvious, it just ends up being cheesy and stupid. A good example of this is Elisabeth Shue’s character in The Saint, who’s life-threatening “heart condition” mysteriously disappeared when her and Val Kilmer’s character fell in love (excuse me while I throw up).

This is why I find the new Christina Ricci movie, Penelope, so fascinating. When I first heard about the premise of this movie, about a girl whose family curse leaves her with a pig-snout for a nose, I immediately assumed that it would be a stinker. After all, you can’t get any more obvious than to put an actual pig-snout on a girl. However, when I finally saw this trailer, which just hit the internet a couple days ago, I was pleasantly surprised. Not only does this movie not look cheesy or stupid; it actually looks pretty good.

I guess the only explanation for this is that sometimes you can go to such an extreme that it ends up being interesting. Instead of trying to be clever about this girl resembling a pig, this movie just throws it in your face from the very beginning and you have no choice but to get over the lack of subtlety and focus on the rest of the story.

Indeed, Penelope seems to turn this character device on its head in more ways than one. Most importantly, instead of having Christina Ricci’s character be a bit of a slob or have an ugly personality, as the pig-snout would imply, her character is actually the exact opposite of these things. Thus, the character device is no longer being used to imply anything at all about the character’s actual personality. Instead, the pig-snout is there to prove a point, that a person’s physical traits often have absolutely nothing to do with the realities of who the person actually is on the inside.