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| The Golden Compass (New Line Platinum Series Two-Disc Widescreen Edition) | 
| Director: Chris Weitz
Actors: Nicole Kidman, Daniel Craig, Dakota Blue Richards, Ben Walker (ix), Freddie Highmore
Studio: New Line Home Video
Category: DVD
List Price: $34.99
Buy New: $11.46
You Save: $23.53 (67%)
Buy New/Used/Collectible from $11.46
Avg. Customer Rating:  (242 reviews)
Sales Rank: 6982
Format: Ac-3, Closed-captioned, Color, Dolby, Dvd-video, Special Edition, Subtitled, Widescreen, Ntsc
Languages: English (Original Language), Icelandic (Original Language), Russian (Original Language), English (Subtitled), Spanish (Subtitled)
Rating: PG-13 (Parental Guidance Suggested)
Media: DVD
Running Time: 113 minutes
Number Of Items: 2
Aspect Ratio: 2.35:1
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.3
Dimensions (in): 7.5 x 5.4 x 0.7
MPN: TRNDN38167D
UPC: 794043120435
EAN: 0794043120435
ASIN: B00005JPNY
Release Date: April 29, 2008
Theatrical Release Date: December 7, 2007
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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Description
In a parallel universe where witches rule the skies and armoured bears are the bravest warriors, young Lyra Belacqua journeys from her home among the scholars at Oxford to the far North to save her best friend. Based on the first book in the Carnegie Medal-winning series, His Dark Materials.
Amazon.com
A fantasy epic with more than a passing resemblance to the Lord of the Rings and Chronicles of Narnia film franchises, The Golden Compass takes place in an alternate universe where each human's soul is embodied in a companion animal called a daemon. Lyra (Dakota Blue Richards), an orphan who's lived most of her life among the scholars at Oxford, is intrigued when her uncle, Lord Asriel (Daniel Craig), announces his plans to travel north to investigate the source of some mysterious particles called Dust. Lyra has little hope of following her uncle until a mysterious woman named Mrs. Coulter (Nicole Kidman, at her most icily beautiful) asks Lyra to travel north as her personal assistant. All is not as it seems, however, and the disappearance of Lyra's friend Roger (Ben Walker) sets her on a dizzying adventure. She does have an alethiometer, or golden compass, that can help her see the truth, and a number of companions, including her shape-shifting daemon, Pantalaimion (voiced by Freddie Highmore of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory), polar-bear warrior Iorek Byrnison (voiced by Ian McKellen), Texas aeronaut Lee Scoresby (Sam Elliott), and witch queen Serafina Pekkala (Craig's Casino Royale co-star, Eva Green). Even before its release, The Golden Compass was the subject of controversy over its perceived anti-religious themes. While it does involve an oppressive institution called the Magisterium, it's not overtly religious, particularly to a young viewer. The movie's PG-13 rating should be taken seriously, however. Suitable for an older audience than Narnia (though younger than The Lord of the Rings), it deals with complex concepts, violence (though largely bloodless) and implied death, children and animals in peril, and an unrelentingly ominous and unsettling mood. Despite a few changes and rearrangements, the overall plot of the movie is remarkably faithful to its source material, the first installment of Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials trilogy. It doesn't finish the book, however, and--much like The Fellowship of the Ring did--leaves the viewer hanging in anticipation of the next film, The Subtle Knife, due in 2009. So even though The Golden Compass is impressive--especially with its spot-on cast and terrific visual effects--we probably won't know its full emotional impact until the story is complete. --David Horiuchi
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| Customer Reviews: Read 237 more reviews...
 skip the movie--read the book November 22, 2008
A Hollywood studio spent millions of dollars making a movie that sucks the life out of a fantastic book--what a surprise!
This movie has a fine cast, lavish production values and great special effects. All it lacks is a soul.
By all means, read the book, and the remainder of Pullman's wonderful trilogy. But don't waste your time on this pointless exercise.
Not the worst fantasy movie, but certainly not the best. November 17, 2008
"The Golden Compass" made a decent fantasy movie. Most of the characters in it were very good (I found Lee Scoresby and Iorek Byrnison to be especially likeable). It also had a very unique environment that departed from the normal medieval-ish confines of the fantasy genre. Unfortunately, the story in it seemed quite predictable and uninspiring. I never found it terribly exciting. It held my interest the entire time, but I don't see myself standing in line to wait for the sequels. "The Golden Compass" is a good work to have in your fantasy collection, but there are many better works of fantasy out there.
disappointment November 8, 2008
The movie was a disapointment. Yeah, the graphics were ok but not as good. The story line deviates from the book. If you are a fan of the book I recommend not buying this movie. It's ok to watch but not to own. They could have done much more but they didn't. I watched the movie before deciding wether to buy it or not and trust me, its not worth your money.
Couldn't make any sense of it November 3, 2008
0 out of 1 found this review helpful
I've got a funny feeling that this was made by massive fans of the book. And they thought that every one else in the world, has read it and where also massive fans of the book. I've never read the book, so maybe if I had the movie might have made some sense.
The book was very good - the movie was disappointing November 2, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
I read the first two books with great enthusiasm, and slowed a bit with the third as it petered out and became preachy.
But I was excited about Golden Compass because it was a well written book and I was interested to see how it was ported to the big screen.
Sadly, it was dumbed-down so much that most of the plot of the book - which was unraveled skillfully in the book - is revealed in the first 5 minutes of the movie through exposition.
You are flat out told that people in this world wear their souls on the outside of their body in the form of familiar animals. In the book you figure it out on your own and feel clever about it when you do so.
This is the case for half the plot of the book. It is just told to you in synopsis form by a narrator and all of the joy of DISCOVERING things is taken from you.
I don't know who the director is, but I intend to find out and avoid his future movies. Hopefully they hire him to finish out the series (doubtful, since this one was dismal at the box office) so he won't ruin any other movies for a while.
In short, if you liked the book - and Golden Compass was a good book, even if you are an intolerant right wing person this book shouldn't have offended you, they don't start really offending the Catholics until book three in my opinion - then you will be disappointed by the movie. It was just poorly done.
A final note, yes - the special effects and cinematography were good, but any idiot with some money can hire good computer graphic companies and do that these days. It was the story that was ruined by this shoddy directing.
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