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THE FILM STRIP: Black narnian Cornell R. John aids prince Caspian and the Pevensie Crew in wiping out ethnic cleansing: 'The Chronicles of Narnia:’ Ben Barnes, Anna Popplewell and William Moseley talk about messages.
*Call me weird but I have always liked centaurs. My favorite segments of the TV series “Xena: Warrior Princes” were the ones that included the centaurs. In “The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian,” British stage and screen actor Cornell S. John is the centaur Glenstorm. The English musical theater star once played a king royalty himself—King Mufasa in “The Lion King”—in the show’s debut in London’s West End in 1999. In “Prince Caspian,” John is the commanding and powerful centaur who aids the Telmarine Prince Caspian and the Pevensies in their fight against King Miraz, who is set on ethnic cleansing and wiping out all the creatures in Narnia that don’t look like them.
Like other actors in the film, John endured a lengthy seventy-five minute makeup process that transformed him into one of mythology’s quintessential creatures, the centaur. Latex face appliances combined with the new fashion rage—green screen tights (over which VFX magician Dean Wright superimposed the body and legs of a horse)turned the soft-spoken but confident actor into one of the film’s most imposing creations.
“I’m 160 percent Mike Fields, the guy who did my make-up,” John allows. “In the beginning I had no idea what I should look like, but after talking with the designers the look finally came together. I was hoping for something that expressed honor, pride, and tradition. Because centaurs can live for hundreds of years, there’s no age limit on this. I put myself at 170 Earth years. Like I said earlier, you had to earn the right. This face is Glenstorm. It’s a face of time. A face of honor. A face of dignity.”
As for what John expects when he sees that face on-screen for the first time, his candid comment were: “I haven’t a clue what’s going to happen when I see it for the first time. And I like that. I never watched any of the video playbacks during filming. I just lived the character. So when I sit down in the cinema house for the first time, I could be shocked. I could be surprised. I could be sad. I could be happy. I don’t know. Anyway, it will be an event.”
“The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian” is the follow-up to the very successful 2005 “The Chronicles of Narnia: the Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe,” in which the evil White Witch (Tilda Swinton) put an icy spell on the Narnians’ land. Thrown back in time through a wardrobe, Peter (William Moseley), Susan (Anna Popplewell), Edmund (Skandar Keynes) and Lucy (Georgie Henley) Pevensie battled the White Witch’s hold over Narnia. With the help of Aslan (the voice of Liam Neeson}, a seeming metaphor for the Messiah, they freed Narnia from her cold hands. After the battle in which Aslan was killed and resurrected, he proclaimed the Pevensie children kings and queens of Narnia.
Thirteen hundred Narnian years later but a year in their present time in England, the Pevensie clan—whose parents are deceased—is standing on a train platform prepared to attend boarding school. With the ancient magical horn Queen Susan left behind, the four are summoned back to Narnia to help Prince Caspian (Ben Barnes) defeat king Miraz (Sergio Castellitto) and the Telmarines from killing all the inhabitants of Narnia.
The Film Strip asked stars from the film if there was a message their character tried or wanted to convey in this installment? A bubbly Ben Barnes hesitated for a moment before responding. “That’s a good question. I'm not sure. I've been discussing this. What I like about ‘Prince Caspian’ is that it's not too spoon-feedy. There's not one particular moral message that comes to the front, but I think there are good lessons in there. There are moments where he makes mistakes and you learn about his regret of those mistakes and there are moments where he has to trust in the other people around him and their ideas and learn to concede.
“Then there's the overarching message, that they're living in something that is greater than themselves. Nature is the thing that saves the day at the end. Fifty years ago when these books were written that was a much more allegorical message and now it's something that looks really cool. I think it's there if you choose to see it. I think the Miraz and Telmarine imagery is very strong. You've got all these sort of eagles and it's a very kind of Nazi-esque kind of look to it, but it's only there if you look to see it, this faceless race with this ethnic accent.
“It's set during World War II and Sergio would be the first to say that he thought Miraz was a sort of Hitlerian figure. Then you look at Caspian and his uncle has murdered his father, thinking that vengeance is the best policy. Pop quiz: What Shakespeare play does this remind you of? So, yeah, I think there are a lot of interesting layers and a lot of good moral messages about humility and all of those things. There are a lot of different messages in there. They're there if you choose to see them and if you don't there are cool battle scenes,” he laughs.
Butt kicking Anna Popplewell explained Susan’s transformation. “I think that from the first film Susan isn't very likeable because she's always the one saying, 'Well, hold on a minute. This doesn't make sense.' She's kept that element this time around as well. She's still asking questions and causing problems, but I think she's a lot more human this time and so I wanted her to be a little more sympathetic and hopefully have people see where she's coming from.”
William Moseley aka King Peter gave his thoughts on what message he thought his character conveyed: “I think as we’ve seen in history there are a lot of leaders who have fallen because of their own egos. I think most empires actually have fallen through their own ego. You know you got the Roman Empire, You got the British Empire and I’m not going to talk about the American empire,” he howled. “But it happens and I think the most important thing Peter has to learn is humility as a leader. He has to serve other people and not serve himself. He has to do what’s best for everybody else. So I think I conveyed the message of humility from a leader.”
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