Diary of a Network Geek

ChroniclesofNarni

Originally uploaded by Network Geek

I saw The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian Friday night.

First of all, let me say that this was as good as or better than the first Chronicles of Narnia movie. Also, I read the books when I was a kid, but I haven’t read them again since. I do remember some of the books, but, most importantly, I recall that I enjoyed the books quite a bit at the time.

This movie was about the four “Sons and Daughters of Adam” of legend, and from the first movie, coming back to find a very different Narnia than they left. Naturally, as we found out in the first movie, time moves quite a bit differently in Narnia than it does in our world, so when Lucy and Susan and Edmund and Peter go back, they’ve become ancient history. The kingdom they built with Aslan has fallen to a foreign invader. They’ve ruled for more than ten generations, driving the Narnians into hiding, after trying to kill all the former subjects of Narnia, that is. So, as you can see, there may be a bit of tension between these two factions. Now, picture if you will, a prince who’s been taught all the old stories and has a very different view of his people’s ancient enemy. And, there, in a nutshell, is the central conflict of the movie. Prince Caspian fighting his own people to bring about an age of peace and prosperity between traditional enemies.

Now, as I generally do on this blog, to keep from ruining the movie for you, I’ll stop here lest I accidentally fire off a spoiler. I will say this, though, the movie was great. Also, to a Christian and a writer, there were quite a few very obvious references to not only the Bible but many ideas central to Christian theology. The idea that we must come to God through faith and that He cannot be truly proven or disproven, but can only be found via faith, for instance. And, that God’s way may not be the most obvious way or even the simplest, most straight-forward way to do things. And, of course, all the images that are echoes of Biblical stories and images which run through the movie are far too numerous for me to count. But, I don’t think that a non-Christian would be put off by any of this, as it’s presented in such a non-intrusive way that they’d probably never even notice.

All in all, this was a great movie, with a good plot and excellent production values. Well worth seeing and, even seeing again.

Wherein my little, male ego takes a bit of bruising.

So, the sweet, almost-divorced lady at work, C., gave what little male ego I have left a little battering yesterday. She compared me to Milton in Office Space. Apparently, all the extra hours getting our phone system upgraded to a new, modern phone switch had me mumbling rather like Milton, who famously grumbled about blowing up the building and his red Swingline stapler. To her credit, she quickly added that I didn’t look like Milton.
Obviously, I don’t think I’m anything like Milton.

Honestly, and I think this is true of most guys my age who do my kind of work, I saw myself as somewhere between Mathew Broderick’s character in War Games and Robert Redford’s character in Sneakers. Okay, maybe I’m pushing it with Reford, but, still, Milton? I mean, at least the other two guys got the girl!
Really, the most realistic comparison, is Peter in Office Space. I mean, I have five bosses and everyone in the company tells me when anything is going wrong with the computer system. My ex-wife’s name was Anne, just like Peter’s girlfriend, and she was cheating on me, too. Even at my current company I got moved from cube to cube until I had no view. Though, I have to admit, I did actually end up with my office in the storage room. Kind of sad, isn’t it? My office used to be one of two storage rooms and now it’s the server room, too. No windows and not enough A/C.  But, still, I’ve got to have more going for me than Milton!  I have people skills!  (If you’ve seen the movie, you get that line.)

Well, I suppose it could have been worse.  At least she didn’t compare me to Nick Burns!
All that and I still may end up adopting her dog because her ex doesn’t want it and I have a soft heart, especially for dogs.  Oh, and her divorce should be final December Fourth.  No idea if she even finds me remotely attractive, but, well, if she’s comparing me to Milton…