The Golden Compass: Review By Josh

A mostly entertaining but far from great movie, The Golden Compass reaches but lands somewhere beneath great fantasy epics like the Lord of the Rings and The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe.

The plot is interesting enough, and the film contains many interesting concepts (like daemons and the magisterium), but ultimately disjointed storytelling leaves most of these concepts unexplored, and Lyra's world is such an odd mishmash of mythology that it sometimes lacks believability. Despite great acting (especially from newcomer Dakota Blue Richards), characters are given little depth and many seem to get lost with little or contrived relevance to the story.

From a visual standpoint, the film looks simply okay. Some effects are great, like the "dust" effects during kills, but the character cgi on some of the daemons and animals seems dated and cartoonish.

The movie gets awesome while it is focused on the ice bears, and remains awesome pretty much until it stops focusing on them. Ultimately, The Golden Compass is an okay movie with a few really neat elements, but not enough to make a complete film work. I'll reserve final judgment until the trilogy is complete.