Narnia

LOS ANGELES -- Disney's fantasy came true with The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, which opened as the top weekend film. This was, of course, before King Kong stomped onto the stage Wednesday. The top 20 movies at U.S. and Canadian theaters Friday through Sunday, followed by distribution studio, gross, number of theater locations, average receipts per location, total gross and number of weeks in release, as compiled Monday by Exhibitor Relations Co. Inc.:

From Baltimore to New Zealand, Mark Johnson has made movies of all sizes, costs, colors and flavors. As Barry Levinson's producing partner in Baltimore Pictures, he teamed up with the prolific, versatile writer-director on some peak accomplishments, including Levinson's classic remembrance of things past, "Diner" (1982), and his radically original mobster movie, "Bugsy" (1991). When Johnson started Mark Johnson Productions, he continued to go in zigzag yet profitable directions. He immediately hired a gifted Mexican filmmaker to create a new version of Frances Hodgson Burnett's children's book "A Little Princess" (1995)

What do a Cheerios box, a McDonald's Happy Meal and St. Martin's United Church of Christ in Dittmer, Mo., have in common? It's Narnia business - or at least business for Narnia. All three, though not all see it as such, are promoting The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, the new movie based on the C.S. Lewis novel in which a Christ-like talking lion gives himself up to be sacrificed, is resurrected and triumphs over evil. It's not the first time churches and religious groups have joined commercial interests in getting behind a Hollywood production.

Starring David Duchovny, Gillian Anderson. Directed by Chris Carter. Fox Home Video. $29.95, blu-ray $39.95 *** The X-Files may have ended its television run in 2002, but interest in agents Fox Mulder and Dana Scully and all that stuff the FBI isn't telling us continues. Which is why, six years after the weekly series left the air, The X-Files: I Want to Believe hit the big screen in July. Fans will be glad to run across Mulder and Scully once again: She's a dedicated surgeon trying to eradicate the world's ills over which she has some control, while he's become pretty much a basket case, burnt-out, disillusioned and basically not giving a darn anymore.

New York -- "Isn't Tilda amazing as the White Witch?" asks Mark Johnson, the producer of The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, about Tilda Swinton, the film's live-action star. "The part could be so evil and growly, so Cruella De Vil. But she plays it just as cold and unresponsive as can be. Before the big battle, when she says, `I have no use for prisoners: kill them all,' it's just a statement of fact." With 5-foot-11 Swinton in the role, Jadis the White Witch needn't seethe or scream.

Which is stronger, a messianic lion or a 25-foot gorilla? Audiences will strike the final blow in that battle, as Peter Jackson's remake of King Kong goes up against Disney's screen adaptation of C.S. Lewis' The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe in a battle for America's filmgoing dollar. With a little luck, the winner will help pull Hollywood out of its year-long box-office doldrums. The major studios have a lot more than usual riding on this Christmas. As always, they'll be rolling out their prestige pictures, the ones they hope will serve as Oscar bait and help them land a bunch of the golden statues when the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences hands them out March 5. But this year, studio heads are praying for some big-time dollar signs to go with the glowing reviews, as Hollywood hopes to end with a financial flourish big enough to partially offset a 6 percent drop in box-office receipts compared to last year.

The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe plunges into an imaginative landscape as large as all creation - and never slackens its barreling pace or shrinks its panoramic scope. As it moves from the Battle of Britain to an apocalyptic war between good and evil in the bizarre parallel world of Narnia, this movie has everything a first-rate fantasy should have, including sweep, color and clarity. It boasts some indelible performances, notably from Georgie Henley as Lucy Pevensie, the little girl who trailblazes Narnia's glacial wonderland, and Tilda Swinton, as Jadis, the White Witch.

NEW YORK - As soon as word hit the Internet that Andrew Adamson, the director of Shrek and Shrek 2, would direct the movie version of C.S. Lewis' The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe, Narniaheads attacked him without mercy. They suggested that Adamson would make the human characters crack wise and sling mud like the baggy-pants cartoon humans in the Shrek films - and that Aslan, the noble lion, would belch and scratch himself like Shrek, the director's jolly green ogre.

"Since I work out a lot during the week, I take the weekend to go out with friends and/or go dancing. Saturday, we'll see a movie (Chronicles of Narnia) and prep for the holiday. Sunday we go to church, and I always try to do something adventurous, like rock climbing or attending a sporting event, before I start planning the week ahead." Lynne Brick, owner, Brick Bodies Fitness clubs

Starring David Duchovny, Gillian Anderson. Directed by Chris Carter. Fox Home Video. $29.95, blu-ray $39.95 *** The X-Files may have ended its television run in 2002, but interest in agents Fox Mulder and Dana Scully and all that stuff the FBI isn't telling us continues. Which is why, six years after the weekly series left the air, The X-Files: I Want to Believe hit the big screen in July. Fans will be glad to run across Mulder and Scully once again: She's a dedicated surgeon trying to eradicate the world's ills over which she has some control, while he's become pretty much a basket case, burnt-out, disillusioned and basically not giving a darn anymore.

Prince Caspian, the second entry in the Chronicles of Narnia series, is a glorious medieval war movie. It's about war as the ultimate pitch of conflict that tries men's souls, and women's, too, in director-co-writer Andrew Adamson's liberated, post-feminist rendering of C.S. Lewis' novel. The battle between good and evil couldn't be more clearly drawn. But the movie also depicts the fluidity of change in every sphere of life, public or private, from a household of siblings to a civilization nearing Armageddon.

When The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, opened for Christmas 2005, it faced off with an actual 800-pound gorilla: Peter Jackson's King Kong. Jackson, coming off one of the most imaginative and audacious of all escapist movie classics -- his beloved and hugely profitable Lord of the Rings trilogy -- was tackling a remake of his and many other fans' favorite fantasy adventure. The creative stakes were as high as movie-lovers' hopes, with casting choices that veered between the brave (Jack Black, Adrien Brody)

Interfaith service at Beth Shalom Beth Shalom Congregation, 8070 Harriet Tubman Lane, Columbia, will be the host for the ninth Martin Luther King Jr./Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel Interfaith Service at 8 p.m. Jan. 13. Rabbi Susan Grossman and Cantor Richard Walters of Beth Shalom will welcome the Rev. John Wright, pastor of First Baptist Church of Guilford, who will speak, and the Rev. Carletta Allen, minister of Locust United Methodist Church, who...

LOS ANGELES -- Disney's fantasy came true with The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, which opened as the top weekend film. This was, of course, before King Kong stomped onto the stage Wednesday. The top 20 movies at U.S. and Canadian theaters Friday through Sunday, followed by distribution studio, gross, number of theater locations, average receipts per location, total gross and number of weeks in release, as compiled Monday by Exhibitor Relations Co. Inc.:

A 55-year-old story about four British children, a fantasy world of talking creatures and the battle between an icy witch and a divine lion has made an Oxford don who died more than four decades ago the hottest Christian writer in America today. An explosion of new releases - dozens of new works of biography, criticism and inspiration, timed to share in the anticipated success of the movie The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe - is focusing new attention on the life and work of the enigmatic C.S. Lewis.

"Since I work out a lot during the week, I take the weekend to go out with friends and/or go dancing. Saturday, we'll see a movie (Chronicles of Narnia) and prep for the holiday. Sunday we go to church, and I always try to do something adventurous, like rock climbing or attending a sporting event, before I start planning the week ahead." Lynne Brick, owner, Brick Bodies Fitness clubs

Interfaith service at Beth Shalom Beth Shalom Congregation, 8070 Harriet Tubman Lane, Columbia, will be the host for the ninth Martin Luther King Jr./Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel Interfaith Service at 8 p.m. Jan. 13. Rabbi Susan Grossman and Cantor Richard Walters of Beth Shalom will welcome the Rev. John Wright, pastor of First Baptist Church of Guilford, who will speak, and the Rev. Carletta Allen, minister of Locust United Methodist Church, who...

NATIONAL Patriot Act extension approved House and Senate negotiators approved an extension of the controversial Patriot Act yesterday, but a bipartisan group of senators pledged to try to block final passage, and at least one lawmaker, Sen. Russell D. Feingold, threatened a filibuster. pg 3a WORLD Baghdad explosions kill 30 Two explosions, one detonated by a suicide bomber, tore through a crowded bus in Baghdad's main bus terminal yesterday, killing at least 30 people and wounding 25, witnesses and police officials said.

NATIONAL Patriot Act extension approved House and Senate negotiators approved an extension of the controversial Patriot Act yesterday, but a bipartisan group of senators pledged to try to block final passage, and at least one lawmaker, Sen. Russell D. Feingold, threatened a filibuster. pg 3a WORLD Baghdad explosions kill 30 Two explosions, one detonated by a suicide bomber, tore through a crowded bus in Baghdad's main bus terminal yesterday, killing at least 30 people and wounding 25, witnesses and police officials said.

What do a Cheerios box, a McDonald's Happy Meal and St. Martin's United Church of Christ in Dittmer, Mo., have in common? It's Narnia business - or at least business for Narnia. All three, though not all see it as such, are promoting The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, the new movie based on the C.S. Lewis novel in which a Christ-like talking lion gives himself up to be sacrificed, is resurrected and triumphs over evil. It's not the first time churches and religious groups have joined commercial interests in getting behind a Hollywood production.