The Golden Compass and Other Dark Materials

By Andrew Wurdeman

Reading the widely successful trilogy, His Dark Materials, by acclaimed author Philip Pullman, was a great triumph for me. I’d spent two years or so needling my parents into letting me get the books, which I’d never quite gotten them to do. This was largely due to the fact that the author is a staunch atheist who incorporates some heavily anti- Christian themes into his books. But when I heard the news that a movie was coming out, I doubled my efforts—everyone knows that the movie is always cooler than the book. So I asked my parents, expecting a “no” and many groans and complaints and gnashing of teeth. But instead, I got a “yes”—if my mother and I both read the books and agreed that they were compatible with our Lutheran faith. I was ecstatic.

In retrospect, I probably should have smelled a trap.

So I set about reading the books and tackled them in the span of less than a week. I was very surprised. First off, the writing was absolutely superb—first-rate, top-notch, whatever. Gone was the flowery and monotonous style of most big-name fantasy authors. Here was a man who proved himself capable of providing vivid scenes of the beautiful world he created with as few words as humanly possible. This book series is rife with armored battle-bears, flying witch clans, and Texas aeronauts in gigantic hot air balloons. It had plenty of action, with momentous battles and several brutal hand-to-hand fights that took my breath away. Yet it could also be touchingly sweet or hauntingly powerful. Philip Pullman is a truly gifted storyteller.

But alas, that pesky thing called “theme” got in the way again. What good is literature if it has no message behind it, or worse, the wrong message? Anything can be arranged to look nice. The whole point of writing a book is to get a moral across. I discovered that this series, while not a masterpiece like some critics have hailed it, is certainly very good, but it has several huge flaws and extremely misleading viewpoints.

The plot of the books is that a young girl’s father, Lord Asriel, is leading a massive rebellion against the Authority (another name for God, Who is even called Yahweh in the books). The girl, Lyra, must go on a personal journey and help her father succeed by doing various tasks, be they journeying into the Land of the Dead or summoning the witch clans up against God. Yes, this book series is extremely anti-Christian. Priests are portrayed as drunks and murderers, and the Sacraments are mocked by several of the “heroic” characters. No character affiliated with the Church is shown in a positive light. Philip Pullman has even publicly stated that if there is a God, and if He is as the Christians say He is, then He not only deserves scorn, but rebellion. And don’t fall for the movie’s misguided public relations campaign. There’s no way religion, or the lack thereof, could be taken out entirely from the plot. That’s like trying to film The Lord of the Rings without the ring. And interestingly enough, this is what made the movie flop at the box office: the director tried to take out the theme of the story in a compromise that satisfied no one.

Yes, some people say that these books are necessary in order that the full range of the literary spectrum may be studied. I agree that you need to look at a topic from every angle, but this novel only offers its single, narrow-minded perspective. It is not a defense or study of atheistic beliefs—it is a brutal attack on Christendom. Pullman offers no answers to questions (for example, he calls the Bible a corrupt and unreliable text but gives no proof as to why it is). This series is so glaringly one-sided that no discussion could possibly be gleaned from it.

However, there is some value in these books, although it is certainly not the message that Pullman wanted. It is the fact that, starting on His Dark Materials assumption that the Bible is untrustworthy, the rest of the story could easily fall into place. If the Bible is not 100 percent perfect, who is to say that Mr. Pullman is not correct? How can we prove anything that we believe in? Perhaps this is why the books have sold so many copies. Sadly, it's even popular among secular Christians to agree that some parts of the Bible are false. In our world today a good way to appear open-minded is to accept popular opinions without question. So the Bible is partly wrong? His Dark Materials is a very plausible warning of where that dangerous line of thought could take the reader.

So here I am, forsaking both a free movie ticket and being forced to admit that, yes, my parents were right for once. I don’t know if I’ll ever live the humiliation down.

So what are you going to do with your spare cash when this movie hits the DVD shelves? Instead of buying this movie, you could rent a drama that provokes thought, or an action flick that’s pure eye candy, or maybe a good horror film to make you appreciate that you only have to do Chemistry homework. Watch it. Enjoy it. Movies aren’t all bad. They occasionally have something to say. It’s what I’ll be doing.

Andrew Wurdeman, blossoming arts critic, lives in Indiana with his parents, who are occasionally right. He attends Zionsville Community High School and can be reached at wurdguy05@hotmail.com