Earthsea

Like many, I'm a big fan of Ursula Le Guin and her writings. In particular, the Earthsea books were ones that I read whilst a teenager, and have revisited several times since. They have many dimensions and introduced me, all unknowing at the time, to Taoist thought. Given that I had a strongly Catholic up-bringing that I was less than enchanted by, the alternative approaches to morality, spirituality and society in the books fascinated me greatly and gave me an alternative viewpoint to many items of dogma the teachers and nuns at school were eager to push onto me. Later, when was a University student, I discovered the Tao Te Ching and was delighted by it's combination of authority and ambiguity.

So I was pleased to discover that a film adaptation of it had been made whilst looking for something to watch over the Christmas holiday, and was airing on a channel I could actually watch. I was expecting something like Peter Jacksons effort at the Lord Of the Rings triology. Perhaps not an adaptation that could capture all the dimensions of the books, but at least a credible transfer of the narrative to a visual medium, perhaps highlighting the aspects that transferred well to a visual treatment.

Instead I switched off the show after five minutes, feeling as if I had just watched someone urinate on a particularly valuable antique. Everybody was white. The name of the lead character was wrong. All the scenes were sexually charged. The story was recast to being about a mad megalomaniac who wanted to unleash dark powers to rule the world. All the hackneyed clichés you can imagine, they were there. I no longer recognised the thoughtful coming-of-age story of a goatherd turned wizard from Gont, struggling with his powers and identity, and the hard choices of a child-priestess, abandoned in the desert, her childhood sacrificed to empty ritual.

It turns out that this adaptation is notorious and has caused a serious spat between Ms LeGuin and the production company. I cannot fathom the decision-making process that lead to the production of this dreck, and hope the producer is never let near a job which requires the slightest creative judgement ever again. Harsh, but that's what you should do to someone who does the equivalent of re-inventing the Wind In The Willows and making Toad a rampant philanderer.

Labels: earthsea fantasy leguin