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BY MAGGIE SCOTT

With an eye to box office receipts and common denominator appeal, director Chris Weitz has gutted the anti-religious dogma thrust of the literary source for the fantasy film, “The Golden Compass.”

Pre-release controversy over the film is unwarranted. This viewer could discern no explicit indictments of Christian theology such as are allegorically rendered in Philip Pullman’s trilogy “His Dark Materials,” on which the film is based. Implicitly, the film’s story paints a disapproving portrait of the repression of free thought and inquiry.

Embodied in unintentionally humorous caricatures of fascist authorities, this totalitarianism is institutionalized in something called the Magisterium. It countenanced the destruction of alethiometers—golden compasses whose intricate workings and mysterious symbols revealed truth to those with the ability and the will to interpret it.

Counter to the Magisterium is Jordan College, an august body of scholars who were once engaged in centuries of free inquiry. Appealing to their heritage, one Lord Asriel (Daniel Craig) appears before them seeking support for his quest to locate the origin of Dust, a banned element believed to be the source of the world’s evil and what Asriel believes connects humans to worlds without authority.

Asriel is a heretic in the Magisterium’s eyes; but his threat is mild compared to that of the young woman Lyra (Dakota Blue Richards), the spirited niece of Lord Asriel. He wanted the College to turn her into “a lady.” Vigorously rejecting that notion, Lyra pleads to go on her uncle’s quest.

Denied, she turns to the cloyingly elegant and mysterious Mrs. Coulter (Nicole Kidman) who promises Lyra a journey to “the north” after she has had some time to indoctrinate Lyra in the proper accoutrements, behaviors and personal grooming of the upper class. The mentorship soon sours, as Lyra realizes what a devious tyrant Mrs. C. is: she’s responsible for having the children of the lower class “Gyptians” kidnapped by “child cutters” and taken to an Experimental Station, where they will be helped to “grow up.” Translation: transformation into soulless automatons toeing the Magisterium line.

Fleeing Coulter, Lyra sets out to free the children. Her quest will take her to the lair of the Gyptian King and to a meeting with a disgraced polar bear prince called Iorek Byrnison (voice of Ian McKellen) seeking redemption and his rightful place as King of the Ice Bears. An aeronaut (Sam Elliott) and a beautiful witch (Eva Green) also assist; but it is Lyra’s courage and cunning that win the day.

As epic fantasies go, this one will leave some viewers as cold as the Kingdom of the Ice Bears. Action (pedestrian) and computer effects (dazzling) are ascendant over character development and story craftsmanship. Shape-shifting, talking animals known as “daemons” who accompany the human characters (icky insects for the bad guys; majestic owls, eagles, snow leopards, etc., for the good guys) as their “souls,” didn’t register any profound meaning or reason for being, other than to demonstrate the awesome capabilities of the ever-more-amazing CGI technicians.

Rated PG-13 for fantasy violence.
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