At any given moment on any given day over the last 3 1/2 years, Andrew Adamson could have been fretting over fauns, goblins, unicorns, satyrs, ogres, sprites, centaurs and dryads. The director of “The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe” might be found worrying about four actors so young the littlest member still sucks her thumb. Adamson may well have been occupied by a crew of up to 800 people, a budget of $180 million, and some 1,700 special effects shots. Or perhaps he was negotiating a story point with the C.S. Lewis estate, which was determined not to let Hollywood disfigure the author’s most famous book.
But on this warm and sunny spring afternoon in the middle of nowhere on New Zealand’s South Island – Day 97, if you are counting, of a staggering 139 days of principal photography – Adamson for a minute can think about nothing else but snow, and whether or not to fake it.
“The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe” represents a vast leap for the 38-year-old Adamson, who co-directed the first two “Shrek” movies. As with “Shrek,” his new film is set in a fantasy world populated with talking animals and mythical creatures. Unlike those animated blockbusters, however, “The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe” is the first movie Adamson has directed without a partner, and it’s the first time he has made a live-action film.
Equally important, Adamson doesn’t enjoy the luxury of stealth, which he certainly benefited from on the first “Shrek” movie. As “The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe” was readied for its Dec. 9 debut, everyone – including Disney, which is betting the movie can mend its ailing studio, and religious leaders, who see the film as a significant Christian parable – was looking over Adamson’s shoulders each step of the way, concerned that the filmmaker get the smallest things right. That pressure makes seemingly minor decisions feel momentous – which leads to the snow.