Super Sweet Scenes

Good morning Consumers, This is Please Consume, the Film newsletter that loves you more than Ben Affleck loves being from Boston. 

Mr. Willy Wonka means quite a bit to me.

The 1970’s Gene Wilder version of the film is the first movie I remember watching.

While the Wonka brand is back in the zeitgeist for the holiday season. We want to talk about some tasty treats…

The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe (2005)

Written by Tom Fortner

When I got the assignment for a scene of sweets or candy my mind immediately went to the scene in The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe when the White Witch gives Edmund an ornate container of Turkish Delight.

That’s right, Turkish Delight.

I’m still not quite sure what it is, but I do know how amazing this scene is. Let’s dive in!

The Backstory

For those of you who aren’t familiar with The Chronicles of Narnia, the  book or the films, I’ll give you a brief rundown. The series was originally written by C.S. Lewis and published during the first half of the 1950s. The stories are intended for children but are heavily lauded by adults as well, specifically for the fact that they are largely allegorical of Christian themes and ideas, something that Lewis denied, but is painfully obvious (Lewis is a famed Christian apologist). As a result, if you’re a Christian, chances are you’ve come across these books before.

Recently, three Narnia films were released between 2005 and 2010 by Disney, Prince Caspian, The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, and The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe. As a young fan of the books, these movies were adventurous and engaging, even if they didn’t follow everything from the original source material. And for the future of the franchise, Greta Gerwig is currently set to helm new adaptations for Netflix which has me extremely giddy!

It Was Only the Beginning

The scene itself is one of my favorites from the films. This isn’t because it's suspenseful or triumphant, no, it’s because of how damn good the sweets look. The White Witch (Tilda Swnton) has found Edmund lost in the snowy woods entices him into her sleigh, wrapping her big fur coat around his shoulders and creating a goblet of hot tea from a drop of liquid. Edmund (Skander Keynes) is understandably entranced. Who wouldn’t be? She tells him she can make whatever he wants to eat and a silver box of Turkish Delight appears from her drop of liquid at his request. It is only a bit later that she uses the promise of Turkish delight to entice Edmund to return to her castle with the rest of his siblings whom she has taken an unsettling interest in. Edmund has eyes only for the sweets.

 As an adult looking back on this scene, I can understand why I gravitated towards it so much. Basically, if I were in that situation, I would be no different from Edmund, ignoring clear warnings that this was definitely not a safe situation in order to have more candy. I know this because all I could think of as a kid was how awesome it would be to be capable of making any food I wanted out of thin air.

I see it as a reminder that I all too quickly will choose what is easy and seems good in the moment over my long term benefit. There’s a reason why, when Edmund is finished with his drink, the Witch’s servant throws it against a tree and it explodes into snow. It wasn’t real. It was vapor. The fact that this concept is in a children’s story is what makes them readable for adults as well as children. They are so aware of human tendencies.

Author’s Note

I’m still not entirely sure what Turkish Delight is, but believe it or not, I have tried it before. That is, I picked it up  from the international section at Publix, so how accurate that is to the real thing I don’t know.

What I do know is that I found it rather disgusting.

It had a sort of spicy taste, like the type you get when you have too much ginger, but it wasn’t ginger. I shiver to imagine it. Anyway, I encourage you, dear reader, to try it for yourself.

Today’s Scene