The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian is a 2008 fantasy film based on Prince Caspian, the second published novel in C. S. Lewis’ children’s fantasy series The Chronicles of Narnia.

It will be the second film in The Chronicles of Narnia film series from Walt Disney Pictures and Walden Media, following The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. The four Pevensie children return to Narnia to aid a young prince in his struggle for the throne against his corrupt uncle King Miraz.

Originally scheduled for a December 14, 2007 release, the film was pushed back to a May 16, 2008 premiere. The film, while fourth in the series’s internal chronology, was the second story authored by C. S. Lewis and will help maintain believable continuity with the maturing actors. In continuity with the film version of The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe, having returned from Narnia, the children’s next visit to Narnia would be during the events of Prince Caspian.

One year has passed in our world since the first adventure ended, but in Narnia almost 1,300 years have passed. The villainous King Miraz prevents the rightful king, his young nephew Prince Caspian, from ruling the land of Narnia. Caspian uses Susan’s magic horn that was left in Narnia to summon the four Pevensies to help him and a small army of Old Narnians reclaim his rightful throne.

Before the release of The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, the screenplay for the sequel Prince Caspian had already been written. Screenwriters Christopher Markus and Stephen McFeely described their aim to explore how the Pevensies feel after returning from Narnia, going from being kings and queens back to an awkward year as school children. They noted, “[C.S. Lewis] doesn’t much consider what it would be like for a King of Narnia to return to being a 1940s schoolkid.” They also decided to introduce the Pevensies back into Narnia nearer the start, in order to weave the two separate stories of the Pevensies and Caspian, in contrast to the book’s structure.

A sense of guilt on the Pevensies’ part was added, seeing the destruction of Narnia in their absence. Andrew Adamson also noted his desire to make the film larger in scale. As part of this, a new battle scene in which Peter and Caspian make an attempted raid on Miraz’s castle was created. Susan and Lucy were also given a bigger part during the action sequences.

Andrew Adamson described the film as being darker, as it takes place “another 1300 years later, [and] Narnia has been oppressed by Telmarines for a large period of that time, so it’s a dirtier, grittier, darker place than the last world was. When the kids come back in, they bring a lot of nostalgia with them and they think they are going back to the place they knew and instead they’ve come back to a very changed world.” Howard Berger also said that Prince Caspian would be more medieval than The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. For the Narnians, Berger envisioned them as more wild in appearance, as they have been forced into the forests.

He also decided to increase the portrayal of various ages, sizes and races. The black dwarfs are distinguished by the red dwarfs as they have more leather and jewellery, and a darker colour scheme in their costumes. Each race of creatures also had their fighting styles made more distinguishable. The minotaurs have maces, and the centaurs use flails. The satyrs were redesigned, as their creation on the first film had been rushed.

The filmmakers interpreted the Telmarines, including Caspian, as being Hispanic because of their pirate origins, which producer Mark Johnson noted made Caspian “a contrast to the lily-white [Pevensies].” Production designer Roger Ford said he had wanted the Telmarines to be French, as they had a confrontational history with the English, who are represented by the Pevensies. This was scrapped as the crew were unable to shoot at Pierre Fonds Castle, for Miraz’s lair, so they went for the Spanish feel. Weta Workshop created masked helmets for their army, and faceplates for the live horses on set.

The stunt soldiers wield two-hundred polearms in two different styles, two-hundred rapiers of varying design, over a hundred falchions, two-hundred and fifty shields and fifty-five crossbows. Caspian’s own sword is a variation of the Royal Guard’s weapons. Costume designer Isis Mussenden looked to the paintings of El Greco to inspire the Telmarines’ costumes. She wanted to use colours that looked “acidic and hot and cool at the same time”, unlike the red and gold seen in the Narnian soldiers. Their masked helmets are based on conquistadors and samurai.

Prince Caspian has over 1500 special effects shots, more than The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe’s 800 effects shots, yet the film has less time to complete them. The scale of special effects led Andrew Adamson to decide to base production in England, to take advantage of new tax breaks. British visual effects companies the Moving Picture Company and Framestore CFC were hired, to create the visual effects alongside Weta Digital. One of the improvements made over the previous film was to make the centaurs walk during dialogue scenes, so Cornell John as Glenstorm wore Power Risers (mechanical stilts with springs), to mimic a horse’s canter and height. Alex Funke, who worked on The Lord of the Rings, will be directing the film’s miniatures unit. These include 1/24th and 1/100th scale miniatures of Miraz’s castle.

Composer Harry Gregson-Williams is returning to score the film. He has said the score will be darker than the previous film, and that he will develop “one or two of the cues.”Disney initially announced a December 14, 2007 release date, but pushed it back to May 16, 2008. The official trailer was released on 4 December 2007 on Narnia fan sites and social networking sites to a potential audience of nearly 400 million.