Fury as Hollywood waters down Materials

Fans of author Philip Pullman have responded with anger to the decision to remove mention of the Church in the Hollywood adaptation of His Dark Materials for fear of upsetting American Christian groups.

The movie's director said the studio, New Line Cinema, which was also behind the Lord Of The Rings trilogy, was anxious that the film would fail to make money if it was perceived as anti-religious.

But fans of the award-winning trilogy have condemned the planned removal of anti-religious sentiment as a "blatant cop-out to the Bible Belt of America".

While relating the adventures of two children on a quest, Pullman's fantasy books also examine the corrupting force of religion and end with the death of a geriatric God. The Church itself is described as "wrong and bad".

But the film's director, Chris Weitz, told a fan website for the books, bridgetothestars.net, that he had a "certain amount of leeway" with some of the novel's "treacherous issues".

He said: "New Line is a company that makes films for economic returns.

"They have expressed worry about the possibility of His Dark Materials' perceived anti-religiosity making it an unviable project financially.

"My job is to get the film made in such a way that the spirit of the piece is carried through to the screen, and to do that I must contend not only with the difficulties of the material but with the fears of the studio.

"Needless to say, all my best efforts will be directed towards keeping His Dark Materials as liberating and iconoclastic an experience as I can.

"But there may be some modification of terms. You will probably not hear of the 'Church'."

The Hollywood director said that "the Authority in question could represent any arbitrary establishment that curtails the freedom of the individual,
whether it be religious, political, totalitarian, fundamentalist, communist".

But he admitted: "This will certainly be the issue that will ignite the most controversy amongst fans and amongst the general public."

Mr Weitz, who directed About A Boy starring Hugh Grant, said that Pullman agrees that the "Authority" in the novels could be more widely interpreted.

But a fan responds on the website: "The Authority represents the particular kind of blank, unconditional faith humans put in religion and their total unwillingness to question it.

"Having a Communist Authority, as Weitz actually dares suggest, would be utterly ridiculous."

The fan adds: "Why not go the whole hog and make it a parable about terrorism and have the Authority as a bearded dictator?"

The books have already been reworked for the stage in a successful production at the National Theatre.

The film hit controversy before when Oscar-winning playwright Sir Tom Stoppard had his draft for the project shelved.