meganbmoore: (curiouser and curiouser)
The Curse of Sleeping Beauty is a modern gothic horror retelling of Sleeping Beauty. Which sounds a lot better than it is.

A reclusive artist named Thomas keeps having dreams about, well, a sleeping beauty who he tries to kiss but can't. He used to be sociable but now just sits in his apartment all day, drawing pictures of the creepy house and sleeping girl in his dreams. Then he inherits a house from an uncle he's never heard of before that turns out to be the creepy house from his dreams. His uncle leaves him a letter that basically ays "Really sorry to do this to you kid, but it really sucks to be part of our family. Also, don't go to the lower levels. Ever. EVER. Trust me."

Naturally, he isn't there for five minutes before he's knocking on basement walls to find secret passages.

The house is full of creepy weird manequins. The local appraiser says that people keep disappearing and everything points to the house, but nothing is ever found. His new neighbor, Linda, tells him thatshe moved to town after the house took her brother, and that 53 people have been disappeared by the house over 125 years, so she's pretty sure it's cursed. OBVIOUSLY, Thomas and Linda go exploring the hidden tunnels and almost die from it.

I would have loved to see this movie get a good budget and a more experienced team (apparently the writer/director Pearry Teo, has done several other indie horror movies, but I haven't heard of them). The concept is there and a lot of the visual designs for the horror and fantasy elements could have been amazing with a good special effects budget. Unfortunately, the movie doesn't have what it needs to fulfill it's potential on any level. Don't get me wrong, I've seen some low budget indie SFF movies that I wished could get the full Hollywood treatment for the budget they needed to live up to their full potential, but still thought they did the best they could with what they had. That isn't what happened here. This movie is a half-hearted mess that threw up its hands in the last 5 minutes and decided not to write an ending in favor of sequel baiting for a sequel that will almost certainly never happen.
meganbmoore: (snow quuen 2002: gerda walking)
This is a take on "The Snow Queen," set in the modern world and with a heroine, Hazel, who was adopted in India by a white, American couple. (This is, I think, the only fiction I've read to take a look at that particular cultural trend and go "geez, I wonder what that's like for the kids, 10 years down the road...")

Hazel's life has recently been turned upside down: her parents recently got a divorce, forcing her to change schools. At her old school, she was considered imaginative and creative. At her new school she's considered withdrawn and not really connected to reality, existing in her own world in which her expansive library of children's literature takes a central role in her reasoning process, and her situation isn't aided by the fact that she sometimes has trouble communicating with people. (Note: Does anyone know if anyone has asked Ursu if she intended for Hazel to be read as ADD? Because I can't tell if I think it's deliberate, or if i'm over identifying and recognizing too much of my own 5th grade self.) In addition, her mother has decided that it's time for her to stop living in the clouds and conform more to conventional ideas of femininity and girlish interests and such. (In her mother's defense, I don't recall any indication that her mother actually thinks Hazel's relatively mild tomboyishness is bad, she just knows her daughter has problems and thinks that having "normal girl" interests will help her.)

Her only real friend, and the only person she feels can understand her, is Jack, who share's in her fantasy world and they do things like have superhero football and make magic forts and he gets when she communicates real world ideas and decisions through fictional allegories. But Jack is one of the things her mother feels she needs to "grow past," and Jack himself has started pulling away from Hazel and has befriended a pair of boys who like to harass Hazel.

Then one day, Jack's eye is mysteriously hurt, and shortly after, he disappears. When Hazel hears about a witch in the woods, a woman seemingly made of ice, who may have taken Jack, she gathers a survival kit and goes off into the woods to get him back. Except that the woods she finds herself in are not the same woods she entered, and the woods are full of frightening things pulled from all sorts of fables and mythology, all of which are frightened of the witch.

This is pretty great, guys! As I indicated before, I had more over-identification issues with Hazel at times, which may have increased my overall interest and investment, but I don't think I would retract my two thumbs up without that. My only complaint is that it really isn't addressed that Jack started being something of a jerk and bad friend to Hazel before he got the mirror shard in his eye, not just after, and i wish that had been dealt with.

There is apparently a quasi-sequel that just came out, but it's about other characters.

meganbmoore: (frozen)
Trailers for the only 2 movies currently on my radar to try to see in theaters:

Maleficent:



I like how they managed to convey the creepy gothic imagery from the animated movie to live action, and the visual feel of the movie overall. I'm iffy, though, on the fact that Aurora's actress is 15 and and Philip's is 24. I know Hollywood (and equivalents worldwide, really) likes to do that for characters who are supposed to be close in age, but it stands out more when one of them is too young to have a driver's license in most states. I think the ages of the leads in The Secret of Moonacre were around the same ages at the time, but that was heavily implied future romance, as opposed to explicitly romantic on screen, as I'm sure this will be.

(And I wonder if they're going to do "Once Upon a Dream." Which is THE MOST ROMANTIC THING EVER when you're 8, but then you rewatch it as an adult and it's "OMG PHILIP HOW DID I NOT KNOW YOU WERE A CREEPY FOREST PERV. Childhood crushing is destroyed.")

And Frozen:



I have very mixed feelings about this one. On the one hand, in and of itself. I really really like the idea of Frozen and think it looks fun. On the other hand, it bugs me as an adaptation of "The Snow Queen." Based on what I've heard about it, they went "good girl, bad queen, snow, road trip" and ditched the rest. While the final product may (will probably?) have more similarities than promotional material would imply, it's pretty unrecognizable as an adaptation of the source material. I mean, say what you will about Disney's adaptations of other fairly tales and the changes they made, they're pretty easily recognizable in relation to the original stories. Another thing about it being billed as an adaptation of "The Snow Queen" as opposed to original material is that then I have to dwell on how they took out all the women (which there are a reasonably large number of) but the Gerda and Snow Queen equivalents and replaced them with men, as seems to be the case from the trailer and character lists.

And Sundry

Aug. 13th, 2013 08:44 am
meganbmoore: (gerda: wind and snow)
 1.  Barbara Mertz, AKA Elizabeth Peters, AKA Barbara Michaels, has passed away at the age of 85.  She published 38 books under the name of Elizabeth Peters, 29 books under the name of Barbara Michaels, and 3 non-fiction books on Egyptology under her real name.  While I haven't read many of her Barbara Michaels books and none of her non-fiction (I intend to change both, but keep getting distracted) and the attitudes of when the earlier Peters books  were written tend to be obvious in the most cringeworthy way at times, her mysteries were a big part of my life in terms to fictional consumption and expectations for female leads in mysteries in my late teens, and Amelia Peabody is and always will be one of my favorite literary characters.  

2.  Male comic creators are being douches about women in comics (and POC, because representation is just tokenism*, but this article focuses on their comments about women).  News at 11.  I read a longer article yesterday about Mark Millar's dismissing the use of rape in fiction as being problematic by claiming it's just a good way to show villainy, but the comments were pretty much defending rape culture and shaming the objection to the casual use of rape in fiction, and I just never want to see the panels used for examples again.

3.  Related, it is explained how Jerry Conway is Very Very Wrong On The Internet (and at life) by claiming that Joan of Arc is the only female knight in history.  I do wish she'd also taken Eastern history and literature into account, though, because there's a whole lot more there.

4.  I'm finishing up a rewatch of The 10th Kingdom, and 13 years later, it's as delightful as ever, despite the fact that the trolls get even more annoying every time I watch it.  The opening credits are also still pretty impressive, despite how far CGI has come.

5.  I've tracked down a 1986 Finnish adaptation of The Snow Queen and a 1966 Russian one (both movies.)  Has anyone seen these?



*And it pains me so much that a panelist at WisCon said this in response to an audience member rattling off a list of shows with major female characters-mostly lead characters-between the ages of 35-50~, in response to claims that they didn't exist.

And sundry

Feb. 1st, 2013 05:17 pm
meganbmoore: (2 of a kind)

1.  I wanted to have lasagna for dinner, but I don't have the ingredients and that football game is Saturday, and the grocery store's parking lot was packed, so no lasagna for me.  Woes.

2.  10 of the most bizarre fairy tale adaptations.  (Print only.)  You can guess which I've read, and which 3 I now intend to read.

3.  I've been watching the original The Bionic Woman, and it holds up considerably better than I was expecting.  There are bits that make me cringe and/or roll my eyes, but I'm largely enjoying it.  The episodes of The Six Million Dollar Man that Jaime appeared in are also included.  Interestingly, while The Bionic Woman generally does a good job (so far) of not objectifying Jaime, The Six Million Dollar Man is perfectly to objectify Steve, who acquired an unflattering pornstache at some point.  It's also rather amusing to see how much EVERY SINGLE CHARACTER ships Jaime/Steve, given that they aren't even in the same series.  (My introduction to the franchise was actually when I caught a TV movie in the 90s in which they finally got married a couple decades later.)

4.  Apparently Do No Harm, the latest modern remake of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde had utterly horrible ratings for the pilot.  I'm not surprised, as it sounded rather unimaginative and very "the exact same thing, but in modern times."  (Then again, "the exact same thing, but in modern times" seems to be working pretty well for Sherlock, so you never know.)

5.  I refuse to ever use the title "five things to make a post," but apparently I still feel there should be a 5.
 

meganbmoore: (got: danaerys: egg)
1. While I am generally up for almost any fairy tale riff/sequel, I have very little interest in the upcoming Hansel and Gretelmovie. Largely because every "grown up" Hansel and Gretel I've encountered has basically had one or both as a mini-inquisition. And while I like the fairy tale and can see "professional witchhunters" as being a logical next step for them, I always get uncomfortable. That said, I hope to be persuaded by news and trailers.

Also, if nothing else, maybe this will be the movie that finally gets US fandom to realize that Gemma Arterton has an entire career outside of Clash of the Titans and Prince of Persia, and had it long before those movies too.

2. I've been reading the new ASoIaF book and...finding it a struggle. The TV show made me suspect I'd filtered out a lot of the things I didn't care about as much without really noticing I was doing so, and reading it confirms that. I'm finding it really hard to care without Cat or Sansa, and have been bored by all but Jon and Dany's parts. (I'm currently on Dany's second chapter.) Due to his frequent internal and sometimes external displays of misogyny, I'm finding Tyrion in particular difficult to pay attention to.

Also, while I still like epic fantasy as a viewing genre, i've come to not really care for it as a reading genre in recent years, as evidenced by books in series I love/authors I love that I simply haven't read yet. My reading fantasy tastes are more contained/small scale these days. I'll read a multi-book medieval-ish world fantasy series these days, but one with an end in sight and a smaller cast and more contained plot. Tastes change?
meganbmoore: (crossroads)

I just watched this movie (I believe it's based on and Angela Carter story?) which uses the basic Red Riding Hood story as a framework to tell all sorts of werewolf myths.  It was very interesting and 80s fantasy turned weird and creepy and surreal (and 80s fantasy is weird and surreal and sometimes creepy to start with) and actually possibly the most weirdly surreal thing I've seen (well, no, Utena is kinda hard to beat...), and I've seen my share of weirdly surreal things (though nowhere near as much as some of you.)

Seriously, though, if you're interested in myths and stories that combine myths, check it out.

Though, some comments people made about Red Riding Hood make more sense now.

 

spoilers for both movies )
meganbmoore: (curiouser and curiouser)

So, I just watched the new Red Riding Hood movie.  It was a bit slow paced, but generally pretty good (and ridiculously pretty and OMG THERE WAS SO MUCH SNOW I WANT SOME IT'S 11 PM HERE AND 94 DEGREES FAHRENHEIT!!  Uhm...the movie was very pretty.) and less about The Boyfriend than previews indicated and I was all cozy and happy...and then we got to the end.
 

 

spoilers spoilers spoilers )
meganbmoore: (crossroads)
These are the first three in what I believe is a projected 4 book series in which Cinderella, Sleeping Beauty, and Snow White are the secret service of Queen Beatrice, the mother of Cinderella’s Prince Charming. While the setting itself is a fairly common Medieval-lite world, Hines uses the older, darker versions of the fairy tales-heals and toes get lopped off, huntsmen are sent to cut out hearts, princesses wake up from 100-year-long comas due to labor pains. Etc.

Danielle (Cinderella) is the new princess and becomes a secret agent mostly out of necessity, Talia (Sleepy Beauty) is one of the world’s deadliest fighters thanks to her fairy blessings, but is also cold and distant due to the consequences of her enchanted sleep, and Snow (White) is a promiscuous sorceress and major bookworm.

The books are largely a blast, with The Stepsister Scheme focusing mainly on the Cinderella and Snow White fables, The Mermaid’s Madness on The Little Mermaid, and Red Hood’s Revenge on Little Red Riding Hood and Sleeping Beauty, though I think the first is the strongest, even if the second had the most interesting plot for me. Based on these books, I think Hines works best with one main POV, and not quite as well with multiple POVs, though he’s still good that way. Book one is primarily from Danielle’s POV, with the other two adding other POVs. While I actually prefer Talia and Snow as characters, Danielle’s POV is the strongest, I think.

Hines is definitely aware of the problems of the genre and attempting to address them in the books, and largely with success, though he does end up unintentionally slipping into other problems a bit in the process. For example, the basic concept takes three heroines mostly notable in their tales for virtue and (mostly forced) passivity and gives them action and agency and purpose, but when Red Riding Hood, who is the more active heroine in many versions of her tale, is introduced she’s a darker, ruthless character shown in a somewhat villainous light. (I haven’t read reviews of Red Hood’s Revenge yet, but I do know most seem to enjoy it less than the previous installments, and I wonder if that may factor in?) Then there’s Talia. [spoilers] On the one hand, a black woman is the Most Beautiful In The World (with it addressed that tastes and standards change like to flat hair and skinny bodies and black women‘s skin mysteriously becoming way lighter between series) and is the best fighter with the focus on her being good, not on her being a fetishized Warrior Woman badass. On the other, she‘s also the detached rape victim who has difficulty making connections and unrequited love for her heterosexual best friend. That said, I‘m very glad that Red Hood‘s Revenge clarified that she is lesbian, as opposed to asexual except for Snow, who she had years of non-threatening exposure to, which was the impression I got in The Mermaid‘s Madness. Which would have made perfect sense given her history, but also has the “rape kills a woman‘s sexuality” undertone.


I think, though, that Hines still ends up far on the positive side, and am not sure the negatives could be avoided with the subjects he’s tackling, given the cultural baggage that comes with a lot of it. The books are a lot of fun, and I’m eager for the next, which I think is Hines’s take on The Snow Queen, which is basically my favorite fairy tale. Has anyone read his Goblin books?
meganbmoore: (rose red)
I didn't really go in for most teenybopper movies even when I was one, but I thought I'd check Sydney White out because I like fairy tale adaptations.  Like Sleeping Beauty and Cinderella, Snow White isn't  a fairy tale I've ever been particularly fond of, always prefering story like The Snow Queen, East of the Sun West of the Moon, The Twelve Dancing Princesses, Beauty and the Beast, The Little Mermaid, The Seven Swans, and even The Frog Prince.  Like Ever After, though, it seems you can make me like the story if you rewrite it so that the heroine is the heroine of her own story instead of getting rescued by a prince she barely knows because she's pretty and pure and does chores.

This sets the story on a college campus where Sydney, a plumber's daughter, joines the sorority her mother was a member of only to be kicked out by Rachel Witchburn, who rules the campus, for not being "Sorority material."  And because the guy Rachel likes likes Sydney.  I may or may not love Rachel because she tried to run down the marching band.  The seven dwarves are the seven campus dorks who live in a rundown cottage on campus, and who Sydney uses to try to overthrow the absolute rule of the campus sororities and fraternities.

By pur coincidence, I've also started to read Gregory Maquire's Mirror, Mirror, which is a retelling of Snow White set in Itally in the early 1500s, with Lucrezia Borgia as the wicked stepmother.  I should be in love, but am actually a bit bored, I think mainly because there are already I think 4 narrative voices in 50 pages, and none really grab me, though I'm sticking with it, though it's mostly making me want to reread Cantarella.  For fans of Maguire's: does it get more interesting when the lead grows up?  Is this one of his better books?  Well liked?  Etc.
meganbmoore: (princess tutu-once upon a time)
  1. You probably have at least one dead parent. Maybe two.
  2. You’re always falling into a coma.
  3. Your husband has the exact same name as every other princess’s husband.
  4. You have an evil step-parent. Possibly evil step-siblings, too.
  5. Your boyfriend falls in love with you in five seconds because you’re pretty. He doesn’t care if you went to Yale and graduated at the top of your class or if you think 2 + 2 = 7. He also doesn’t care if you help old ladies across the street, or like to kick them in the shin and steal their canes. As long as you’re pretty.
  6. All the other girls hate you because you’re pretty and the cute guy likes you. (Welcome to high school. And fandom.)
  7. All your friends are dwarves or talking animals.
  8. Curses. Somebody is always cursing you. And it’s always because you’re pretty, or because your daddy forgot to invite them to a party. They never do it because of anything you’ve done.
  9. There’s only ever one good looking, age appropriate guy around. Sure, he’s the prince, but wouldn’t a choice of some sort be nice?
  10. Really, you shouldn’t worry about #5, because all you really have to do is clean, dance, and look pretty when the prince comes to rescue you. You don’t need a brain or much personality anyway.

Disclaimer: Megan loves fairy tales. But there are reasons The Snow Queen is her favorite fairy tale, and that Mulan is her favorite Disney movie.

meganbmoore: (Default)
  1. You probably have at least one dead parent. Maybe two.
  2. You’re always falling into a coma.
  3. Your husband has the exact same name as every other princess’s husband.
  4. You have an evil step-parent. Possibly evil step-siblings, too.
  5. Your boyfriend falls in love with you in five seconds because you’re pretty. He doesn’t care if you went to Yale and graduated at the top of your class or if you think 2 + 2 = 7. He also doesn’t care if you help old ladies across the street, or like to kick them in the shin and steal their canes. As long as you’re pretty.
  6. All the other girls hate you because you’re pretty and the cute guy likes you. (Welcome to high school. And fandom.)
  7. All your friends are dwarves or talking animals.
  8. Curses. Somebody is always cursing you. And it’s always because you’re pretty, or because your daddy forgot to invite them to a party. They never do it because of anything you’ve done.
  9. There’s only ever one good looking, age appropriate guy around. Sure, he’s the prince, but wouldn’t a choice of some sort be nice?
  10. Really, you shouldn’t worry about #5, because all you really have to do is clean, dance, and look pretty when the prince comes to rescue you. You don’t need a brain or much personality anyway.

Disclaimer: Megan loves fairy tales. But there are reasons The Snow Queen is her favorite fairy tale, and that Mulan is her favorite Disney movie.

meganbmoore: (fables-snow bigby 2)

I've been watching scattered episodes of FTT the last week and a half.  Since all the episodes are self contained and I've seen a fair number of them before (only two of this batch, though) it's a lot easier to pace myself with these than it normally is for me.

blah blah )
meganbmoore: (Default)

I've been watching scattered episodes of FTT the last week and a half.  Since all the episodes are self contained and I've seen a fair number of them before (only two of this batch, though) it's a lot easier to pace myself with these than it normally is for me.

blah blah )
meganbmoore: (fables-snow bigby 2)
Shelley Duvall’s Faerie Tale Theatre (which shall now be referred to as FTT) was one of the earlier cable successes.  It’s a collection of 26 fairy tales, many of which started then-big names(and some still are)  Robin Williams, Teri Garr, Liza Minelli, Mick Jagger, Barbara Hershey, Bernadette Peters, Susan Sarandon, Mary Steenbergen, and Christopher Reaves were in it off the top of my head.  The stories themselves range from tongue in cheek to close retellings of the original to Disney-like versions to a happy middle ground, whatever suited each tale and actors best, and they’re all self-contained, and range from about 40 minutes to an hour each.

My parents had copies of about half of them, so I got to watch them a lot when I was a teenager (up until my brother recorded over several…bah) And I had just started working my way through them when I got sidetracked by doramas last year(the fact that I had seen 4 of the 6 I watched multiple times growing up didn’t help, as it gave it a “comfy rewatch” status, as opposed to “new viewing” even though I hadn’t seen them in a long time and there are a lot of stories I haven’t seen yet)

As an aside, when I first learned that the series had been released on DVD and was reading Amazon reviews, and someone tore into this version of the Little Mermaid for “ruining” a beautiful romance…the Little Mermaid in FTT is almost word-for-word Andersen’s story…

meganbmoore: (Default)
Shelley Duvall’s Faerie Tale Theatre (which shall now be referred to as FTT) was one of the earlier cable successes.  It’s a collection of 26 fairy tales, many of which started then-big names(and some still are)  Robin Williams, Teri Garr, Liza Minelli, Mick Jagger, Barbara Hershey, Bernadette Peters, Susan Sarandon, Mary Steenbergen, and Christopher Reaves were in it off the top of my head.  The stories themselves range from tongue in cheek to close retellings of the original to Disney-like versions to a happy middle ground, whatever suited each tale and actors best, and they’re all self-contained, and range from about 40 minutes to an hour each.

My parents had copies of about half of them, so I got to watch them a lot when I was a teenager (up until my brother recorded over several…bah) And I had just started working my way through them when I got sidetracked by doramas last year(the fact that I had seen 4 of the 6 I watched multiple times growing up didn’t help, as it gave it a “comfy rewatch” status, as opposed to “new viewing” even though I hadn’t seen them in a long time and there are a lot of stories I haven’t seen yet)

As an aside, when I first learned that the series had been released on DVD and was reading Amazon reviews, and someone tore into this version of the Little Mermaid for “ruining” a beautiful romance…the Little Mermaid in FTT is almost word-for-word Andersen’s story…

meganbmoore: (fables-rose)
Happily N'ever After is the latest(to my knowledge) entry in the retelling Fairy Tales with attitude movie trend...you know, Shrek, Hoodwinked, Ella Enchanted, endless TV movies and minis, etc.  I loved the first Shrek, really liked the story but hated the animation on the second, I adore Hoodwinked, I liked Ella Enchanted, I love 10 Kingdoms and have found a variety of the other fairy tale TV movies and miniseries to be likable enough, but I have to say, much as I love the subgenre(and we aren't even  getting into Fables, Lullaby or Castle Waiting, as they're all comics, much less all the novels...) but it's entirely possible that the trend is starting to wear itself out.

HNA is set in a fairy tale world where, by keeping the scales of good and evil perfectly balanced, good always wins and all stories end happily.  Of course, this set off my trouble meter less than 5 minutes in, as, if the scales are perfectly balanced, how the heck does good manage to always and unconditionally win?  Moving on...the wizard in charge of keeping the scales balanced decides to go on vacation, leaving his two apprentices in charge just as the latest Cinderella's story is about to take place.  Ella, of course, is hopelessly in love with the local prince, a nice but utterly useless fellow, while RIck, a ckitchen boy, is hopelessly in love with Ella.  On the night of the ever so famous ball, the Wicked Stepmother(voiced by Sigourney Weaver and by far the best part about the movie) overhears the two apprentices bickering over the scales(one accidentally almost got the frog prince eaten by fooling around) in a tower and, when she investigates and finds out what's about to happen, kicks the apprentices out, steals the wizard's staff and tips the scales in the favor of evil.  Thinking that only a true hero(read: prince) can save them, Ella sets off to find the prince, who the stepmother sent away, and Rick sets out after Ella.

The movie is amusing enough, but is very much a "because these are popular these days" piece.  I doubt I'll remember much beyond the stepmother being kinda cool and the animation reminding me of the 7th King's Quest game(I think the 7th...the one where Rosella goes to the other world and gets turned into a troll and her mother follows her to save her) which is a point in it's favor.  Part of the problem is that Ella's supposed to be strong and sympathetic if all about the wrong guy and Rick is supposed to be brave, clever and snarky, but Rick has maybe 2 good lines and both characters really just seemed shallow and petty.  And the apprentices, while amusing, were pretty generic.  At only 80 minutes, it's no loss to watch it, and it's amusing and diverting enough, but, ehile not bad, there's nothing great or exceptionally stand out about it.

Oh, and Sarah Michelle Gellar is anorexic when animated, too.

In other news, it reminded me that I had started watching Shelley Duvall's Fairy Tale Theatre(mostly rewatching so far, actually) last year, but then I got sidetracked by dorama...I should get back to that.

ETA: In the alternate ending, the Prince's name is revealed to be Humperdink.  This raises the movie a notch or two.
meganbmoore: (Default)
Happily N'ever After is the latest(to my knowledge) entry in the retelling Fairy Tales with attitude movie trend...you know, Shrek, Hoodwinked, Ella Enchanted, endless TV movies and minis, etc.  I loved the first Shrek, really liked the story but hated the animation on the second, I adore Hoodwinked, I liked Ella Enchanted, I love 10 Kingdoms and have found a variety of the other fairy tale TV movies and miniseries to be likable enough, but I have to say, much as I love the subgenre(and we aren't even  getting into Fables, Lullaby or Castle Waiting, as they're all comics, much less all the novels...) but it's entirely possible that the trend is starting to wear itself out.

HNA is set in a fairy tale world where, by keeping the scales of good and evil perfectly balanced, good always wins and all stories end happily.  Of course, this set off my trouble meter less than 5 minutes in, as, if the scales are perfectly balanced, how the heck does good manage to always and unconditionally win?  Moving on...the wizard in charge of keeping the scales balanced decides to go on vacation, leaving his two apprentices in charge just as the latest Cinderella's story is about to take place.  Ella, of course, is hopelessly in love with the local prince, a nice but utterly useless fellow, while RIck, a ckitchen boy, is hopelessly in love with Ella.  On the night of the ever so famous ball, the Wicked Stepmother(voiced by Sigourney Weaver and by far the best part about the movie) overhears the two apprentices bickering over the scales(one accidentally almost got the frog prince eaten by fooling around) in a tower and, when she investigates and finds out what's about to happen, kicks the apprentices out, steals the wizard's staff and tips the scales in the favor of evil.  Thinking that only a true hero(read: prince) can save them, Ella sets off to find the prince, who the stepmother sent away, and Rick sets out after Ella.

The movie is amusing enough, but is very much a "because these are popular these days" piece.  I doubt I'll remember much beyond the stepmother being kinda cool and the animation reminding me of the 7th King's Quest game(I think the 7th...the one where Rosella goes to the other world and gets turned into a troll and her mother follows her to save her) which is a point in it's favor.  Part of the problem is that Ella's supposed to be strong and sympathetic if all about the wrong guy and Rick is supposed to be brave, clever and snarky, but Rick has maybe 2 good lines and both characters really just seemed shallow and petty.  And the apprentices, while amusing, were pretty generic.  At only 80 minutes, it's no loss to watch it, and it's amusing and diverting enough, but, ehile not bad, there's nothing great or exceptionally stand out about it.

Oh, and Sarah Michelle Gellar is anorexic when animated, too.

In other news, it reminded me that I had started watching Shelley Duvall's Fairy Tale Theatre(mostly rewatching so far, actually) last year, but then I got sidetracked by dorama...I should get back to that.

ETA: In the alternate ending, the Prince's name is revealed to be Humperdink.  This raises the movie a notch or two.
meganbmoore: (Default)

Cursor's Fury is the 3rd book in Jim Butcher's Codex Alera series(more commonly known as "Butcher's other fantasy series")  The CA series is a rarity for me in that, while I like coming of age fantasy series I generally only tolerate(Eragon) or like well enough but prefer other cast members(Harry) to the main character.  However, off the top of my head, the only other character besides CA's Tavi I flat out love is Twelve Kingdoms' Yoko(now, in both cases, neither is QUITE my favorite, but I'm extremely attached to both) The CA series is set in a world where everyone bonds with furies(essentially, elementals) and as a result, works magic to the point where the entire society(loosely based on ancient roman society) depends on it.  Except for Tavi, who has no furies at all.  The thing about Tavi is that he's not "special" he's "abnormal"...Tavi having to live without furies is the equivalent of our being deaf, mute or blind.  He is lacking in something that others consider to be crucial to daily life(pleae note that I'm not saying being deaf muteor blind makes one abnormal, just that that's what Tavi is in his world).  Tavi isn't the kid with special abilities and a destiny to save the world, he's a civilian in a world of superheroes.  To compensate, Tavi has to learn to think one step ahead of everyone...the only thing he has to compensate for his lack of furies is his brains.  He's not supersmart or inherently clever, but he learns to be clever, and to survive.  One other thing about Tavi is that, unlike other "coming of age heroes" who get coddled or praised when being naive or immature(*waves to Eragon*) when he acts immature or naive, he gets called on it.  Why?  Because if he's not and he goes around acting like that, he's going to get himself or someone else killed.  (The fact that he has an awesome OTP to keep him in line helps)  He doesn't get his hand held and magic companions or weapons or powers given to him, he has to rise to the occassion and get things done with nothing but himself and whatever loyalty he manages to inspire.

The first two books have Tavi pretty much accidentally saving the  realm and becoming page to the first lord and a soldier in training.  Cursor's Fury, I understand, came about because Butcher took up a bet someone made with him that a fantasy novel about the Roman Legions couldn't be good(he won by a long shot) so his locks got shorn and the First Lord shipped him off to what was SUPPOSED to be well aware from the battlefronts in disguise as a low ranking officer for safety(not that it works out that way)

more )

Also read Juliet Marillier's Wildwood Dancing, her first young adult book and(as far as I know) her first standalone book.  I'm actually not quite sure why it's marketyed as YA.  The characters  are in the same age group as the characters in her regular fantasy books, and like her other books, the story is drenched in the society and cultural of the period, as well as the local folklore and mythology.  Granted, the plot isn't as complex as the plots are in her other books, but those are A) longer and B) parts of series.  The plot is, though, much more complex than what I generally associate with YA fiction(though I guess Harry Potter is changing that) and there are elements to it that I'm not sure most teens would uderstand.  I rather think she wrote it then it got marketted as YA.  The book itself is loosely based on two fairy tales:  The Dancing Princesses and The Frog Prince.(with nods to others)

more )
meganbmoore: (Default)

Cursor's Fury is the 3rd book in Jim Butcher's Codex Alera series(more commonly known as "Butcher's other fantasy series")  The CA series is a rarity for me in that, while I like coming of age fantasy series I generally only tolerate(Eragon) or like well enough but prefer other cast members(Harry) to the main character.  However, off the top of my head, the only other character besides CA's Tavi I flat out love is Twelve Kingdoms' Yoko(now, in both cases, neither is QUITE my favorite, but I'm extremely attached to both) The CA series is set in a world where everyone bonds with furies(essentially, elementals) and as a result, works magic to the point where the entire society(loosely based on ancient roman society) depends on it.  Except for Tavi, who has no furies at all.  The thing about Tavi is that he's not "special" he's "abnormal"...Tavi having to live without furies is the equivalent of our being deaf, mute or blind.  He is lacking in something that others consider to be crucial to daily life(pleae note that I'm not saying being deaf muteor blind makes one abnormal, just that that's what Tavi is in his world).  Tavi isn't the kid with special abilities and a destiny to save the world, he's a civilian in a world of superheroes.  To compensate, Tavi has to learn to think one step ahead of everyone...the only thing he has to compensate for his lack of furies is his brains.  He's not supersmart or inherently clever, but he learns to be clever, and to survive.  One other thing about Tavi is that, unlike other "coming of age heroes" who get coddled or praised when being naive or immature(*waves to Eragon*) when he acts immature or naive, he gets called on it.  Why?  Because if he's not and he goes around acting like that, he's going to get himself or someone else killed.  (The fact that he has an awesome OTP to keep him in line helps)  He doesn't get his hand held and magic companions or weapons or powers given to him, he has to rise to the occassion and get things done with nothing but himself and whatever loyalty he manages to inspire.

The first two books have Tavi pretty much accidentally saving the  realm and becoming page to the first lord and a soldier in training.  Cursor's Fury, I understand, came about because Butcher took up a bet someone made with him that a fantasy novel about the Roman Legions couldn't be good(he won by a long shot) so his locks got shorn and the First Lord shipped him off to what was SUPPOSED to be well aware from the battlefronts in disguise as a low ranking officer for safety(not that it works out that way)

more )

Also read Juliet Marillier's Wildwood Dancing, her first young adult book and(as far as I know) her first standalone book.  I'm actually not quite sure why it's marketyed as YA.  The characters  are in the same age group as the characters in her regular fantasy books, and like her other books, the story is drenched in the society and cultural of the period, as well as the local folklore and mythology.  Granted, the plot isn't as complex as the plots are in her other books, but those are A) longer and B) parts of series.  The plot is, though, much more complex than what I generally associate with YA fiction(though I guess Harry Potter is changing that) and there are elements to it that I'm not sure most teens would uderstand.  I rather think she wrote it then it got marketted as YA.  The book itself is loosely based on two fairy tales:  The Dancing Princesses and The Frog Prince.(with nods to others)

more )

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