Post by jon on Sept 20, 2006 6:48:51 GMT -5
Fairytales are fun. But they're also mostly a bit grim and creepy, as many people know, and are only considered sappy kid's stuff these days thanks to Disney & Co making sappy kid's movies out of the nicer parts of the source material.
So let's talk about the other stuff. More sources and influences. Not everyone wants to go read the original stories, and people who have done might want more material. So let's talk about stuff like modern retellings that aren't cartoons designed for 8 year olds. Oh yes.
Shrek - HAH! It's a CGI movie and not a cartoon. Okay, so it's really light-hearted, but anyone of any age can really laugh at these movies. And they're got a great way of updating old fairytales in unconventional ways. Just watch all the background characters whizz by and there'd be more than enough there to run this entire room. So many ideas.
Changeling: The Dreaming - RPG system by White-Wolf, set in the World of Darkness. You know, where those Vamp-section people play. But this is the light-hearted system that was a real joy to play -- and hence nobody liked it
But it's all about the same thing as fables. Faeries, fay and changelings brought into existence by people's belief in them in the old tales, exiled from their homelands and trying to survive in the modern world. I even think someone here is playing a Sluagh from this system, and I know in the past I'd made both Puss-In-Boots (recycled AVs from him even) and the Cheshire Cat as Changeling characters. Prime material.
Rammstein - Sonne - Fantastic music video. If you haven't seen it, you should. My favourite take on the Snow White tale, featuring her beating the dwarves when they don't mine enough gold, to snorting golddust in the bathtub. Top marks.
American McGee's Alice - Probably responsible for the post-millennial renaissance of people wanting to remake fairytales as truly twisted things. A PC game that has more artistic direction than the Louvre on wheels. Set after the books, Alice's home and family perish in a house fire, and she is left comatose by the event. Taken to an asylum, the entire game is played out in her head, in Wonderland after it's lost much of it's wonder. The Cheshire Cat is a mangy beast with decaying teeth. The Mad Hatter is a half-clockwork psychopath in a straightjacket who conducts experiments to turn schoolchildren into clockwork cyborgs. The Dutchess is a baby-eating ogre. Visually stunning, the soundtrack is one of the best of alltime and one of my favourite albums ever, done primarily by Chris Vrenna (member of NIN up until after Downward Spiral, which coincidentally is when they started to get a bit shit) and with contributions from members of Marilyn Manson. But it's not industrial rock, no way, it's clockwork nightmares and deformed nursery music. The game's actual gameplay is a bit mediocre, but this is the ultimate triumph of style over substance, because it just doesn't seem to matter when you're playing.
Snow White: A Tale of Terror - Sam Neill and Sigourney Weaver star in one hell of an insidious movie. Much more like the original tale, this one sets the characters up as realistic people. The "wicked stepmother" tries to like her new stepdaughter, but Snow is an utterly obnoxious spoiled brat, and the last straw is when the stepmother's own child is stillborn. Snow meets the "seven dwarves" who are gruff, bluecollar miners, most of whom don't give a shit about her or actively dislike her. People die in disturbing ways, the whole tone of the movie is full of despair, and yet it's still got the fairytale feel of everything being "not quite right". Great work.
American Gods, by Neil Gaiman - A novel that's quite consistently voted into the top 10 novels ever in various polls. It's about the various gods that were brought to America by immigrants throughout the years, and how they've lost their power. It's enjoyable purely as a modern fantasy romp, but it's an utterly remarkable metaphor that details 500 years of american culture with ease. There's no real "fables" in it as such, but minor deities, myths and legends are sprinkled heavily throughout, and the core theme of people's belief in these old tales is naturally applicable to this place.
More later but I'm getting tired of typing, so you people add things!
So let's talk about the other stuff. More sources and influences. Not everyone wants to go read the original stories, and people who have done might want more material. So let's talk about stuff like modern retellings that aren't cartoons designed for 8 year olds. Oh yes.
Shrek - HAH! It's a CGI movie and not a cartoon. Okay, so it's really light-hearted, but anyone of any age can really laugh at these movies. And they're got a great way of updating old fairytales in unconventional ways. Just watch all the background characters whizz by and there'd be more than enough there to run this entire room. So many ideas.
Changeling: The Dreaming - RPG system by White-Wolf, set in the World of Darkness. You know, where those Vamp-section people play. But this is the light-hearted system that was a real joy to play -- and hence nobody liked it
But it's all about the same thing as fables. Faeries, fay and changelings brought into existence by people's belief in them in the old tales, exiled from their homelands and trying to survive in the modern world. I even think someone here is playing a Sluagh from this system, and I know in the past I'd made both Puss-In-Boots (recycled AVs from him even) and the Cheshire Cat as Changeling characters. Prime material.Rammstein - Sonne - Fantastic music video. If you haven't seen it, you should. My favourite take on the Snow White tale, featuring her beating the dwarves when they don't mine enough gold, to snorting golddust in the bathtub. Top marks.
American McGee's Alice - Probably responsible for the post-millennial renaissance of people wanting to remake fairytales as truly twisted things. A PC game that has more artistic direction than the Louvre on wheels. Set after the books, Alice's home and family perish in a house fire, and she is left comatose by the event. Taken to an asylum, the entire game is played out in her head, in Wonderland after it's lost much of it's wonder. The Cheshire Cat is a mangy beast with decaying teeth. The Mad Hatter is a half-clockwork psychopath in a straightjacket who conducts experiments to turn schoolchildren into clockwork cyborgs. The Dutchess is a baby-eating ogre. Visually stunning, the soundtrack is one of the best of alltime and one of my favourite albums ever, done primarily by Chris Vrenna (member of NIN up until after Downward Spiral, which coincidentally is when they started to get a bit shit) and with contributions from members of Marilyn Manson. But it's not industrial rock, no way, it's clockwork nightmares and deformed nursery music. The game's actual gameplay is a bit mediocre, but this is the ultimate triumph of style over substance, because it just doesn't seem to matter when you're playing.
Snow White: A Tale of Terror - Sam Neill and Sigourney Weaver star in one hell of an insidious movie. Much more like the original tale, this one sets the characters up as realistic people. The "wicked stepmother" tries to like her new stepdaughter, but Snow is an utterly obnoxious spoiled brat, and the last straw is when the stepmother's own child is stillborn. Snow meets the "seven dwarves" who are gruff, bluecollar miners, most of whom don't give a shit about her or actively dislike her. People die in disturbing ways, the whole tone of the movie is full of despair, and yet it's still got the fairytale feel of everything being "not quite right". Great work.
American Gods, by Neil Gaiman - A novel that's quite consistently voted into the top 10 novels ever in various polls. It's about the various gods that were brought to America by immigrants throughout the years, and how they've lost their power. It's enjoyable purely as a modern fantasy romp, but it's an utterly remarkable metaphor that details 500 years of american culture with ease. There's no real "fables" in it as such, but minor deities, myths and legends are sprinkled heavily throughout, and the core theme of people's belief in these old tales is naturally applicable to this place.
More later but I'm getting tired of typing, so you people add things!
