Horror movie in disguise

I've found many descriptions that dub Pan's Labyrinth as a fairy tale for adults, but I'd say that it's a well-crafted horror movie in disguise as a fantasy film and period piece, like a haunting "Alice in Wonderland" in civil war Spain.  I heard nothing but rave reviews about it since it came out, but it wasn't until almost five years later that I got around to watching it; it's not the kind of movie that I would toss into the DVD player and run in the background as I do chores or surf the web because its subject matter and it's spoken entirely in Spanish.  Initially I was daunted by the prospect of watching this movie but I was handsomely rewarded when I finally saw it.  If the story doesn't linger in your memory, the theme/melody will.  I don't really do horror movies, so this would be the film I would watch tonight (and I could because, after 20 hours, the power has come back on!  Alas, this is one of  the holes in my DVD collection.)

I'm thinking of a book...

I’m thinking of a popular book, one that was recently adapted into a movie.  It is set in the South around the 60’s and features a young white female protagonist who forms a strong and loving relationship with older black females.  No, it’s not The Help; I’m referring to The Secret Life of Bees.

thoughts on Pan's Labyrinth

Stream of consciousness writing, vomit draft, raw & largely unedited thoughts on the aforementioned film.

“Pan’s Labyrinth” is another one of those movies I had meant to watch for ages but kept finding one reason or another to put it off until later.  I have this feeling against casually watching movies that demand more attention.  This seemed like a fairly prestigious film, one that had been nominated for an Academy Award and therefore made me sort of sigh reluctantly at the thought of having to block out time to watch it.  Plus, it’s a foreign film and necessitates the reading of subtitles for the duration of the film.  I hate to fall under the figure of stupid ugly American who won’t watch a good movie because she has to read subtitles.  Basically it was an accumulation of little excuses that deterred me from discovering this gem, and I’m glad to have finally watched it.

 This film is deserving of its R rating.  I’ve definitely seen more grisly, bloody violence in other movies but there’s something very primal and psychologically disturbing about the violence in this movie, which I admire of it.  Having seen the film more than once I know when to close my eyes and ears—not just the sights but also the sounds that accompany them are equally terrifying.  It is very much an adult fairy tale.  This sounds misleading, as if there is some “adult content” that children should not know of until they reach a certain age, but it is not the case with this movie.  It is just that children would probably have nightmares about it, and there are heavy topics that would have more of an impact with adults who can process the psychological and historical occurrences.

I’m not sure if I would go as far to say that director Del Toro is a feminist but he certain puts a lot of womb-like elements into the set direction.  There is something very pro-woman in this film, which goes against and in contrast to the very male, fascist antagonist figures.  I know that he went against typecast with his actresses; for the deferring mother he cast a woman known for playing strong independent females, and for the strong surrogate mother maid he cast an actress who typically plays more of a femme fatale, lusty eye candy for men.

A real grown-up fairy tale, very well told by director Guillermo del Toro.  A wonderfully brave and not too precocious nine year old actress plays the protagonist.  Wi would tell anyone who dismiss fantasy as kids stuff to watch this and have them change their minds.  Some truly gripping, terrifying scenes that don’t show violence but hint at it, which makes it all the more gasp-inducing.  I’ve read somewhere that its really a horror film disguised as a fantasy, which it may well be.  And really, if I hahad known it was so violent I probably never would have seen it.  However, that wasn’t the only impediment/deterrent that prevented me from getting around to watching this.  Sometimes I like to watch something that I can put on in the background and sometimes I want something “meaty”, something I can chew over, some food for thought.  I heard much acclaim about this movie and worried about finding the time for such a prestigious work.

Forgot to include this in yesterday's post

I think that a big part of my fascination with "Beauty and the Beast" stories has to do with a segment I saw on Reading Rainbow when I was a child.

Butterfly in the sky... c'mon, you know you want to sing along:

For all the various clips of this show that are out there I can't seem to find one of the segment that I remember.  I've even looked at the episode list for all the seasons and can't find one that matches what I saw.  But I'm pretty sure that I saw it on Reading Rainbow because when I was that child age I almost exclusively watched PBS.  Anyway, the clip that I remember was from the end of a ballet version of "Beauty and the Beast".  It was incredibly affecting and has haunted me for all these years.  The dance was beautifully choreographed, I remember thinking to myself but not in those exact words, but what was the most striking was the Beast costume and how the heroine literally transformed him.  The danseur's costume was made of a stiff chiffon-like material, like very fine netting, and it covered his head and a bit of his chest; also he wore gloves made of the same material, and these gave him claws through which his hands could still be seen.  He lay mostly supine while she slowly removed these pieces to reveal his true visage, the man underneath the beast exterior.  And then they both got up and danced.

There are a lot of random things that I remember from childhood-- really random things, events that I don't deem to be of much or any importance.  But I remember this scene from this ballet which I am positive actually existed; though I was an imaginative little kid I wouldn't have been able to make this up at that age.  This might be the first version of "Beauty and the Beast" I ever saw, and certainly one of the first ballets I ever saw, albeit one that was filmed for a television audience of early readers.  Ah, someday I'll find that episode in which this clip was shown! Someday!

On "Beauty and the Beast"

Disney's "Beauty and the Beast" was my favorite Disney princess movie while I was growing up.  Now, Pocahontas, Mulan, and "The Princess and the Frog" heroine Maddie are up there as well.  It's kind of depressing to think about, though, considering how dark that movie is and the implications of the turn of events at the end:
1.  Belle says to the Beast (whose name, Adam, is never revealed in the film) that she loves him
2.  The rose is deflowered with the last petal floating magically down to the table
3.  The Beast (animal, base) becomes a Man (noble, gentle but strong)

Not to mention that this version justifies domestic violence in framing the female protagonist as the one who sees beyond the masculine one's abuse and endures it, ultimately transforming him through her love and patience and other feminine virtues.

There are many iterations of this story, both in text and film.  I have seen and read many of them:
- Cocteau's La Belle et la Bête (1946)
- Panna a nevtor (1981) from Czechoslovakia
- Cannon Movie Tales' musical version (1987) starring John Savage and Rebecca De Mornay
- Faerie Tale Theatre's Beauty and the Beast episode (1984) starring Klaus Kinski and Susan Sarandon
- the first season of the CBS drama Beauty and the Beast (1987) with Ron Perlman and Linda Hamilton
- of course, the Disney version from 1991 (but not any of the sequels or spin-off straight-to-VHS movies)
- haven't seen it but I have the soundtrack of the Broadway musical version of the Disney version
- the Hellboy movies, with Ron Perlman, include a bit of "Beauty and the Beast" undertones
- ...as do werewolf stories (and probably vampire ones too, but I don't want to get into that)
- any sitcom with a hot wife and schlubby/not conventionally attractive husband counts as an addition to this list

I've felt conflicted about my passion for this story, but I've come to accept it for what it is-- patriarchal teachings to pubescent females-- and can't help but appreciate the storytelling and, well, the romance of it all. Oh, I'll have to watch some of those movies again and write a post in response to each one; there's just so much for me to analyze.

thoughts on movie violence...

It's hard to say which I think is less bad: stylized violence or realistic violence.  I'm going to refer to the Kill Bill  films as examples of stylized violence and The Departed as one that has violence that is over the top but still too realistic for me to call it stylized.  (Spoiler alert for the movies).  Stylized violence exists for the audience to enjoy, where the Bad Guys and Good Guys are clearly delineated.  I shied away from watching any Tarantino film for a while because I heard about how violent they were, yet when I finally got around to watching one I found out that I liked them.  The story-telling and dialogue are whip-smart, but also the violence is stylized and unrealistic so I could sort of distance myself and remind myself that it was just a movie I was watching.  On the other hand you have “The Departed”, which is very much set in the real world, where people get beaten up and shown to be in pain, real pain.  The violence is over the top because the situations are over the top, and the violence serves to emphasize just how badass and cold-blooded the characters can get.  What’s better: hand to hand violence or gun violence?  I could argue that the former is better because it is more real, but then the latter evens the field a little more; you don’t have to be physically fit to shoot someone.  But “The Departed” has a lot of non-gun violence in it as well.  At the bottom of it, these are action movies—but with great dialogue!  In horror movies the whole point is to shock or gross out the audience with stylized violence. 

I can’t tolerate horror movies.  I know that the kind of violence portrayed in these movies is also very stylized and unrealistic, but I don’t get anything out of watching people get tortured and scream in pain.  That kind of violence isn’t warranted, to me; oftentimes it’s senseless killing and there’s nothing that smart or thought-provoking about it...

Bun in the oven?

That phrase absolutely tickles me, to say that a woman has a "bun in the oven" if she's pregnant.  It leads to some funny imagery, as recounted by the woman at the 1:16 mark:


Reminds me of another food-pregnancy analogy made by one of my heroines, the incomparable Carrie Fisher:
Someone's summered in my stomach
Somene's fallen through my legs,
To make an infant omelet,
Simply scramble sperm and eggs
- from her book "Wishful Drinking"

What is it about babies and edibility?  More than once I've found myself thinking "That baby is so cute that I want to eat it!"  Wh do I feel that way? I don't even eat meat, or literally wish to consume infants and yet this phrasee is the most apt one for the way I sometimes feel.  And cannabalism is generallly frowned upon, and maltreatment of babies-- born and unborn (fetus'? fetuses? fetii?)-- is similarly discouraged, to say the least.

Ramblings on age (part I, maybe)

I went to go see "Bridesmaids" recently and I got asked to present identification.  That's something that hasn't happened to me in a while; I don't see TONS of R-rated movies but that was only the second time I was asked to prove that I was of age.  Well, actually, I tried to buy a ticket for "Love, Actually" when it came out but bought a ticket for "Haunted Mansion" and sneaked into the theater next door just in time to hear Bill Nighy drop a string of f-bombs.

Happy Birthday Katharine Hepburn!

Note: The Blogger system was down for most of the evening of May 12th, during the time I typically write and post my entries.  The following is what I had written and intended to post for the day.

image source

Today is Katharine Hepburn’s birthday, and if she were still alive she’d be 104.  As it were, she died at the age of 96 and lived a spectacular life.  In a word, she was indefatigable, and one of my heroines.   I’d make a list of the ways she’s admirable but most of the points I would’ve made are compiled in this link.  One thing I'd like to draw more attention to is the fact that most of my peers think of the doe-eyed darling Audrey when it comes to the surname Hepburn-- especially when it comes to making with some serious sartorial statements (too much alliteration?).  But Katharine Hepburn made some of her own by opting to wear pants instead of dresses to her movie premieres, and I rather like that; I've written before of how I dislike wearing skirts.