1. Pan's Labyrinth (Director: Guillermo Del Toro, 2006)
This fantasy film has a narrative that deals with the main character Ofelia escaping into a fantasy world in an attempt to block out the harsh realities of her life during the Spanish Civil War. As she encounters mythical creatures, fairies and monsters it therefore makes an ideal choice as my focus film. It's themes of escapism and innocence are common throughout the genre and I will use the film to compare and contrast with my two other choices.
2. Alice in Wonderland (Director: Tim Burton, 2010)
This is also a fantasy film which shows the main character 'Alice' returning to Wonderland. Wonderland is also a fantasy world with strange characters like talking animals and extreme versions of human characters. Alice was escaping her family. This supports my focus film because they both have similar characters on similar journeys. They are both looking for something better. It also shows escapism which allows comparison to my other film choices.
3. La Belle et la Bête (Director: Jean Cocteau, 1946)
This is also a fantasy film which fits with my theme. It's the first adaption of Beauty and Beast but is different to more recent adaptations. Belle leaves her poor family to live in the beasts castle as a trade. She doesn't want to leave. She develops a relationship with the beast showing a theme of 'how real beauty exists below the surface'. In all three films the main characters demonstrate strength of character which helps to compare and contrast my choices. They also aren't saved by princes which is how fairy tales traditionally end.
4. Guillermo del Toro Interview about Pan's Labyrinth (2006)
http://www.theguardian.com/film/2006/nov/05/features.review1
This article is useful because it talks about how Pan's Labyrinth is a dark fairy tale
that distils his distinctive mix of fact and fantasy, poetry and politics, pain and pleasure I was also trying to uncover a common thread between the "real world" and the "imaginary world" through one of the seminal concerns of fairy tales: choice. It's something that has intrigued me since Cronos, through Hellboy and now to Pan's Labyrinth: the way your choices define you
5. Tim Burton Interview about The Corpse Bride (2005)
http://www.abc.net.au/atthemovies/txt/s1500904.htm
This article is useful because it talks about how
I think all good fantasy, you try to have some reality in it. Any fable or fairy tale has some sort of reality in it. That's why I think I love the form of fantasy or fairy tale, is that you're able to kind of put things in there and let people sort of, discover their own emotion, discover their own sort of feelings about things. Or make their own lessons from it.
6. Guillermo Del Toro Interview about Pan's Labyrinth
http://movies.about.com/od/panslabyrinth/a/pansgt122206.htm
This article is useful because it talks about how del Toro likes fairy tales that are made to instill hope and magic in children and how he thinks there needs to be darkness in them .
There are fairy tales that are created to instill hope and magic in children. I like those. I like the anarchic ones. I like the crazy ones. And, I think that all of them have a huge quotient of darkness because the one thing that alchemy understands, and fairy tale lore understands, is that you need the vile matter for magic to flourish. You need lead to turn it into gold. You need the two things for the process. So when people sanitize fairy tales and homogenize them, they become completely uninteresting for me.”
7. Guillermo Del Toro Interview (Winter 2014)
http://www.dga.org/Craft/DGAQ/All-Articles/1401-Winter-2014/DGA-Interview-Del-Toro.aspx
This article is useful because it talks about how Pan's Labyrinth, despite having all the elements of a classic fairy tale, actually deconstructs the fairy tale
Pan's Labyrinth brought together del Toro’s affection for strange creatures and dark themes into a masterful whole. On the surface, Pan’s Labyrinth has all the trappings of a classic fairy tale, but in a way, it deconstructs the fairy tale.
8. Tim Burton Interview about Alice in Wonderland (2010)
http://www.theguardian.com/film/2010/mar/06/tim-burton-alice-wonderland-guardian
This article discusses the fact that the film is more of a Disney film rather than a Burton film. It's got a simple internal story, like many recent Disney films, about somebody finding their own strength whereas Burton's usual style is much darker in tone. This adds an interesting point as Burton has had to adapt his style to conform to more conventional forms of narrative. I will use quotes from this article to make an argument around how fairy tales must contain typical narrative conventions, it is therefore a very useful item.
9. Tim Burton Interview
http://www.timburtoncollective.com/articles/misc5.html
I love it. Lookit, all monster movies are basically one story. It's Beauty and the Beast. Monster movies are my form of myth, of fairy tale. The purpose of folk tales for me is a kind of extreme, symbolic version of life, of what you're going through.
What's the purpose and the function of fairy tales? I think it does have to do with whatever that young impulse is - Who are we? How are we created? What else is out there? What happens when you die? All that stuff is unknown. Life is unknown. Everything is under the umbrella of life and death and the unknown, and a mixture of good and bad, and funny and sad, and everything at once. It's weirdly complicated. And I find that fairy tales acknowledge that. They acknowledge the absurdity, they acknowledge the reality; but in a way that is beyond real. Therefore, I find that more real.
Because a fairy tale is a romantic version of certain things. Taking something real and heightening it.
10. La Belle et la Bête Review by Roger Ebert (1999)
http://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/great-movie-beauty-and-the-beast-1946
deals, as all fairy tales do, with what we truly dread and desire. the story takes the form of the familiar fable, its surface seems to be masking deeper and more disturbing currents
11. Press Book for the U.S. Premiere of La Belle et la Bête by Jean Cocteau (1940s)
http://www.criterion.com/current/posts/250-once-upon-a-time-french-poet-explains-his-filming-of-fairy-tale
12. Fantasy Cinema: Impossible Worlds on Screen by David Butler
13. Fantasy Film: A Critical Introduction by James Walters
14. Burton on Burton, Revised Edition by Tim Burton
Rejected items
