Blog 4

The story of Cinderella is considered a rise tale.  This means that the tale demonstrates a motive of “rags to riches through magic and marriage”.  This simply means that any person can be saved from their troubles without any effort at all.  We all know that people cannot be saved from their problems by counting on magic and marriage.

In the real world everyone would agree that with hard work you could be successful.  Though, this motif was designed to persuade young girls that if they marry they will be successful.  At the same time the motif teaches young men that they need to be successful in order to marry. 

           In todays society we can only hope for the fairy tale life and be saved from our troubles.  If fairy tales were real, no man would ever attend college or try to get a job because they believe in fantasies. If fantasies and magic did exist, everyone would be happier and life would be a lot easier, yet because of the false tales such as Cinderella that the public views as a story it may make some people believe in fate rather than choice. Even though rags to riches may be an actual stories such as Tyler Perry’s life or the life of Biggie Smalls where they grew up poor, but with hard work and determination, they are able to achieve their respective dreams. But if they would have believed in fairy tales and fate rather than choice and free will, they probably would have stayed poor their whole life and not achieved their dreams.

Blog 3

          Fairytales seem to change over time to fit the goals and morals modern day society.  Sometimes the stories change depending on another’s perspective of the story. The original “Hansel and Gretel” written by the Grim brothers is still similar to the MGM version. In both stories there are two kids, a boy named Hansel and a girl named Gretel, which live in very humble conditions.  The dad is a woodcutter who cannot make enough money to provide food.  The two kids are lost in a forest due to their parent’s actions.  They try to use breadcrumbs to remember their trail back but the birds eat the crumbs.  While searching for the way back the come upon a house made out of food.  The two children are lead into the house by an old woman who is actually a witch.  The witch plans to eat them but with the children’s witty ways they are able to fool the witch.  For example in both versions Hansel uses a chicken bone in order to trick the witch into thinking that he has not gained weight.  Also the Gretel is able to fool the witch into getting in the oven and then trapping her inside.  When they escape they do not hesitate to take the witch’s treasure.

            

          Although the two versions of the story have very similar details, there are still many details that are different.  In the book the mom is written out to be evil and cold hearted.  She intentionally plans to leave the children in the woods.  While in the movie she simply asked them to pick berry’s and they seemed to get there selves lost.  In the movie the crumbs used were not breadcrumbs, but cookie crumbs from a new character known as the baker.  In the movie the dad came after the kids to find them and bring them back home safely.  The kids escape in both, although in the movie they are able to free all the children that were captured by the witch.  When they leave in the movie they take the witch’s staff, which evidently turns into gold coins.  In the book version the children steal the treasure that the witch was hiding.  Grim writes that the children had ran out of the house and found their way back home and to get there they had to cross a river.  The children use a duck to swim them across.  In the movie this very memorable scene is simply removed completely.  MGM leaves it at the children meeting their dad and then the next scene they are home safe and happy.  Finally in the book the children’s mom dies and everyone lives happily ever after.

            The two stories seem similar but as anyone can see are very different.  I believe that the movie was changed to help add a more complex plot to the simple short story.  By changing certain things the story allows for more characters to have more characteristics.  These characteristics help to add emotion to the story to bring the audience closer to the story.  While Grim wanted to influence the audience.  Grim felt it’s what morals they get out of the story not the story.  Also the movie attempted to make the movie somewhat more realistic.

blog 2

            Since the beginning of time tales have been told been told and passed down from generation to generation.  These tales were not just fairytales, but also legends and myths.  Though most would not see a strong difference between the three types of stories, there is.  For example, a myth is a narrative that is believed to be true and has something to do with gods or higher beings.  Legends, on the other hand, are true facts or stories that are dramatized and distorted in some way.  Finally, fairy tales have magic and enchantment within the stories.

            The purpose of a fairy tale is to help guide others thoughts and moral standards.  For example, when the Grim Brothers began writing fairy tales they were trying to help people view Germany as a strong powerful nation through the morals of the tales.  There are two morals in the tales, one for children and one for adults. As known in “Red Riding Hood”, due to the wolf eating the child because she didn’t listen to her mother, the child sees that they should listen to there elders.  At the same adults would find that it teaches girls to be weary of male predators.  Disney also had a purpose for his tales, showing the United States that they are still strong and that men need not be weak because of the great depression.  Though the two tales are changed to meet different goals they have the same basic fairy tale elements.  Fairy tales consist of many elements depending on the intended moral though there are a few common elements in all stories.  The ideas of magic and enchantment are two necessary elements.  There must be a villain, a hero and a victim.  The victim, commonly female, needs help or needs to escape.  The hero, commonly male, is the only one to save her from the villain, commonly monster or witch.

           

           

            Through out time the morals of fairy tales will be changed to meet the needs of the future generation.  Though none of the morals stay the same, the general elements will in fact always be apart of fairy tales, myths and legends.

blog 1

     Grim to Disney was one of my top choices for a fys class.  I have always been interested in film and being that Walt Disney was one of the most popular film makers ever.  I wanted to see exactly how he changed the tales he did and what made them so successful.  Also i want to see the history behind the Folktales we all know today and what their original purpose was. After finishing this course i wish to better understand how these tales have been able to change the way people think, what we think and why we think this way.  Being that the very first movie I had ever seen in theaters was Walt Disney's hercules, I would have to say that is my favorite tale.  This film was the very first film i knew and I have always looked back on the aspects of this film to help understand the basic story elements in almost all movies.