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neadodsI do so love clever, sarcastic people with keyboards! This is from Ty Burr's review of Ella Enchanted for Boston.com.
One of the smaller hard lessons a modern child faces is realizing that the people who make movies often have no idea what they're doing. "Ella Enchanted," the 1997 book by Gail Carson Levine, is by all accounts a classy, nimbly written satire of fairy tales that serves as an exemplary fairy tale itself. "Ella Enchanted" the movie is an overcalculated fusion of "Shrek" and "The Princess Bride" with all the smarts replaced by smartass. It appears to be based on the book in the same way that mammals are based on land.
Having read the book a few weeks ago and the reviews today, I agree. Apartheid? Propaganda? Forced minstrel shows? A cruel warmongering leader? Matrix/Kung Fu fight scenes? What book were the writers actually reading, Sun Tsu does Uncle Tom's Cabin?
And, just because rewriting the plot to make it clumsily politically correct isn't enough, several reviews make a point of mentioning the "plumber's crack" visuals in the scenes with the giants. Just like the clever, complex Ladykillers was "updated and modernized" with gastrointestinal jokes, apparently the charm and sparkle of the Ella book just won't be truely complete without a shot of someone's butt. Nevermind that in the book the giants were gentle, sophisticated, cultured people, and certainly nevermind that the movie has done an amazing whitewash on all the other races in the book - ogres aren't really cannibals and killers, they're just misunderstood - nothing says classy sophisticated humor like a plumber's crack.
Just as nothing says feisty feminist like a heroine who apparently chop-sockys her way through obstacles. Because actually thinking her way out of her myriad problems, as she does in the book, is presumably not visually appealing enough. Who needs a brain when you've got a kung-fu grip? Grrrl power! (Adds a whole new layer of meaning to "Wham, bam, thank you ma'am," doesn't it?)
I'm not even going to go into how or why they seem to have cast the sole black lead as the stupidest, most destructive fairy. Yeah, it's a bigger role, but if they're rewriting the book so the moral is "treat all people well regardless of race" and then they... oh, my head hurts.
Go read the book. It's cheaper than a matinee anyway, and it's going to be a lot more entertaining.
One of the smaller hard lessons a modern child faces is realizing that the people who make movies often have no idea what they're doing. "Ella Enchanted," the 1997 book by Gail Carson Levine, is by all accounts a classy, nimbly written satire of fairy tales that serves as an exemplary fairy tale itself. "Ella Enchanted" the movie is an overcalculated fusion of "Shrek" and "The Princess Bride" with all the smarts replaced by smartass. It appears to be based on the book in the same way that mammals are based on land.
Having read the book a few weeks ago and the reviews today, I agree. Apartheid? Propaganda? Forced minstrel shows? A cruel warmongering leader? Matrix/Kung Fu fight scenes? What book were the writers actually reading, Sun Tsu does Uncle Tom's Cabin?
And, just because rewriting the plot to make it clumsily politically correct isn't enough, several reviews make a point of mentioning the "plumber's crack" visuals in the scenes with the giants. Just like the clever, complex Ladykillers was "updated and modernized" with gastrointestinal jokes, apparently the charm and sparkle of the Ella book just won't be truely complete without a shot of someone's butt. Nevermind that in the book the giants were gentle, sophisticated, cultured people, and certainly nevermind that the movie has done an amazing whitewash on all the other races in the book - ogres aren't really cannibals and killers, they're just misunderstood - nothing says classy sophisticated humor like a plumber's crack.
Just as nothing says feisty feminist like a heroine who apparently chop-sockys her way through obstacles. Because actually thinking her way out of her myriad problems, as she does in the book, is presumably not visually appealing enough. Who needs a brain when you've got a kung-fu grip? Grrrl power! (Adds a whole new layer of meaning to "Wham, bam, thank you ma'am," doesn't it?)
I'm not even going to go into how or why they seem to have cast the sole black lead as the stupidest, most destructive fairy. Yeah, it's a bigger role, but if they're rewriting the book so the moral is "treat all people well regardless of race" and then they... oh, my head hurts.
Go read the book. It's cheaper than a matinee anyway, and it's going to be a lot more entertaining.
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no subject
Date: 2004-04-09 07:50 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-04-09 08:08 am (UTC)I don't get it, really. The book was written in '97, so it's not like it's wildly out of date. And the writing team did Legally Blonde and 10 Things I Hate About You, movies which managed to blend commentary, froth, and fun practically perfectly. (The underlying running comment about the "testical re-extraction" was a little over the top in 10 Things, but it was my only quibble.)
So WTF went wrong?
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Date: 2004-04-09 08:24 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-04-09 10:14 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-04-13 08:12 am (UTC)It sounds like it was one of those "Let's fix the mistakes in the book" movies. When the movie/TV writers don't respect the material and want to remake it it usually leads to trouble. Maybe they put in the low humor because they thought grrrl power and low humor would appeal to young kids. Who was the book geared to?
no subject
Date: 2004-04-13 03:57 pm (UTC)The worth of the book comes in how this smart, determined girl thinks her way *around* this curse until she can find a way to break it. I can't begin to imagine what the movie is supposed to be about.