International Trailer for "Tale Of Tales" Released (Embedded video NSFW)

It's here, it's beautiful, it's NOT for kids (but hopefully you knew that already). Expect both lush, gorgeous scenes and also a good serving of gruesome - still beautifully shot but it's intended to remind you we are dealing with fairly primal fears and desires as well. There's dirt, blood, sex, beauty, beasts and the fantastic all rolled together. Even with all this, it's still clear this is a fairy tale - or a small collection of them put together. It's just for adults.

News you may have seen the last week is that the film is an initial selection for the Cannes festival competition this year too. And I tracked down the Italian poster (as you can see at the top of the post). I don't know what I was expecting but this is wonderfully intriguing and I can see how it reflects the film - and the source - already.

This reminds me of an Annie Leibovitz shoot from a few years ago, but I think she was referencing classic paintings herself so it's not too surprising

International distribution is apparently still under negotiation so no word yet on when it will be seen outside Italy but it will be.

Here's a summary for "Il racconto dei racconti - Tale of Tales":

Inspired and loosely based on Giambattista Basile’s Pentamerone, a 17th-century fairytale collection compiled by the Italian poet, Tale of Tales tells the stories of king and queens, princes and princesses, woods and castles, ogres and fantastic beasts, dragons, witches, elderly laundresses and circus performers. 

The cast features Salma Hayek, Vincent Cassel, Toby Jones, Shirley Henderson, Hayley Carmichael, Bebe Cave, Stacy Martin, Christian Lees and Jonah Lees, Guillaume Delaunay, Alba Rohrwacher, Massimo Ceccherini and John C. Reilly.

The trailer is mostly without dialogue and instead has a lovely soundtrack but the visuals are mildly not safe for work (and definitely not for kids) - please consider yourself cautioned:

(In case you're wondering, the lovely music is Fauré Pavane - Op 50.)

And now we wait and see what the reaction is. Outside the US, people seem excited and thrilled but then they're probably more familiar with Giambattista Basile's Il Pentamerone and know what sort of range of themes to expect, especially in combination with Matteo Garrone's directing sensibilities.

To me this is reminiscent of Pan's Labyrinth in some ways but also completely different. What do you think?

"The Tale Of Tales" Gets A Trailer!

First image from Matteo Garrone's "The Tale of Tales"

And it's quite stunning and shows the film will have elements of 'the fantastic' as well.

If you're a regular reader you know I've been excited about this film ever since it was announced, so  I couldn't wait to share the trailer with you.

Although the film was made in English, it's a big deal for Italy to see this get made so its no surprise the trailer first aired on Italian TV and will premiere there first. The only real problem with this teaser preview via Italian media is, it's not your typical trailer as we've come to expect them: no title, no announcement of when it premieres, etc and it looks sort of cut off at the end.

And, OH YEAH, there's a really prominent Italian voiceover, talking over the whole thing! Ugh. I will forgive him his enthusiasm though, because it is pretty great.

Despite the sound, it's a great preview of what's to come. (Don't be put off by the trailer screen image - remember it's Basile.)

Featuring a great array of ensemble talent including Salma Hayek, Vincent Cassel, John C. Reilly, Toby Jones, Stacy Martin, Alba Rohrwacherand Massimo Ceccherini, the film is a loose screen adaptation of the fairy tales by Italian poet Giambattista Basile.  

"The Tale Of Tales" opens in Italy on May 14th. (source)

By the way, this fairy tale film, in case you had any doubts: definitely not for kids.

Enjoy!

Red As Blood, White As Snow, Black As Ebony... Discussing The Big Three Colors in Fairy Tales

'She bade him leave his horse with her and ride on her own two-winged horse' 
Illustration for The Bold Knight, the Apples of Youth, and the Water of Life
by N. Puttapipat (aka Himmapaan on social media)

This was written yesterday in response to the Tales Of Faerie post (Wednesday, March 4, 2015), which references tri-color themed fairy tales, but my comment was so long it wouldn't post on the site so I sent it via mail. I've posted it here with encouragement from Kristin, who thought more of you might like to read this. I omitted the part of the comment that responds directly to yesterday's post, just because it makes no sense out of context.

You may want to go read Kristin's Tales Of Faerie post first, HERE, before continuing below or at least have a glance at the academic article/paper she mentions (HERE), that she also posted her thoughts on, in December last year HERE. (The referenced paper is a number of pages long and quite detailed but you'll get the gist of the topics with just a scan.)

Note: generally, when writing comments on someone else's blog I write very informally, conversationally, if you like, sometimes almost like shorthand, so it's even less formal than my usual writing for OUABlog.

'But he could not hold the firebird herself; she tore herself from his grasp and flew away'
Illustration for Prince Ivan, the Firebird, and the Grey Wolf.************************

The tri-color aspect of many fairy tales (and cultural color recognition order*) is fascinating and one of the things I'm always curious about (my investigations started in my teens with my wondering about Snow White - of course). Vaz da Silva's article/paper has a lot of interesting points, things I've read or heard about quite a bit but it's also missing some basics I think. 

White and black should be obvious just because there is no greater contrast in the world, and this jives with one of the main interpretations too: ultimate good vs ultimate bad - however, true black and true white are almost impossible to create as well, so there's that dichotomy of the color significance. 

'Next morning the seven-year-old girl took off her clothes, donned a net, took the quail in her hand, sat upon the hare, and went to the palace'
Illustration for The Wise Little Girl.

White is interesting because, while Westerners tend to think "purity", it's the color of death in many other cultures. A strong theory of why clowns freak people out so much (especially children and babies) is because of the white face: it's basically a death mask (and if you know anything about the history of clowning, you'll know this was done on purpose - to remove the personal nature of the performer, among other things). 

'The sorceress was waiting for her, seized her, tied a stone around her neck, and cast her into the sea'
Illustration for Sister Alionushka and Brother Ivanushka. 

Black, on the other hand seems like a no-brainer: death, darkness. The dark was always a scary, dangerous time for people pre-electric lights but there's more to that as well. In many cultures the absence of a shadow is an indication of something supernatural - usually something bad - but once a shadow was seen/restored, then the human/natural element was returned and things were back in balance/safe. (Think of the significance of Peter Pan trying to get his shadow back too.) One of the reasons the twilight time of day is considered magical (or one of the dangerous Faerie times of day - and today - one of the worst times to drive because cars are so hard to see) is because shadows are hard to see/define/distinguish too. Gray is 'in-between" - neither here nor there - there are no silhouettes, no shadows, no easy proof of life.

'She became a terrible lioness, but when she was about to swallow the good youth, his magic steed came running and took hold of her with his mighty legs'
Illustration for Two Ivans, Soldiers' Sons. 

Red has almost always been related to blood and though we see it as violence as well, more often it means life (when you stop bleeding, you're dead.) Women bleeding monthly is still weird and mysterious to guys! How does one bleed without injury or threat of death? In many ways, it's like women have a secret "in" to what life is all about - something further enforced by the ability to create and birth children. I think menstruation and a women's cycles of maturation are a natural connection and a fairly common way of interpreting the appearance of red. Red is blood - blood is life, and blood also rises in passion (of love or violence) - proof of life in many ways.

'She waved her right hand, and lakes and woods appeared; she waved her left hand, and various birds began to fly about'
Illustration for The Frog Princess. 

Black and white are also not technically "colors" - true black is the absence of color and white is all colors together (or, if you want to get more technical - since trying to do this in paint always fails - white is the reflection of every color frequency/wavelength seen together, black is no reflection of any light wavelength). Red is the color that contrasts most against both black or white and especially against black and white together. It could be because we're built to recognize the importance of red (due to blood and the life connection) but I'm guessing there's a scientific reason too. Red is one of the lowest frequency colors - not much light is needed to see "red' at all, whereas other colors can only be distinguished if there's enough light. (Am I boring you yet??)

‘The fox is carrying me away … Cat Cotonaevich, rescue me!’
Illustration for The Cat, the Cock, and the Fox.

For an example of how these interpretations work both ways, think of how vampires are represented almost the world over: black, white and red. Black clothes, white skin, red mouth because they've drunk someone's blood. They're a scary symbol of supernatural-meets-human because they have both - the human element (red lifeblood), the white (death and supernatural) and black (evil but also earthly). Weird, right? But it makes sense too.

Anyway, I think all this has significance with regard to tales across the globe since it works for all interpretations of the how different cultures see black,white and red. 

'She boiled water and poured it into the barrels, thus scalding the six robbers to death'
Illustration for The Wise Maiden and the Seven Robbers.

One fairy tale (**in addition to the ones Kristin and Vaz de Silva mention) that comes to mind from Japan, is The Crane Wife - almost all white feathers but with a distinct black pattern, against the snow, in the dark, wounded, red and bleeding... Again we see the implication of the supernatural mixed with the natural in a single form (the woman), the "real" implication (not a ghost), because of the blood and the almost magnetic attraction to that combination for "man".

****************

If you haven't gone there yet, but want more I suggest going to Tales Of Faerie. There's an Irish tale using the tri-color theme for your reading pleasure as well ("The Snow, the Crow, and the Blood").

All these amazing silhouette illustrations are by N. Puttapipat for the Folio Society edition of Aleksandr Afanas'ev's Myths and Legends of Russia (though I cannot find it on the Folio website!). See left for a description of the book.

* Quote from Kristin's post HERE: "Da Silva cites a study in which they found that if a language has only two words for color, it's black and white. If they have three, it's always red, black, and white. "

** Tales mentioned specifically using the red, white & black tri-color theme, listed below:

• Snow White (& variations)
• The Crow - Basile
• Perceval - Conte du Graal
• The Three Citrons - Basile
• The Snow, the Crow and the Blood

What To Expect From Matteo Garrone’s "Tale of Tales" by "The Thinker's Garden" Custodian (& Film Update via FTNH)

Maxfield Parrish, "Romance," 1992

Reposted in full with kind permission by Andrew Manns, Founding Editor of a wonder-filled place on the web called The Thinker's Garden. 

Film Preview:

What to expect from Matteo Garrone’s Tale of Tales

Matteo Garrone, the same director who made the graphic and telling Gomorrah crime film in 2008, is now hard at work on Tale of Tales, a fantasy film based on Giambattista Basile’s Pentamerone. Production is taking place in various locations around Italy, and the cast reportedly includes A-listers John C. Reilly, Vincent Cassel, and Salma Hayek.

First published between 1634 and 1636, The Pentamerone, also known as The Tale of Tales, or Entertainment for Little Ones, is one of the earliest written collection of fairytales and one of the source texts for the Brothers Grimm. Its author Basile was a Neapolitan soldier, courtier, and poet who was influenced by Italian oral folktales and elements of his own adventures. New Sparta Films released a statement saying the film is a ‘fantastic journey through the Baroque era’, but what else can we expect from Garrone’s interpretation?

1. Dark Fantasy

The Bacchante, Jean-Léon Gérôme 1853. A woman transforms into a goat-creature in Basile’s tale, ‘The Goat-Face’

Giambattista Basile’s tales are full of magic and funny moments, but there are also a few stories with dark and disturbing themes; much like in Greco-Roman myths.  Sun, Moon, and Talia (an early version of Sleeping Beauty) casually depicts the sexual assault of a slumbering princess, Penta with the Chopped-off Hands details the incestuous intentions of a king, and The Myrtle  illustrates the violent murder and dismembering of a fairy princess. Garrone may not try to recreate these particularly explicit scenes, but it’s not difficult to imagine his film exploring the corruptive and decadent aspects of the human psyche within the larger background of Southern Italy in the 17th century. At the time, Naples was full of elite literati but it also had its fair share of revolts, superstitions, religious upheavals, feudalistic petty nobles, wandering bandits, and disease. Perhaps this is why Garrone revealed in a recent Variety interview that he conceives of his movie as a ‘fantasy film with horror elements’.

2. On-Location Wonders 

Interior of Castello Sammezzano

Basile’s fables often unfold in crystal tunnels, subterranean palaces, enchanted woods, or among families of ogres. Garrone’s scouting team is maintaining Basile’s aesthetic of mystique by using lesser known locations in rural Italy for the film sets. So far the cast and crew have been spotted at places such as Castello Sammezano, a peculiar estate built in the Moorish Revival style, Castel del Monte in Apulia, the spooky Bosco del Sasseto near Torre Alfina in Viterbo, and the Etruscan Necropolis and network of ruined roads in Sovana and Sorano.

3. Neapolitan Early Modern culture

Giambattista Basile

The film will be made in English, but that doesn’t mean Garrone will leave out all the Neapolitan colloquialisms and vernacular cultures which originally made Basile’s work famous in the first place. One of the most hilarious verbal exchanges takes place in the first chapter of The Pentamerone, when an old woman and young boy level insults at each other:

One day while Zoza was sitting at the window as sourly as a pickle an old woman chanced to pass by. She began to fill a jar she had brought with her, sopping up the oil with a sponge, and as she was busily going about her task a certain devil of a court page threw a stone at her with such precision that it hit the jar and broke to pieces.

The old woman, who Basile reminds the reader, ‘let no one ride on her back’ then gives the prankster a piece of her mind :

Ah you worthless thing, you dope, shithead, bed pisser, leaping goat, diaper ass, hangman’s noose, bastard mule! Just look even fleas can cough now! Go on, may paralysis seize you, may your mother get bad news, may you not live to see the first of May!…Scoundrel, beggar, son of a taxed woman, rogue!

The boy counters with:

Why don’t you shut that sewer hole, you bogeyman’s grandmother, blood-sucking witch, baby drowner, rag shitter, fart gatherer?

The old woman then responds by lifting up her skirt and revealing her ‘woodsy scene’.

Garrone may not take the obscenities that far, but his other Neapolitan films have featured  bawdy dialogue and it’s possible that he may attempt to retain some level of plain-speech and traditional Campanian humour in Tale of Tales.

If you’d like to catch up on Basile’s Pentamerone before the movie comes out in 2015, the best and most recent version is Nancy Canepa’s 2007 edition.

*******************************

Thank you Custodian!

The Thinker's Garden is full of mythical and wonderful posts! This article was originally published on August 14, 2014 by The Thinker's Garden Custodian. If you liked this, you're sure to find other articles you'll like too, so go have a visit! Click HERE.

And now a film update on Matteo Garrone's Tale of Tales

from your Fairy Tale News Hound:

The following update on Tale of Tales was posted on an Italian film website. According to a variety of foreign film and entertainment review sites, Tale of Tales is one of the most anticipated films in Europe for 2015, although it's difficult to find out much more than the following with such a closed set:

 Great expectations for Matteo Garrone that, surrounded by the greatest secrecy, has created a personal version de Pentamerone of Giambattista Basile . Tale of Tales - Tale of Tales (May 14) was filmed in English and starring international stars such as Salma Hayek , Vincent Cassel , Toby Jones , John C. Reilly , along with Italian Alba Rohrwacher .  (Auto-translated from Italian, source)

The only release information currently available is for Italy, UK and France, with May 14, 2015 set as the date for opening in theaters. There are no posters, teasers, promotional shots or trailers yet (that I am aware of). The latest update reported from movieplayer.it, discusses the visual impact (apparently "stunning") though I am, unfortunately,  unable to find any of said images online (yet!):

The first images of the much mountedTale of Tales , Tale of Tales , the new film by Matteo Garrone . " Extraordinary images - says the Director of 01 Luigi Lonigro - after seeing them we realized that we could not open our convention in a different way . " And in fact it is amazing images: you recognize some of the characters, from Vincent Cassel to Salma Hayek , Toby Jones and John C. Reilly , the setting is fabulous and baroque-inspired collection of seventeenth-century fairy tales Pentamerone The element of fantasy is pregnant, the effect is stunning.

A little more from a previous article while shooting from taking place reveals a smidge more information about what we might see:

The shooting, which will last about four months, will affect different regions of Italy, showing mysterious landscapes and still secret places, among castles, villas and gardens still unknown. 

The subject of the film is inspired by and loosely based Pentamerone of Giambattista Basile , genial Neapolitan author of the seventeenth century whose tales are universally recognized as forerunners of the whole fairytale literature of later centuries. The project, whose development has participated in the same Matteo Garrone, collaborating in the writing of the story and screenplay with Edward Albinati , Ugo Chiti and Massimo Gaudioso , is proposed as a large fresco in fantastic Baroque period, told through the stories of three kingdoms and their respective sovereigns. "I chose to approach the world of Basile for I have found in his fairy tales that mixture between reality and fantasy that has always characterized my artistic research. The stories told in The story of the stories describe a world in which are summarized opposites of life: the ordinary and the extraordinary, the magical and the everyday, the royal and the scurrilous, the terrible and the suave " says Garrone. (auto-translated from Italian, source)

It's also been described by the director as "...a fantasy set in 1600..". Here's a bit more from a what seems to be the only press given during filming, while Garrone was on set at "Castel de Monte" for Tale of Tales during July of 2014 (all pictures are from this location and this day):

Beyond the time, then, what really away The Tale of Tales from the rest of the film Garrone is a component that you can very well define the supernatural:

The element fairytale I think it's a bit 'in all my films, but this is the first time I'm telling stories related to supernatural elements, a magical tales. It is a completely new adventure.

"The King Is Dead" (scene)

An adventure that promises to be particularly spectacular, especially from the visual point of view:

I come from painting, my training is pictorial and this is a movie where the visual aspect is predominant. The tales of Basile born as a form of entertainment, lend themselves to a dramatic development, film and I hope that this film has also a component of spectacle and entertainment. In fact I am the first to be curious to see it. 

It is a film that tell three stories that intertwine, a bit 'on the structure of Gomorrah. Salma Hayek is the protagonist of a story, Vincent Cassel another and Toby Jones is the protagonist of the story that will develop in Puglia. The main casting was done in London, then there are secondary roles that involve some Italian actors and then there is the participation of Alba Rohrwacher and Massimo Ceccherini, which will play an important enough. 

There is an Italian news video HERE in which you can see a little more of the castle and "props" from that day.

What do you think? Are you excited? I am. A grownup, European-made, diversely cast, fairy tale with a large visual fantasy element? (And in English so we can see all this as the director originally conceived?) Yes please!