'Bao' - A New Pixar Short Reminding Us of Precious Little Tales

Press release:

Pixar's latest short, Bao is set to release alongside Incredibles 2 on June 15, 2018. The 8-minute short film (Pixar's longest to date) is written and directed by, Domee Shi, (Pixar's first Female-directed Short Film) and focuses on the ups and downs of the parent-child relationship through the colorful, rich, and tasty lens of the Chinese immigrant community in Canada. The official short film synopsis reads: 

An empty-nesting Chinese mom gets another chance at motherhood when one of her dumplings springs to life. But she must come to terms with the bittersweet revelation that nothing stays cute and small forever.

 

In seeing the short preview, we cannot help but be reminded of Momotaro Peach Boy and Thumbelina (especially with the "another chance at Motherhood line there), but also Tom Thumb and Kaguya-Hime! The idea of precious little children (as in teeny, thumb-sized, etc) having to grow up and all the difficulties that come with that (especially from the parent's point of view) seem to be echoed here. We're looking forward to the rest!

You can see the 30 second preview below:

In a recent EW interview, director Domee Shi noted, "Often times it felt like my mom would treat me like a precious little dumpling, wanting to make sure I was safe, that I didn’t go out late, all that stuff", Shi tells EW. "I just wanted to create this magical, modern-day fairy tale, kind of like a Chinese Gingerbread Man story. The word ‘bao’ actually means two things in Chinese: Said one way, it means steamed bun. Said another, it means something precious. A treasure.”

Bao will premiere on April 21, 2018 at the Tribeca Film Festival.

In Memorium: Günter Grass

"Ich bin dabei gewesen" by Günter Grass (lithograph)

Günter Grass October 16, 1927 - April 13, 2015

Günter Grass, a Nobel Prize winning novelist who was fond of using fables and fairy tale motifs in his work, died this morning, aged 87.

He was Germany's best known post-war novelist and his most well known work is The Tin Drum. He's not the sort of author you can read lightly, despite his humorous turn of phrase and observations. His stories are difficult, layered, visceral and sometimes difficult to process.


Grass also wrote - and illustrated!* - a small novel based on the fairy tale The Fisherman and His Wife, titled The Flounder, or, in German, Der Butt. It's an eclectic work, certainly not for everyone and is the sort of novel you might recommend to someone, only to find they hate it, then be surprised that someone else you'd never think would read it, likes it as much as you do. (At the very least, it's good for discussions!) Here's the description:

It all begins in the Stone Age, when a talking fish is caught by a fisherman at the very spot where millennia later Grass's home town, Danzig, will arise. Like the fish, the fisherman is immortal, and down through the ages they move together. As Grass blends his ingredients into a powerful brew, he shows himself at the peak of his linguistic inventiveness.

Since the above doesn't really describe what the book is like, I'm going to post a brief but informative review I found on Goodreads by "Jos":

Deftig (ribald)! This would be the one-word review. Grass is explicit in his extensive descriptions - mostly of food, in parts sexuality or other body functions and sometimes violence. 
The story:Der Butt has three narrative dimensions. 1. Today, the narrator and his wife Ilsebill - who is of legendary fame due to an old fairy tale - are receiving a child. The book is divided into nine chapters, one for each month of the pregnancy.2. The second dimension consists of the narrator's multiple reincarnations through time, starting from neolithitic age. The focus is on his relationships, nine in the past plus two parallel to his current life.3. The third dimension is the tribunal (feminal) against the flounder who is accused of helping the male case, hurting womanhood through all ages. 

Grass uses these dimensions to tell the history of the area around his home town Danzig through time, to criticize nowadays (the 70's) society coined by the male dominance throughout history, to make a case for feminism while parallely dissembling the 70's women's movement and to celebrate the joys of a primary sensual life - natural food, uninhibited attitudes, simplicity. In parts, it's a book of its time, especially the 'politics' are outdated. At the same time the conflict of the sexes never gets old. The sensual pleasures he celebrates were as far away from the 70's as from today.
Grass certainly knows how to write. Some paragraphs are plain brillant. But he also doesn't know when enough is enough and he's fond of preaching. Still, an extraordinary book.

I also found this note in a fairly long tribute by The Guardian today:

His third and final memoir, Grimms’ Words: A Declaration of Love (2010), took the fairytales of the Brothers Grimm as the starting point for an exploration of the political and social side of his life, noting, for instance, how the figure of Tom Thumb lay behind that of Matzerath.

Gunter Grass self-portrait

From an older Guardian article on Grass' final memoir:

Growing up with the fairytales of the Brothers Grimm, Grass said the pair went on to influence his own creative work: Tom Thumb "lives on" in Oskar Matzerath from The Tin Drum, and the brothers themselves play a role in many of his manuscripts. "In The Rat, for example, they are portrayed as a minister and a deputy minister who try to stop forests dying (from acid rain)," he said.

After my experience with The Tin Drum (amazing book but I couldn't get through it, it was so brutal, and the movie version - also amazing but I can never watch it again), I'm reluctant to pick up The Flounder, to read the rest of it (I've read the first few pages via a preview), even though it's a fairly short work in comparison (about 500 pages). Still, I am completely fascinated by the premise and how Grass came to write this in the first place. Clearly, he was the sort of writer we need, asking those difficult questions, examining life from different angles, finding different resonances in tales. He will be missed.

*27 difference drawings, some of which are in this post.

Monthly Discussion: "From the Forest" with Tales Of Faerie - March (Story)

Kristin & Gypsy discuss

“From the Forest: A Search for the Hidden Roots of Our Fairy Tales”

by Sara Maitland

12 MONTHS - 12 FORESTS - 12 TALES

UK Title: “Gossip from the Forest: The Tangled Roots of Our Forests and Fairytales”

MARCH: Airyolland Wood & a retelling of Thumbling

(see the 1st part of the discussion at Tales Of Faerie HERE)

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

Note: Welcome to a new monthly feature we're beginning, in cooperation with Tales Of Faerie! Kristin and I are both reading one chapter of this book each month, discussing our thoughts on both the chapter portion and the story/retelling at the end, then sharing that on our blogs. Each month we will swap discussion parts. This month Kristin started things off by posting the main discussion of the chapter (Part 1) and this is our chat about the story (Part 2). We will alternate who posts Part 1 and Part 2 each month and link to each other's posts so you can follow along. This is the first time for both of us reading this book, so you're getting our thoughts right out of the oven! Enjoy. (I'm putting the jacket summary below for this first round, only, to help you orient yourself. The story discussion is below.)

Jacket summary: Forests are among our most ancient primal landscapes, and fairy tales some of our earliest and most vital cultural forms. In this fascinating and illuminating  book, Maitland argues that the two are intimately connected: the mysterious secrets and silences, gifts and perils of the forests were the background and source of fairytales. The links between the two are buried in the imagination ad in our childhoods.

Maitland journeys in forests through a full year, from the exquisite green  of a beechwood in spring to the muffled stillness of a snowy pine forest in winter, explaining their complex history and teasing out their connections with the tales.

There are secrets in the tales, hidden identities, cunning disguises, just as there are surprises behind every tree in a forest; there are rhythms of change in the tales like the changes of the seasons; there are characters , both human and animal, whose assistance can be earned or spurned and there is over and over again - the journey or quest, which leads to self-knowledge and success. The forest is the place of trial in fairy stories, both dangerous and exciting. Coming to terms with the forest, surviving its terrors, using its gifts and gaining its help, is the way to “happy ever after.”

As a fiction writer, Maitland has frequently retold fairy stories, and she ends each chapter with an enchanting tale, related imaginatively, to the experience of being in that specific forest.

Richly layered, full of surprising connections, and sparkling with mischief, From the Forest is a magical and unique blend of nature writing, history and imaginative fiction.

On “Thumbling”

SOURCE: Grimm’s Household Tales

SOURCE TALE SUMMARY: Childless couple have teeny miracle child; never grows bigger than mother’s thumb. Growing up is a hazard & still, he wants to see the world. Tricks & fast thinking help him escape disaster, death & circuses, to return home, no bigger but much wiser.

FROM THE FOREST THUMBLING SUMMARY: The classic fairy tale is retold from the mother’s perspective. After longing for a child, she gives birth to and raises a tiny son. As he grows, he begins to long for adventure and love. His parents agree that they need to let him go and experience life on his own, and despite their worry he returns home safe and happy, and the family continues on as before.

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

Thumbling by Kiri Østergaard Leonard

GYPSY: It wasn't... as absorbing to me as I expected when it started, because I was completely touched by the beginning. The story was told almost entirely from the mother’s point of view, which makes sense when you remember it came out of the author talking with her own son in the forest to start with (and telling him a tale).  It even fits as a “Mother’s Tale” choice in this instance,with Thumbling being so very small and the mother feeling like she has to be an “UberMother” - someone who has to do more than usual to care for and protect her child. I’m sure the situation in the forest, camping, feeling the weight of the forest in both actuality and metaphor at the same time, amplified that feeling for Sara, the author, so Thumbling was a natural choice of story.

The problem for me, is that I was ultimately left dissatisfied.

Initially, I loved hearing about Thumbling growing, the challenges of caring for him, how he was protected, how the village reacted and the couple grew together as people and as a family (and as a community too) during this time. But then, after a certain point, specifically when Thumbling went “adventuring”, it felt that there was no point to the story anymore, because all three main characters returned to a previous point in their lives/understanding/comfort zone and nothing really changed. They lived their lives afterward exactly the same way as they did before. Actually, no, not exactly the same way, with less “life” than before.

Artist unknown

Did the mother not learn anything about letting go? Or about anything at all after a certain point? What about the need to encourage her son into the forest? How does that fit with the beginning of the story in which she was at first over protective and then realized she had to let him go? When he comes back, she’s.. what? - relieved she doesn’t have to deal with reality? It felt odd. Didn't the mother find her own stories/freedom/adventure, just like she was talking about having done in the process of learning tales and exploring the woods? It seemed to me during the main portion of the chapter that this is the very thing the author was explaining to her son, Adam, and that she was pleasantly surprised to find that, not only was she helping her son, but he was able to add to her learning and journey (specifically with the fungi story) as well. While reading the main chapter I was most interested in this aspect of their conversation, and how his input ultimately informed hers. To the author’s surprise, she had a moment of realization that her son had matured enough to be teaching her as well as her teaching him. It’s like evidence that you’ve done your job as a parent, that your child can do this.

I guess I expected that to be reflected more in the story but instead it seemed like the opposite is what happened: keep him in the pretend forest forever and ever more. I know the Thumbling story was supposed to be partly about coming back home but I felt it started well and developed well then it just ended up being sentimental, without a good reason for coming home except to escape reality. The impression I’m left with is that he’ll be cared for and coddled the rest of his life now and never be encouraged (let alone forced) to experience the world as a mature person, and build his own future, add to the world and his village etc. (At least, until his parents die and he’s left with having to deal with that. Then what will he do? Yikes.)  I should state this is my immediate impression only. I wrote my initial notes straight away specifically as I felt it resonated while the words were still in front of me. I have a feeling there is more to my disquiet with the resolution (or lack of from my perspective) with the story but it would need some more read throughs and more reflective time to nut that out.

What were your impressions Kristin?

Illustration and text taken from "The History of Tom Thumb" from the Mary Bell's Series published by Peter G. Thomson of Cincinnati, Ohio.
Tom went with his mother to see a dun cow : The leaf of a thistle he took for a bough ; He sat down upon it, but, shocking to tell, The cow seized the thistle, and Tom Thumb as well. To the cow's upper jaw Tom manfully clung ; He kicked her front teeth, and he tickled her tongue. The cow could not ask him what he was about, So she opened her mouth and she let him out.

KRISTIN: I thought it was a sweet story (for most of it), I liked the theme of the importance of communicating well within a marriage and underlined a couple of quotes there. Then I liked the mother’s sacrifice in letting her son go and experience freedom, which I thought reflected the sacrifice every mother has to go through-but like you I was surprised by the ending, it seemed sudden and unrealistic that Thumbling would never again yearn for a normal life, or as an adult have increased conflicts with being dependent on his parents.  It missed the fact that letting go is an essential part of being a successful parent, in most cases, although it did remind me of many of the families I interact with who have children with disabilities (although this didn’t apply to the author…) because for them, their children grow up physically but never quite become independent. In a way it can be comforting because the parents know they don’t have to worry about their children rebelling and getting into sex/drugs/etc., but that ideal happy family life doesn’t stay that way forever. Even with people with disabilities, eventually their parents are going to get too old to take care of them but those individuals have to keep on living, so letting go and moving on is even part of parenting for those cases.

The Birth of Tom Thumb, illustration from Our Nurses Picture Book,
engraved by Kronheim and Co., 1869, a painting by Horace Petherick.

GYPSY: I think you nailed it: that fact about letting go is an essential part of being a parent. Especially with this being almost completely from the mother’s POV, it didn’t matter as much what Thumbling’s journey and arc was as hers, but her maturity as a parent didn’t happen. She didn’t fail either. She just… continued.

I like the parallel with disabilities. I never thought of Thumbling as having disabilities before! I can totally see that being a great metaphor, but even when children can’t become fully independent there is usually an effort to help them be as independent as they can manage and to live as vital a life as possible, including giving back to the community if they can. (That’s my experience anyway.) I would have like to see that type of development - or “shift” in thinking - toward a sustainable future for Thumbling beyond the natural life of his parents. Or the opposite - a complete “fail” in which the failure to encourage thriving becomes apparent. (But I’d prefer the happy ending please because that’s just me!)

KRISTIN: Absolutely, a healthy goal for people with disabilities is to point them towards as much independence as they are capable of (worked at a group home briefly)-in household tasks, getting jobs, etc. The ending of the story almost seemed like a creepy version of a mother’s desire to keep her kids innocent and childlike and with her forever, which was weird especially since she’s there telling it to her adult son. It almost seemed like we’re not supposed to take it seriously because it’s so obvious that any lessons learned were completely undone? The ending contradicts everything else in the story, maybe it was just a convenient way to wrap up and end it?

Different Toms: From Our Young Folks, Vol 1, No.1, An Illustrated Magazine (artist unknown); The National Nursery Book (unknown); The Beacon Second Reader (Edna T. Hart)

Come back next month to see Kristin & Gypsy discuss “April - Saltridge Wood” and Sara Maitland’s retelling of “The White Snake”.

"White Shoe" - A Ferragamo Fairy Tale

A lovely short film was made specially for a uniquely "fairy tale entwined" exhibit, built on the many stories, tales, legends - both fairy tale and real - of shoes. This particular film is based on the life, talent and work of one of Italy's most famous shoemakers, Salvatore Ferragamo (saying "cobblers" doesn't seem quite right!).

The exhibit is titled The Prodigious Shoemaker: Tales and Legends of Shoes and Shoemakers so the specific fairy tale quality of the film fits exceptionally well.

The film was designed to be viewed by visitors as they wander through the presentation in which art pieces and works in various media, blend together. They put history and fantasy side by side, with the express intent of showing one couldn't live without the other (as aspect I LOVE!). The stories range from tales - both true and fantastic - around Chinese foot binding, to Cinderella, to The Red Shoes and much, much more.

The official website for the exhibit is in Italian and to do too much to translate it in a hurry from the auto-translate seems to lose a little of the magic of the description, so I'm leaving most of the odd language intact for you to be enchanted by, just as I was on first reading it:

To show the tales, it would seem a contradiction in terms to show what was/is real physically and what is fantasy. Instead, the Salvatore Ferragamo Museum in Florence will show from April 19, 2013 to 31 March 2014 that you can also watch the legends and not just listen to them. It will be through the world of the fairy tale, filling the spacious rooms of the Palazzo Ferroni with "The Prodigious Shoemaker," which will open in Florence on April 18. It's a magical time for fairy tales. At the movies Tim Burton brings his "Alice in Wonderland" and other filmmakers have updated certain icons of childhood, from Little Red Riding Hood to the Beauty and the Beast, to two recent versions of Snow White. And this month are leaving "the great and powerful Oz" and "Jack and the Beanstalk" while in the near future are provided "Hansel and Gretel" and a "Maleficent" starring Angelina Jolie, taken from "The Sleeping Beauty". In short, what was a wealth of children today it is also great, so need to dream.

"The Prodigious Shoemaker - Tales and Legends of shoes and shoemakers," curated by Stefania Ricci, Sergio and Luca Recovered Scarlini hath been given the task to fly the minds of visitors through the history of the shoe, a theme that has always fascinated writers of fairy tales. Wearing shoes was a sign of wealth and power but the shoe is also a job, that of shoemaker and cobbler, antique flavor of passion and sacrifice and so hungry. It 's the story of Salvatore Ferragamo, who has taught so much. 

Many authors and artists from different disciplines who have joined the show, creating works by helping interventions. Experts in children's fiction, as Faeti Antonio and Michele Rak, film scholars like Alexander Bernardi, writers and poets such as Hamid Ziarati, Michele Mari, Elisa Biagini for this project have written new tales supported by illustrators like Francesca and Michela Petoletti Ghermandi.The great composer Luis Bacalov wrote a new musical score as an overture to the show, while young photographers Simona Ghizzoni and Lorenzo Cicconi Massi, along with expert Henry Coppitz, have the photographer Salvatore Ferragamo shoes make them fabulous. And then the work of Annette Lemieux Messenger was approached by the myth of Mercury, that of Carol Rama to the hard version of Cinderella, that of Daniel Spoerri at Tom Thumb. An entire section of the exhibition is dedicated to the sculptures and drawings by Mimmo Paladino: For this occasion the artist field has collaborated on an original animation with the writer ecomico Alexander Berger, author of a visionary tale. And many others.

I hope to be able to write more about the exhibit soon, because the details of various pieces in particular are amazing, but for now, I'll just include this excerpt of the official introductory blurb from The Salvatore Ferragamo Museum, that's hosting and housing the exhibition:

...fairy tales are invading our imagination. As if now, more than ever, there was the need to address through the paths mysterious fantasy and dream solutions, the answers to that set of moral questions, doubts  and hardships that afflict our times. It is in times of crisis that presents a more urgent need to fantasize with imagination and overcome obstacles and fears. It is a universal need as this  is primal instinct. That's why fairy tales are considered inexhaustible reservoir of our archetypes,  of our primitive experiences.

Without further ado, for your viewing pleasure, White Shoe:

The Prodigious Shoemaker: Tales and Legends of Shoes and Shoemakers (in which White Shoe is shown in various backdrops as part of the multi-media presentation), is currently showing in Florence, Italy at The Salvatore Ferragamo Museum until March 31st, 2014.

Art: Doré Engravings With Flowers Are Creeping Me Out!

Say WHAT with flowers??!

These greeting cards by Maria Mikhhalskaya's 8th of March, fairy tale greeting cards-with-a-twist*, are causing a twist in my gut... and I think that's the point. The 8th of March is International Women's Day and these special greetings make you think about it all rather differently, don't they?

Put in a malevolent context, flowers can be very creepy...

For instance, look at Bluebeard's eyes above, as he's giving his latest bride/victim a wooing gift. *shudder*

And the Ogre from Tom Thumb talking to his wife, looking very much like he's asking her to cook Tom and his brothers with these lovely herbs:

And, of course, how like a fairy tale wolf to twist the deception one step further when approaching his prey, bringing her flowers to confuse her - perhaps the very sorts of flowers Little Red had been gathering when he met her earlier...

Well done Ms. Mikhhalskaya! You've made me think about these tales in a different way, yet again. (And I will also look at any flowers I receive in the future a tad suspiciously...)

You can find Maria Mikhhalskaya's greeting cards and more on her gallery at Behance HERE.

* If the images look familiar, they should. They're based on/are made using Gustav Doré's engravings for Perrault's fairy tales.

The Odd Life of Timothy Green

With all the emphasis on fairy tale film retellings like Mirror, Mirror, Snow White and the Huntsman, Jack the Giant Killer, Maleficent etc there's one fairy tale inspired movie that may have slipped past your radar.

The Odd Life of Timothy Green definitely has echoes of Tom Thumb, the main difference being that Timothy/Tom grows to normal boy proportions so the focus of the story becomes different (ie not all about a miniature person in a world of giants), though his appearance is just as magical.

The official synopsis is as follows:

Cindy Green and Jim Green, a childless couple, become frustrated with their inability to conceive, so one night they dream up their ideal offspring and write the child's characteristics and life events on pieces of paper, including "scoring the winning goal." The couple places the notes in a box and buries them in their backyard. After a stormy night in Stanleyville, a 10-year-old arrives at their doorstep, claiming the Greens as his own. Soon they realize that the child, named Timothy, is far more special than they originally thought.

Sounds a little yawn-worthy but I'd be very surprised if there wasn't more to this movie than first meets the eye (just like Timothy Green). The movie was originally the idea of Ahmet Zappa (who is the multi-talented son of Frank Zappa and has a long association with Disney in various capacities) and the script was written by Peter Hedges (About A Boy, Dan In Real Life, What's Eating Gilbert Grape?).

Here's the trailer:


This is a Disney movie and was in production well before the edgy side of fairy tales became vogue again but it's clear that this film's theme focuses on things that aren't as they appear to be (and is PG) , so we may be surprised beyond the normal family fare one might expect. Overall the images released for the film so far are almost all of idyllic family photo ops but clearly that wouldn't sustain an entire movie so I'm wondering what we're not seeing. The additional colorful images I've found below (also shown in the trailer) certainly hint at more other-worldliness to come.

There hasn't been a lot of buzz about it to date, at least not since the poster was first released, and I'm curious to see how it will be marketed for a summer release now the tide of public interest has shifted toward fairy tales that show their shadows.

The Odd Life of Timothy Green is due for release on August 15, 2012.

Lilliputian Brides and Grooms

NOTE: In honor of the upcoming Valentine's Day I'm going to post a few fairy tale romance related posts in the next week. There are also some blogs with wonderful fairy tale themed romance posts right now too.

1) Supernatural Fairy Tales has an awesome line-up for the month with movies, reviews, stories and more - all on the fairy tale love theme.
2) Heidi has just announced the SurLaLune Blog will be having a fairy tale romance week too and I'm really looking forward to seeing what she has to show us.

Fairy tales have a lot to teach us about true love - and I'm not talking about love-at-first-sight, though there's that too, along with consequences! - so Valentine's Day is a good time to focus on this aspect and find the good stuff normally overlooked (it's not ALL about happily-ever-after, or at least, not in the way many people think. ;)

It appears there's a new-ish trend in Asian wedding photography: using false perspective in wedding photos to turn brides into Thumbelinas and grooms into Tom Thumbs.

Via Trendhunter:

Girls are always dreaming of a fairytale wedding, and false perspective wedding photos are a way to weave a fairytale-like story through art.

Here's a different couple - the photography isn't quite as good in quality but the photos are still lovely, fun and memorable:

Stylish, sweet and humorous. I love it!