Del Toro's 'The Shape of Water' is an Other-Worldly Fairy Tale

Poster by James Jean

“If I told you about her — the princess without a voice — what would I say?”
(Opening narration from the trailer)

So begins a very different exploration of a princess, and of a mer (not maid but) man. Set in the Cold War era of 1963, we're taken to the world of a mute and lonely cleaning woman of a high-security government lab, who discovers a top-secret experiment: an “aquatic man”, destined to be experimented on. The discovery - and he - change her life forever.

It sounds sci-fi/ monster-movie-ish: where is the fairy tale aspect? (we hear you ask...) Take a look at the trailer and see. There's something undeniably fairy tale about the way this story is told, and it's not just the strong styling. Clearly Guillermo del Toro is exploring a number of fairy tale themes here:

The mythology teases are tantalizing: All we know is that the creature was revered in the Amazon as a god but somehow ended up under U.S. government control. (Collider)

It seems not a whole lot is known about the synopsis other than what is shown in the trailer. From the initial pitch by del Toro and footage here, we could be looking at plot, or dreams, or both. The use of art as a medium within the film for storytelling is intriguing as well. Recalling shades of The Creature From the Black Lagoon and Night of the Hunter, both of which do have a fairy tale slant to them. Whatever the case, the mousey little woman finds her 'voice' and a strength it's unlikely anyone, including she, knew she had. 

Abe? Is that you?

And that appears to be where this 'other-worldy fairy tale', as it is officially described, begins. 

You may consider our curiosity piqued.

Fox Searchlight has given “The Shape of Water” an awards season release date of Dec. 8.

"Triune Tale of Diminutive Swine" (aka "The Three Little Pigs" by John Branyan)

The set up for this piece is Branyan sharing that Shakespeare apparently had a working vocabulary of around 54 000 words, whereas the average today is much closer to 3 000. (Really? Yikes.) He then proceeds to reason that this is why reading the classics is so confusing, and that even a simple fairy tale would be difficult for many to understand.

Sent to us by fairy tale friend and mythic filmmaker Lisa Stock of InByTheEye, please enjoy an "enhanced vocabulary" version of The Three Little Pigs by comic John Branyan (recorded live in 2011).

We predict that, within minutes, any person within the vicinity of this recording will be uttering bardic phrases in complete delight.

We were very pleased to find that Branyan had translated this performance into illustrated print and it is available for purchase through his website HERE.

In the meantime, those with little folk (or other large folk) in the house, are welcome to perform their own reading of Triune Tale of Diminutive Swine, by reading the text loud HERE.

[We aim to procure this volume for our library, with the admitted selfish motivation of encouraging the formation of further volumes of like tales. ;) ]

A Word About The New Year

We all know names have power in fairy tales but specific words or phrases do as well. Sometimes it's a curse, sometimes it's just the words "I promise". Fairies are known to both tell the truth but also be very devious with the exact words they use so that the meanings can be hidden or layered. Sometimes simply the word "yes", sets off a chain of events. Either way, articulating a thought, an agreement or giving something a name or form has power in fairy tales, sometimes accidentally; even to the point of making something real. As such it alerts us to the power of our own words, both in speaking with others and in how we talk about ourselves.

Being on a Snow Queen kick at the moment, due to both the season and all the ruminating on Snow Queen characters in general at present*, I was reminded that there is a single word Kai is trying to form out of ice shards: "Eternity".

I was reminded of this as I saw people summing up either their New Year's Resolutions in a single word, or perhaps more accurately, their one-word description of how they intended to approach their coming year. While I didn't see anybody use ETERNITY (because wow, that would be harsh!), common words were ENJOY, LIVE, IMPROVE, FIT while more unique words were WORDS, PROTECT and FABRIC. It quickly became clear that one word can mean so many different things!

If I had to make a one word resolution for my 2014, the first one to mind is:

BETTER

What would yours be?

(No explanation necessary.)

Note: The beautiful photos are by Christian Aare on deviantArt HERE and show little peeks of Christian Birmingham's lovely, lovely Snow Queen illustrations within the settings.

* My review on Frozen is coming soon - I just need to cut it down to about half its current size because apparently I have a lot to complain, er, say about it, but it doesn't mean you'll want to read it all!