Showing posts with label trolls. Show all posts
Showing posts with label trolls. Show all posts

Saturday, August 24, 2019

Juliet Marillier Retells "East of the Sun, West of the Moon" in Audible Exclusive "Beautiful"

Yes - you read correctly: this is an ears-only story!

Most fairy tale fans have heard of Juliet Marillier. Ever since meeting Sorcha in the first book of the Sevenwaters series, Daughter of the Forest, still many folks' favorite retelling of The Wild Swans, she's been an author who guarantees a fresh, folklore-based and well-researched take on any fairy tale she puts her pen to.

This time she's tackled the popular Norwegian fairy tale, East of the Sun, West of the Moon, and, true to form, the narrator isn't someone you'd suspect.

Marillier's look at the beloved tale is told from the perspective of one of the players in the story who was taken advantage of, then unceremoniously left behind as the main couple "get their Happily Ever After".

Here's the description:
Illustration by Anton Lomaev for the novel East, written by Edith Pattou
With the Nordic fairy tale East of the Sun and West of the Moon as her inspiration, Juliet Marillier weaves a magical story of a young princess' search for her true self.
Hulde is a queen's daughter and lives in a palace. But her life is lonely. Growing up atop the glass mountain, she knows only her violent and autocratic mother and a household of terrified servants.

Then a white bear named Rune comes to visit, and Hulde learns what kindness is.

But the queen has a plan for Hulde. When she turns 16, she will wed the most beautiful man in all the world. Hulde has never met her intended husband, and her mother refuses to explain the arrangement. Hulde becomes desperate to find out more and seeks the help of a magic mirror. Perhaps someone is coming to her rescue.

On her wedding day, Hulde's existence is turned upside down. For the first time she leaves the glass mountain behind, setting out to be as brave as the heroines in her beloved storybook.

The journey will test Hulde to the limit. Can she overcome her fears and take control of her own life?
Marillier posted this little insight on her personal blog:
East of the Sun, West of the Moon by Bev Johnson
Beautiful (the novel) is in three parts. Part one follows the pattern of the fairy tale, though the central character is not the white bear prince or the intrepid young woman who travels east of the sun and west of the moon to save him from a curse. Our narrator, whom I named Hulde, only had a bit-part in that original story. The novel-length version takes Hulde way out of her comfort zone as she heads off into the unknown world beyond the glass mountain, to find out what it means to make your own story. I really loved writing this book and I hope readers will enjoy it too. It has adventures and catastrophes and a dragon. Beautiful is suitable for both adult and young adult readers.  
One reviewer, Steff (Mogsy) at Bibliosanctum, had some interesting things to add about the book, which made us more inclined to consider taking the time to listen:
Hulde is what you would call the bit-parter, the forgotten one. Not the bold and indomitable heroine, nor the girl who gets the guy, she is in fact the troll princess, the quiet and unassuming daughter of the power-hungry Troll Queen. Marillier has described Hulde as “rather hard done by” in the original tale, so her novel was a chance to explore the character and her viewpoint in more detail. The first part of Beautiful tells of her childhood high in the mountain castle, growing up under the thumb of her temperamental and ambitious mother. Hulde is told that when she reaches age sixteen, she will be married to the most handsome prince in the land, though having been sheltered and isolated all her life, our protagonist isn’t really sure what to make of that. Her only friend—and the only one she’s ever had those kinds of feelings for—is Rune, the kindly white bear who only visits the castle every three years. 
Well, knowing the gist of the original fairy tale, you can probably guess what became of that relationship and how Hulde took it. Hard done by, indeed. After the introduction, I began to better understand the author’s fascination for the forgotten troll princess’ role in the story as well as her motivation to come up with the next chapter for her character, and I was glad to see that parts two and three of Beautiful did just that. Following Hulde after she finally steps out from the shadow of her mother, this book chronicles the epic journey of her self-discovery.
While Marillier did publish a novella-length version in the Aurum anthology late last year, this story, released in May 2019, is novel-length, and clocks in at 7+ hours of listening time. To date, if you want the whole story, this audiobook exclusive is the only way to go. (We hope that changes in the future!)

You can have a sample listen at Amazon HERE or at Audible HERE. It's free with a 30-day trial of Audible.

Thursday, July 20, 2017

Pixar's New Untitled 'Suburban Fantasy World' Movie Will Have Elves & Trolls& Sprites in Surburbia

Image from presentation at D23 2017
At D23, the Disney fan convention, director of Monsters University, Dan Scanlon, came on stage to make a surprise announcement about a new, personal movie he's directing for Pixar. Currently untitled, it's described as being set in a 'Suburban Fantasy World'.

From movie web:
Rip Van Winkle by Mike Ploog
According to Scanlon, who lost his father at a very young age, the movie is inspired by the question he's always asked: 'Who was my father?' The story is set in a world with no humans, only elves, trolls and sprites... Scanlon went on to give a brief synopsis of the untitled animated movie that will fit right in with the tears that Pixar is so famous for. He explains this. 
 "In the film, we're going to tell the story of two teenage elf brothers whose father died when they were too young to remember him. But thanks to the little magic still left in the world, the boys embark on a quest that will allow them a chance to spend one last magical day with their father."
Bruce Pennington
(Additional quote via MTV): "The story takes place in a modern fantasy world where there once was magic — real magic — but it was hard to do and complicated to learn, so people just lost interest. In this world, a mix of "the fantastical and the everyday," humans don't exist. There are only elves, trolls, and sprites — or "anything that would be on the side of a van in the '70s," the director said. Oh, and unicorns are everywhere. They roam the streets of this modern, magical suburbia like rodents." 
(Emphasis in bold by OUABlog - because that looks like the style you can expect to see, sort of like 'The Night Begins To Shine' special event beginning August 1st, on the Teen Titans Go series, which albeit leaning more toward 80's than 70s, taps the same nostalgic vein.)
One of the more family friendly 70s van art images found via google (no credit given for the photo)
The homes on the street are apparently going to be Mushroom houses much like the Smurfs, but set in a modern time where there are satellite dishes sticking out of the roofs. Magical and majestic unicorns will be seen digging through the garbage much like a possum or raccoon. No release date has been set for the untitled movie, but it certainly does sound like a very Pixar affair, balancing the absurd with the heartbreakingly realistic portrayals of life even if the lives are those of troll, sprites, and elves that live in mushroom houses surrounded by magic.
Also - according to the D23 image - there will be dragons. We approve. Always good to remind heroes of how crunchy they can be.

Assuming the Pixar powers-that-be and associated creatives are accessing their childlike, nostalgic sides more than anything else though, it's likely we can expect an adventurous and humorous romp through Lord of the Rings-meets-D&D-in-suburbia, (or Stranger Things for kids), along with some heart-wrenching, family/origin story threads, designed to have us muttering about something in our eyes. 

In other words: bring it on.

What do you think? Are you intrigued? What do you think the potential is for a contemporary fairy tale-type story here? What troll, elf and sprite tropes (or lore) do you think Pixar will tap, if any?

Monday, November 21, 2016

Movie Review: 'Trolls' Will Brighten Your Day In the Best Way

"Life isn't all cupcakes and rainbows.."

Approaching that strange season of random pupil-free days and the impending holiday chaos, our FTNH (Fairy Tale New Hound) found herself escorting some children to the only G-rated movie currently in the offering, Dreamworks Trolls. Here's her review:

If you don't know anything about this movie, it's quite a ridiculous set-up. Remember those ugly little troll dolls with the bright and colorful hair that kids collected in the eighties? It's based on that toy franchise. No story, no mythology to tap into, just those dolls. The only good thing I could think about it's existence was that a lot of animators and artists were going to be able to feed their families for that coming year, but it turns out they were doing more than most people realized.

I fully expected to plaster an insincere smile on my face and grit my teeth for 90 minutes, enduring an overload of glitter, rainbow colors and ridiculously upbeat songs, and for the first 10 minutes, that's pretty much where I was. Until I realized 5 minutes later that I wasn't gritting my teeth anymore. Instead I was genuinely enjoying myself, along with the kids who were delighted by the mix of textures and creatures and, yes, riotous color. I wasn't even cringing (much) at the remix of Peer Gynt's "In the Hall of the Mountain King" - and believe me, I was primed for outrage. (In the Hall Of the Mountain King, from the Peer Gynt Suite by Edvard Griegwas one of those brilliant pieces of classical music I listened over and over as a child, sitting rapt in front of my father's speakers, imagining the story sequence of a brave hero invading the mountain fortress of the Goblin King.)

How did this happen? I'm not completely sure but Dreamworks did something right (and sadly underrated) with this movie. They took a serious look at how to be happy, did a great job of explaining how to get there, and they made putting it so simply look deceptively easy.

Perhaps it had something to do with the fact that it followed some fairy tale principles. The peril is real (the trolls are in serious danger of being eaten) and that danger, though never graphic so as not to be suitable for young children, is never dumbed down or downgraded so as to be confusing. Being eaten means dying and never coming back, and that loss is real to the characters - no magical resurrection or going back in time to fix it. It's something kids understand and appreciate, making surviving - and a resolution - very satisfying for them.

The story premise is straightforward: trolls - who are the epitome of happiness, (and teeny, think insect size) are being eaten by the 'Bergens' (think ogres and house sized) every 'trollstice, as that's the only way the Bergen's can experience happiness - to eat the incarnation of it, literally. At the beginning the trolls are prisoners, and the Bergens are greedily looking forward to Trollstice, which happens to be the very next day, and to eating a troll and feeling happy again. The trolls make a run for it and escape into hiding, leaving the Bergens extremely unhappy, kicking out the power-hungry chef in disgrace for losing them all, and leaving the Bergen boy prince who was about to eat his very first troll, completely miserable, never expecting to experience happiness in his entire life... Cut to 20 years later and the Bergen prince is now and unhappy king and the King of the trolls daughter is soon to become queen. Queen-to-be Poppy wants to throw the biggest party of all time, against the advice of the one gloomy troll (called Branch), who believes they're still in danger. She does anyway, betrays their location to the disgraced chef and many trolls are captured and taken to the royal kitchen of Bergen town. Poppy, who managed to escape "by a hair", sets out optimistically, and ridiculously under-prepared, to save her friends and people, and discovers life is not all "cupcakes and rainbows".

I kind of love that the movie takes a real tongue-in-cheek approach to the use of color, glitter, optimism and scrapbooking, while at the same time celebrating those things. Take a look at the trailer:
Along with the undertones of troll and ogre mythology, which were very subtly sprinkled throughout the movie from start to finish, one fairy tale took center stage but in quite a different way. Cinderella motifs were immediately identifiable to the kids with me but the focus wasn't on 'the Cinderella' (who was not the main character by the way) having her dreams come true or being center stage when recognized by her prince. There are bigger, more important issues at stake at that point in the story and the Cinderella character is blessedly free of the 'where's my happy ending' focus. It was refreshing.

All the technical aspects meet today's high standards and, with a world of fabric and doll making materials, it's a pretty wonderful playground for the imagination - something the animators obviously had a lot of fun with. Backstory and occasional narration pops out in little scrapbooking sequences, which could easily be annoying if they weren't so funny. And yes - it's funny - wonderfully, innocently, purely funny, without all that self-referencing studio business that seems to be standard of animation these days.

A note should be made about the music, which was also done far better than I could have predicted. Again, I fully expected to be teeny-bopped to within an inch of my tolerance, (and admittedly the obnoxious party scene - which was supposed to be obnoxious, came close), but, after the first 15 minutes, I stopped cringing with every first bar of a new tune and instead found the pacing and treatment of the music throughout to be sensitively done, to the point that it even made for some extremely touching moments. By itself the soundtrack might be a bit much to take, but in context, it works far better than I could have anticipated.

While clearly aimed at including young children, I keep reading about adults who have been taken by surprise at how much they enjoyed the movie, and blown away by how wonderful the message is. The movie is unashamedly bright, positive and happy (something I can usually only take in small doses) and celebrates the enjoyment of beauty, song and dance, as well as other less obvious things, like the wonder in the world and the power of friendship. Though the 'turnaround' near the end was necessarily simplistic, by that stage I was happy to let it slide and enjoy the characters enjoying their hard won happiness.

If I had known what this movie was truly like, I would have collected every worried child I knew on November 10 and taken them to see this movie. There are a lot of people who could use a dose of this message right now, and its power to restore a little hope and happiness shouldn't be underestimated. Instead, we should be sharing it. (And if you have cupcakes, share those too.)