dont be greedy!

First off, I want to apologize for the lateness of this post- i forgot that we’re all part of different blogs so my friend in a different one said that her TA emailed them to post a response to the blog, so i was waiting on an email to go post and forgot to just look on the blog site. so im sorry! And will remember to look here next time right after our class meetings on tues.

So for my movie pitch, i am taking a bit from Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and the issue of greediness from the essay we read. There was one part in Bettelheim’s essay that talks about children and greediness and how they must learn to overcome these destructive desires, for they only lead to more evil and danger. Especially since a lot of times, these desires are for physical satisfaction, and thus appealing to the eye and tempting but are so bad if one gives into temptation.

The story is set in a land far, far away where it is not confined by time or physical space. A drought and famine has hit the land and all is dark, desolate, and dreary. Hansel and Gretel are the 2 eldest in their family of 8 (7 and 5 respectively), so they have the responsible of somehow making some money and finding food for the rest of their brothers and sisters, while their widowed mother is picking the dried up grain and bits and pieces of the abundant harvest just from months ago (their father had died from the lack of food). There was this huge factory where most of the townspeople were employed, that was owned by this mega-millionaire. He had so much money that he didn’t know what to do with it and was bored. He was also very lonely because his beloved wife had died due to being too greedy- she ate too much of the food at one time and then died from complications with digestion. And she failed to bear him children, so he had a great idea. Because of the famine, a lot of families were selling their children away or just plainly abandoning them, so the local orphanage is overfilled and can’t take anymore. His idea was to hold a contest and whomever finished/completed it, he would adopt them and the rest of the family to live with him happily ever after in his mansion. He wanted to make sure that they weren’t greedy, because he could not risk losing someone else he loved to greediness. He would devise a whole obstacle course that lead to a huge feast at the end for the children and their family, but also along the way he would try to distract them with candies littering the ground, or cookies hanging from the trees, or cakes and other delicious pastries lining the pathway. The children had to race each other through the enchanted forest, and whomever gets to the feast first and beats out the others, wins. Also, eating the food along the way will cause them to get fatter and fatter and throughout the obstacle course, there are parts that are tight squeezed and where they have to climb over walls, jump through hoops, squeeze under small spaces, and swing on ropes. So those that were tempted and wanting to satisfy their hunger because they haven’t eaten in so long, will get fatter and fatter and not complete the whole race because they won’t be able to fit through so of the spaces. So long story short, all of the children from the town entered the contest, and one by one they all fall victim to the delicious and appetizing food along the way. Hansel and Gretel encouraged each other not to eat of those, because they could feel that something greater and better awaited them at the end. So they win, eat the wonderful feast with their family, and now lives in the mansion. Oh and the mother and the millionaire marry and they all lived happily ever after!

Movie pitch

These children come from a place where bread, cake, and sugar is sparse, correct?  Hansel and Gretel come from the island of Sansnom, off the coast of what people call "the mainland."  They are island children, dressed in leaves with tanned skin, and dine totally (under normal island circumstances) on tropical fruits, birds, and lizards.  They do not have grain on the island.  Alas, no bread.  No cake.  And no red meat.  

The witch, of course, is fat and fair-skinned, for she comes from the forest.  She lures the children in with the promise of bread and meat...little do they know that they are to be the main course.  In exploring the topic of cannibalism, the children will actually eat the witch after she is cooked to a medium-well temperature, because they want to know what red meat tastes like.  

Hansel and Gretel

Tatar says that “Hansel and Gretel” “mirror[s] the hard facts of the premodern era” (pg. 180). And so, I would want to bring those difficulties into the film to show that life for children was hard and that they could not expect their parents to take care of them until they were older. Here is the idea that I would pitch:
Hansel and Gretel are both fairly young, no younger than 6 and no older than 10. They are the two oldest children in a large peasant family who struggle daily to find their next meal and keep a roof above their heads. Since the father and mother cannot afford to feed all of the children they send Hansel and Gretel, being the most capable of the children, out into the streets to fend for themselves. Hansel and Gretel beg for food for a few days until they find a bakers shop. They steal some bread that is cooling on the windowsill and when the old baker’s wife catches them she brings them in and makes them apprentices to the baker. While the children are given plenty of food, they are unhappy because the baker and his wife are cruel to them. However, they know that they are lucky to be off of the streets and so they continue to work as hard as they can.

Kids for Sale

This story takes place in a monastery orphanage in the late 1600's. The church takes in Hansels and Gretels from all over whose parents cannot afford to take care of all their children, so the weaklings who cannot pull their weight are given up to the church. But the head friar cannot take care of all the children who have been previously left at the monastery. The boys who have made oaths and those who help with the chores are able to stay in the monastery. But a small select group must leave, and are taken by the father and abandoned many miles away. The children come to a small secluded town and some adapt to new society, while some fall by the wayside and become confused wanderers in the forest forever.

(this is lame, but really, I think H&G as said by a few of the essays written, is firmly based in what happened, parents had to abandon kids when they just could not take care of them... people have been doing this forever, practically... all the way back to Moses).

Response #2

I found it interesting while reading the essay on Hansel and Gretel in The Classic Fairy Tales that these stories were primarily written as a sort of fantastical take on what was really occurring in pre-modern times. If I had to envision the world in which a story like Hansel and Gretel would arise, I would first take into account that these were times when the lower class families really did struggle for food and other things needed for basic survival. Therefore, it would be very evident in the film that the characters were of a lower class and were not living in comfort. I think that the main characters of the film would have to be the children, and it would be best if they inhabited a world where much of what they learned they got from being vigilant and incredibly tactful. I would imagine that in order to survive, these children would have to grow up quickly and stay completely aware of their situation so that they could be one step ahead of those who would attempt to do them harm. The adults in this world would be seen as most of the secondary characters, and they would be seen as full of worry for the well being of them and their family. It would have to be a world where the adults were so caught up in their own affairs that they did not realize that their children were intelligent and capable people.
All of these worries about food and simply surviving day by day would be a good foundation for the story of Hansel and Gretel. As the tensions build up within a family, thoughts become more and more irrational, which could lead to actions that might not have been taken in a more stable atmosphere.

Assignment: 20 January 2009

Please respond to the prompt below by tonight (Tuesday) at midnight. You should place your response in a new post, rather than using the “comment” function. Later this week, you will be able to check back and see featured entries on our main page, The Philosopher’s Stone.

Keene imagines the world that created the fairy tales we read today in The Juniper Tree. Considering this Ur-world, full of poverty, fear, ignorance, and a need for storytelling, imagine what factors would lead to a story like Hansel and Gretel.

Pretend you want to pitch a movie that shows the world that produced Hansel and Gretel. How old would the main characters be? What would your supporting cast look like? And perhaps most importantly, what sorts of problems would feed into the Hansel and Gretel story? Use the week's readings to guide your thinking; consider the themes which appear in the various fairy tales from England, France, and Germany.