Great assignments, everyone! I enjoyed reading all of your creative takes on this classic tale. Below are some especially imaginative twists--if you haven't read these posts yet, you should really check them out.
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From the Tomb of Hermes:
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.
Posted by Ellie at 12:06 AM
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From the Tomb of Hermes:
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.
Posted by Laurie at 11:39 PM
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From the Peasants’ Hut:
January 20, 2009 "Hansel and Gretel"
Since "Hansel and Gretel" and stories related to it deal almost exclusively with lack of food and hardship, there was obviously some sort of famine occurring at the time. The references to cannibalism make it seem that the famine had drawn on for a long period of time, and people were desperate.
If I were to make a movie about the world that created "Hansel and Gretel," the main characters would be around nine or ten. Hansel and Gretel would be the two oldest children of a large peasant family that was struggling to make ends meet. The supporting cast would consist of the large peasant family who were hard working and practical, and a richer, aristocratic family that had not been greatly affected yet by the famine.
The peasant family's struggle for money and food would be the main problem that fed the storyline. In order to survive the family would sell Hansel and Gretel to a rich family as servants. In return, the family would receive money to buy food, and also have less mouths to feed because Hansel and Gretel would be at the richer family's home.
The fairy tale could serve as the warnings that their parents gave Hansel and Gretel about how they should behave as servants: always be prepared like Hansel in the story with his pebbles, do not go looking for trouble like the children in the story did when they began to eat the house, and always keep your wits about you like Hansel in the tale by using the bone as his finger and Gretel did by pushing the witch into the oven. If the children obeyed their parents and behaved, they could return home someday like the fairy tale "Hansel and Gretel".
Audra Crosby
Posted by AudraC at 7:34 PM
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From the Peasants’ Hut:
Tuesday, January 20, 2009
Hansel and Gretel
Hansel and Gretel (2009) is the dark origin story behind the beloved fairy tale. The titular characters are ten and eight, respectively. Their mother, shown in flashbacks as a loving woman, died during the birth of Gretel. Their step-mother, younger and meaner, walks all over their father, who is in his early thirties (but looks about sixty).
One day, while going to the market, Hansel begins imagining a land of candy and sweets. One house in particular, made of gingerbread, stays in his mind. Before going to bed that night, he tells Gretel what he had imagined. He goes to sleep, and imagines the house again. Hansel and Gretel walk inside, only to be tormented by their step-mother. She is about to kill them, but he wakes up in a cold sweat.
The next morning, he tells the family what he had dreamed. To avoid being beaten, he changes the step-mother into an old witch. To seem more heroic (and to tell a good story), he also adds in a new ending, where he and Gretel foil the witch, and throw her in the oven. The parents smile at the ending, where the children come home with a pile of gold. After the story ends, their parents send them back to the market.
Posted by Michael Hetrick at 11:35 PM
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From the Court of King Mark:
The 3rd darkest screenplay ever
Hansel and Gretel starts, “At the edge of a great forest, there once lived a poor woodcutter with his wife and two children.” Obviously, this is the sugar-coated fairy tale version. The house should be a small wooden cottage in a dark forest. The trees should be huge; while the setting cannot be so specific as to name a place one should think wonder what part of the Black Forest this is supposed to be in. It should also be completely isolated. As the father is a woodcutter, there should be plenty of crude, sharp, terrifying tools lying around as a motif.
There is a small cast. Brother Hansel and sister Gretel, close in years, a father, and possibly a stepmother. The stepmother role, which commentary points out was a much more common part of life, makes for an easy explanation as to why the mother is willing to abandon the children. I think one important addition is a bird, probably Hansel’s pet.
I don’t see much need for a specific instance (a famine) to cause the parents to abandon Hansel and Gretel. Since the movie is supposed to highlight the fear, ignorance, and need for storytelling in the real world at the time, stressing how hard life is should be good enough. Since the house is in the forest, the land for crops would only be what they cleared and supplemented with game from the forest. In such a harsh world and dealing with a stepmother, it would make sense for Gretel to get upset at something and convince Hansel to run away with her; only by quick thinking does he mark the trail so when they decide to return home they are able to. The second time they run away, Hansel only uses breadcrumbs which are eaten by forest animals.
After wandering in the forest lost for a while Hansel’s bird leads them to another cottage. An old woman lives alone; she is not a witch, but she is mean. She lets them stay with her but forces them to work for her and abuses them verbally and physically. The old woman eats well, mocking the children. After a month or so after some display of extreme brutality, probably threatening to kill them with some terrifying sharpened antique, Gretel yells back and forces the woman to impale herself accidentally. They take her money and Hansel’s bird leads them home. The movie ends there; it does not display a happy ending.
Stories are an important escape from realism in this dark, bleak world. One is told in the forest when Hansel and Gretel are lost, and at least one more is told while at the old woman’s cottage. I think the rose-tree should be told verbatim; it obviously contains themes similar to Hansel and Gretel to be grouped together and also incorporates the unsavory theme of cannibalism. I also think a story incorporating ogres and outwitting them by switching headgear with the ogre’s own children while they sleep is important because it brings up ideas of magical creatures and intelligence in children.
Song of the blog: “Zombie,” by The Cranberries.
Posted by Chester at 9:42 PM
