© ATOM 2012 A STUDY GUIDE by Katy Marriner
http://www.metromagazine.com.au
ISBN: 978-1-74295-134-8 http://www.theeducationshop.com.au Re-enchantment is an immersive journey into the hidden meanings of fairy tales. Presented as an interactive multi-platform documentary project, it explores why fairy tales enchant, entertain, fascinate and horrify contemporary adult audiences. Re-enchantment provides users with an experience that is both immersive and interactive. As a creative interpretation of fairy tales, it brings together text, digital video, documentary footage, feature film sequences, advertising, cartooning, photography, animation, artwork, still images and sound. Written and directed by Sarah Gibson and produced by Sue Maslin, Re-enchantment can be accessed online at
Teachers and students can follow Re-enchantment on Facebook at
2 Fairy tales are always changing and media artists and popular culture • engage imaginatively and critically and adapting; so are interpretations in each story space. The artists’ work with literary texts and multimodal by writers, social historians, can also be sourced in the Gallery. texts to expand the scope of their psychologists and cultural Users can also contribute their own experience; commentators. Re-enchantment re-imaginings of fairy tales to the • to explain and analyse the ways in explores psychological, social, Gallery and express their views about which stories, characters, settings historical and cultural interpretations fairy tales and fairy tale themes in the and experiences are reflected in of fairy tales and fairy tale themes. Forum. particular genres, and discuss the Rather than stripping away the appeal of these genres; mystery and enchantment, Re- Re-enchantment is rated M and is • identify personal ideas, enchantment shows how various recommended for students aged 15 experiences and opinions about interpretations and versions of a and over. Educators are advised to texts and discuss them with story deepen our connection to and preview all sections of the website others; fascination with the richness of fairy prior to using Re-enchantment as a • recognise areas of agreement and tales. curriculum resource. difference, and how to develop and refine their interpretations The fairy tale story spaces offer The activities in this study guide through discussion and argument; detailed examinations of Bluebeard, are designed for use with senior • create their own texts in different Cinderella, Hansel and Gretel, secondary students in English forms and genres and for particular Rapunzel, Red Riding Hood and Snow and Literature. Teachers of these audiences. White. The three-minute documentaries subjects are encouraged to use about fairy tale themes each have a Re-enchantment to promote Students may be referred to Re- different question at their core and as contemporary disciplined-based enchantment to support individual such can be watched across a series learning in these subjects. project work in subjects such as of lessons rather than all at once. Dance, Drama, Media, Psychology, Re-enchantment also includes the In completing the tasks, students will Studio Arts, Theatre Studies and re-interpretation of fairy tales by visual have demonstrated the ability to: Visual Communication and Design.
Welcome to shortcut to the six story spaces in • Your responses to the Re-enchantment the forest. There is a drop-down questions and activities in this menu for each story space here study guide can be contributed Tips for Exploring the that provides useful shortcuts to the Gallery and Forum Website back to particular sections such as pages of the website. In the the stories or a page dealing with Gallery, just use the ‘Create’ Why do fairy stories continue to an issue. The Menu also offers a button to upload your photos, enchant, entertain, fascinate and shortcut to the Gallery or you can artwork, videos or sound horrify contemporary audiences? use the Gallery button on the left- files. Your responses will be hand side of the screen. There are moderated before they are Visit Re-enchantment using the many layers of information within published. following URL
3 Fairy Tales
Fairy tales existed as oral stories --Do you still read fairy tales? of its plot, characters and for thousands of years before Why? language are transferred to they appeared as literature --Share your answers to another form or medium. for children. Many of today’s these questions with the An adaptation alters the fairy tales have evolved from class. Listen to the answers reader’s experience of the centuries-old stories that have expressed by others. original text. appeared, with variations, in • Working as a class, write • Fairy tales are a genre of multiple cultures around the a definition of the term literature. Like all genres of world. Fairy tales, and works fairy tale. You may consult literature, fairy tales tell a derived from fairy tales, are still dictionary definitions to help story in a particular way. written today. you settle on your definition --Return to your list of fairy of the term. When you have tales. Drawing on your The term ‘fairy tale’ is taken from spent time exploring Re- knowledge of the fairy tales the French conte de fées which enchantment, you may want that you have listed, what Charles Perrault popularised in to revise the definition. observations can you make his now famous collection of fairy • Why do fairy tales begin with about the conventions of tales Contes du temps passé ‘Once upon a time’? Why do fairy tales? Divide your (1697). Fairy tales are set in a they end with ‘… and they all observations into the distant imaginary past. They do lived happily ever after’? following sections: not always have fairies, but usually • Would you like a fairy tale • Plot there is magic: enchantments, existence? What would it be • Narrative structure transformations, talking animals like? • Narrative voice and people under spells. • If your own life story was a • Characters fairy tale, what tale would it • Settings Across cultures, fairy tales be? • Themes have been retold and changed --Write your own life story so • Language with each telling. They have far as a fairy tale. Aim to • Symbolic Motifs been collected and written write 500–750 words. down, translated and edited in • How many fairy tales can you Watch ‘Ever After’. ‘Ever After’ ways that have also altered the name? Share your list with a is a three-minute documentary stories. However, folklorists have peer and then with the class. about fairy tales. The identified many common motifs --Drawing on the list of fairy documentary offers information and story types throughout the tale titles, write another list that will support your work on the world. that names films, plays, genre of fairy tales. novels, songs, paintings, Fairy tales are cultural snapshots dance performances, This is one of a series of three- of the lives of men and women, musicals, advertisements minute documentaries that their economic and family etc. that are transformations can be viewed on the Re- circumstances and the conditions or adaptations of fairy tales. enchantment website. They are of childhood. At the same time --A transformation of a also available on DVD. fairy tales reflect our inner lives, text occurs when there our conscious and unconscious is a change in the way a Teachers can purchase the fears and preoccupations, as well text is communicated. A DVD series of 10 x three- as our fantasies and dreams. transformation alters the minute documentaries reader’s experience of the at
4 Bluebeard
luebeard was a well-known folk tale by the time it first Bappeared in print in Charles Perrault’s 1697 collection of fairy tales. The tale tells the story of a violent nobleman in the habit of murdering his wives and the attempts of one wife to avoid the fate of her predecessors. Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm’s ver- sions of the story were titled Fitcher’s Bird and The Robber Bridegroom. Bluebeard is known in Italy as Silver Nose and in England as Mr Fox. The story involves a forbidden chamber and the dire consequences of curiosity and disobedience.
There have been several historical serial killers of brides, children and pregnant women that can be paralleled to the Bluebeard story. Gilles de Rais, a fifteenth-century aristocrat and prolific serial killer, has been suggested as the source for the character of Bluebeard. Another Bluebeard type was Cunmar the Accursed, a mid sixth-century ruler of Brittany, who beheaded his wives when they became pregnant.
• Read and listen to the Bluebeard stories. --Bluebeard virtually disappeared information about Bluebeard on the are all examples of women from collections of fairy tales, Re-enchantment website to help you whose curiosity exacted dire because it was thought too complete the following tasks. consequences. Use online gruesome and scary for children. resources to learn about the story --Can you ever remember being • Construct a concept map that of these three women. Can you told the Bluebeard story as a identifies and explains the think of other curious women child? characters and relationships that both real and fictional? Was their --What do the versions of are part of the Bluebeard story. curiosity to their advantage or Bluebeard have in common? • What type of man is Bluebeard? disadvantage? How do the stories differ? When • How do you regard the female --Is male curiosity regarded you have compared the stories, protagonist of Bluebeard? Is she differently to female curiosity? spend time as a class, discussing bold? Is she brave? Is she clever? • Make an A3 collage that uses how the changes affect the way • Whose side do the storytellers words and images to depict the the story is understood. take? images, symbols and motifs of the The White Dove, The Old Dame • Some versions of Bluebeard are Bluebeard stories. and Her Hen, and How the Devil subtitled: ‘The fatal effects of • One of the themes of Bluebeard is Married Three Sisters are other female curiosity.’ marriage. variants of the tale. Locate and --Is Bluebeard a cautionary tale? --Watch ‘Beastly Husbands’. SCREEN EDUCATION © ATOM 2012 read print or electronic versions of --Does it warn that women will be (See Fairytale Themes in the the stories. punished for their curiosity? Re-enchantment website menu.) --The fatal effects of feminine --At the time of Perrault’s telling Now that you are familiar with the curiosity have long been of the tale, arranged or loveless story of Bluebeard, your task is to the subject of story. Lot’s marriages were the norm. interpret the fairy tale. Draw on the wife, Pandora, and Psyche Remarriage by widowers was
5 also common. A young woman Australia’s campaign to stop another Hollywood film from this could find herself married without violence against women. era that drew on the Bluebeard consent and often to an older • Develop your knowledge and story. You can watch the film man who may turn out to be a understanding of domestic online at
6 Cinderella slipper. Charles Perrault’s Cendrillon was immensely popular and is the inderella is one of the oldest version of the story that Walt Disney and most well-known fairy based his 1950 animated feature Ctales. A Cinderella story film Cinderella on. Perrault was usually has common elements responsible for the fairy godmother, have compared the stories, spend of a heroine of low status who the glass slipper and the pumpkin that time as a class discussing how achieves success or a heroine who transforms into a coach. Aschenputtel the changes affect the way the is mistreated by her stepmother and by the Brothers Grimm does not have story is understood. stepsisters, but thanks to a shoe that a fairy godmother. A tree planted on --In what versions of the story does is lost and rediscovered, is destined her mother’s grave and watered by Cinderella take an active role in for success. Story details are adapted Cinderella’s tears provides the dresses her liberation? and changed to suit particular for the ball. This Cinderella is more countries. There may be over one resourceful. She takes an active role in Now that you are familiar with the thousand variations around the world her liberation. She makes her own way story of Cinderella, your task is to including several versions with a male to the ball. Rashin Coatie is a Scottish interpret the fairy tale. Draw on the Cinderella. fairy tale first written down in 1542 information about Cinderella on the in which Cinderella’s dead mother Re-enchantment website to help you An Egpytian version of Cinderella returns to help her in the form of a red complete the following tasks. handed down by the historian Strabo calf. in the first century BC tells of what • Construct a concept map that happens to the courtesan Rhodopis • Read and listen to the Cinderella identifies and explains the when her sandal is stolen by an eagle stories. characters and relationships that while she is bathing in the waters of --Can you remember how you are part of the Cinderella story. the Nile. In a Chinese version of the responded to Cinderella when • In what ways does Cinderella’s SCREEN EDUCATION © ATOM 2012 fairy tale from 850 AD, Yeh-Shen is you were a child? What were name reflect her situation in life? befriended by a fish who helps her you thinking and feeling this time • Why can’t Cinderella’s stepmother escape the tyranny of her stepmother around? love her stepdaughter? and stepsister. She wears a cloak --What do the versions of • What part does sibling rivalry play of kingfisher feathers to the spring Cinderella have in common? How in Cinderella? festival and leaves behind a golden do the stories differ? When you • Who is the fairy godmother?
7 Cinderella a makeover. Cinderella is transformed. --Watch ‘Princess Culture’. (See Fairytale Themes in the Re-enchantment website menu.) Who are contemporary Cinderellas? --Makeover culture is an aspect of contemporary society. --Working as a class, make a list of makeover television programs. --What features do these programs have in common? --What promises do these programs make? Are the changes authentic? • View the artwork inspired by Cinderella. Which artwork interests you the most? Write a 100-word --Does the fairy godmother deprive story emerged from China during appraisal of the artwork that Cinderella of her ability to think the tenth century when the small provides both a description and and act for herself and to find her foot was considered a mark of your opinion of it. own success? Or does the fairy extraordinary virtue, distinction • Hundreds of films have been made godmother represent the good and beauty. Foot binding was that are either direct adaptations of mother who enables Cinderella to accepted in aristocratic circles. Cinderella or have plots based on realise her own desires? --Watch ‘If the Shoe Fits’. the story. • Cinderella offers very little (See Fairytale Themes in the --Your task is to write a review of information about the prince. He Re-enchantment website menu.) one of the film adaptations of doesn’t even have a name. Why --Use print and electronic Cinderella. Your review should is the prince desirable? What resources to learn more about compare the adaptation to the evidence is there that he loves the custom of foot binding. early versions of the story. Is its Cinderella and that Cinderella --There is a saying ‘beauty knows message consistent with early loves the prince? no pain’. Are modern women, versions of the story or does it • ‘Cinderella is not so much a and men, prepared to suffer for pursue a different agenda? romance as a rags to riches story.’ beauty’s sake? • Your turn: Re-imagine the story of Do you agree? --Can you think of any modern day Cinderella. You may choose the • Can you think of any women or beauty regimes that are far from form. If it is possible, add your men whose life story bears some sensible? re-imagining of Cinderella to the resemblance to Cinderella’s • The fairy godmother gives Re-enchantment Gallery. experience? • Is the moral of Cinderella that hard work, virtue and patience are rewarded? • Make an A3 collage that uses words and images to depict the images, symbols and motifs of the Cinderella stories. • While some versions of the Cinderella story feature a shoe made of fur, why do you think Charles Perrault’s use of the glass slipper has endured? What type SCREEN EDUCATION © ATOM 2012 of shoe would a contemporary Cinderella wear? Why do you think the Cinderella story has been so strongly linked to the shoe? • What view of beauty is promoted by Cinderella? --An early version of the Cinderella
8 Hansel and Gretel who threatens to devour them. But in escape the abuse by their wicked other versions, the father is not at all stepmother. She casts a spell on ansel and Gretel belongs to reluctant to abandon the children, and the streams in the forest, turning the a group of stories folklorists the creature in the woods is male. brother into a deer who is cared for by Hcall The Children and the the sister. A king falls in love with the Ogre or Children in the House of the Hansel and Gretel by Jacob and sister and rescues them both. Monster where children stumble into Wilhelm Grimm closely resembles the world of an ogre, giant or witch other stories such as Charles Baba Yaga tells the story of a but manage to outwit them, often Perrault’s Tom Thumb and Finetta stepmother who sends her two destroying them by method of the the Cinder Girl published by Madame stepchildren to Baba Yaga, the witch, monster’s own invention. The story is d’Aulnoy in 1698. The Grimm Brothers with a promise of sweet things to eat. also closely related to stories about modified the story in later editions, The witch’s house is not edible, but children sacrificing themselves to save changing the real mother to the stands on chicken legs. The children’s their parents in times of famine. stepmother and attributing less blame final triumph and escape comes out to the father. not from cleverness or even courage, In the most familiar versions of but from kindness to all things, which the story, there is a strong parallel In Little Brother and Little Sister by is repaid by assistance from Baba between the stepmother who Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm, the brother Yaga’s attendant animals. abandons the children and the witch and sister decide to leave home to The Two Children and the Witch by Consiglieri Pedroso offers no explanation for the mother’s actions, and there is no father. There is no gingerbread house. Instead, the children steal cakes that are being fried by an old woman who is blind in one eye.
• Read and listen to the Hansel and Gretel stories. --Can you remember how you responded to Hansel and Gretel SCREEN EDUCATION © ATOM 2012 when you were a child? What were you thinking and feeling this time around? --What do the versions of Hansel and Gretel have in common? How do the stories differ? When
9 --Can their abandonment be peers, storyboard and film an justified? advertisement that uses the --Watch ‘Wicked Stepmothers’. Hansel and Gretel story to warn (See Fairytale Themes in the about childhood obesity. Re-enchantment website menu.) OR --In early versions of Hansel and Working with a team of Gretel it was their mother who peers, storyboard and film an abandoned them. By the 1840 advertisement that uses the version of the story, the Brothers Hansel and Gretel story to warn Grimm had turned her into a about adult obesity. stepmother. Why do you think • Make an A3 collage that uses the Brothers Grimm made this words and images to depict the revision? images, symbols and motifs of the • Have you ever been lost? Share Hansel and Gretel stories. your experience with the class. • Rewrite Hansel and Gretel from --Watch ‘Into the Woods’. (See Gretel’s perspective of her time in Fairytale Themes in the Re- the witch’s house. enchantment website menu.) --Before you begin, spend time --Can you think of any contempo- exploring the ‘Witch’s Clothes rary fiction about a lost child or Line’. lost children? Make a class list of • Watch the following film adaptation novels, short stories, poems and of Hansel and Gretel: you have compared the stories, films. Choose a title from the list --Hansel and Gretel (1955) spend time as a class discussing and write a fifty-word review that
10 Rapunzel face into that of a dog. Luckily the Studios’ Tangled (2010). Is witch’s own pet dog, like her magic it a successful adaptation of apunzel is the best known of talking furniture, has taken a liking to Rapunzel? Rumour has it that the the maiden in the tower story Angiola, and intercedes successfully title was changed from Rapunzel Rtype. There are many versions on her behalf. Prunella, a variant of to Tangled to market the film to of the fairy tale from a wide range of Rapunzel, is the story of a child who both girls and boys. Do you think countries, including England, France, steals plums from a witch’s tree and is that both genders would enjoy Italy, Germany, Greece and Egypt. She caught and imprisoned. Tangled? What changes have may have different names but her fate been made to ensure that Tangled always involves being locked away. The Grimm Brothers’ first edition of would appeal to a contemporary Rapunzel featured a fairy in a garden audience? Perinette, the heroine of a fairytale who later becomes an enchantress. from 1697 by Charlotte-Rose de la In subsequent editions, they played Now that you are familiar with the Force, is held captive in the tower down Rapunzel’s pregnancy and the story of Rapunzel, your task is to by an old witch to whom she has birth of twin children. interpret the fairy tale. Draw on the been handed over. In Petrosinella information about Rapunzel on the by Giambattista Basile, the prince • Read and listen to the Rapunzel Re-enchantment website to help you rescues Petrosinella from the tower stories. complete the following tasks. with the help of some magic gall-nuts --What do the versions of Rapunzel from an oak tree. They elope and have in common? How do the • Construct a concept map that SCREEN EDUCATION © ATOM 2012 avoid the suffering of other tales. stories differ? When you have identifies and explains the Beautiful Angiola, a Sicilian folktale compared the stories, spend time characters and relationships that begins with the theft of jujubes, exotic as a class discussing how the are part of the Rapunzel story. fruits from the witch’s garden. The changes affect the way the story • It is claimed that the fairy tale heroine is rescued by her prince but is understood. Rapunzel was based on the legend the witch punishes her by turning her Watch Walt Disney Animation of Saint Barbara. Saint Barbara was
11 a great beauty, who was locked in a tower by her father in an effort to isolate her from the world. --Use print and electronic texts to lean more about Saint Barbara. --Do you think that Saint Barbara inspired the story of Rapunzel? What similarities exist? • Rapunzel refers to the practice of keeping young women away from the attentions of unsuitable young men, sometimes by going to lengths such as locking them up in towers or convents. --Can the tower be thought of as both a positive and negative symbol? --Have you ever heard of the term ‘helicopter parents’? Can your parents sometimes be overprotective? • In Rapunzel the father bargains away his unborn child. Is this a sign of fear or weakness or love? Is his decision understandable? portray herself as the guardian that Rapunzel is of the prince climbing --Exchanging a child for a food to Rapunzel needed? Is she merciful up the heroine’s golden hair to satisfy a craving is an uneven and just? where she is imprisoned in a tower. exchange. Can you think of other • In what sense is the story of --What other meanings can be fairy tales that use the premise of Rapunzel about the joy of associated with Rapunzel’s long an uneven exchange? being pregnant and the painful and blonde braids? • How do the storytellers portray experience of being infertile? --What meanings can be Rapunzel’s mother? • Make an A3 collage that uses associated with cutting off long • Imagine the witch is given the words and images to depict the hair? chance to tell her side of the story. images, symbols and motifs of the --Did you know there is a global What would she say? How would Rapunzel stories. business in selling long hair? she defend her actions? Would she • The most well-known image from --Why do hair advertisements nearly always feature long hair? • Both the prince and Rapunzel act immaturely. Do you agree? Is this why they must be punished? Could it be argued that if they were not punished, they might never have acquired maturity and insight? • View the artwork inspired by Rapunzel in the ‘Hair Tales’ exhibition in the Gallery. Which artwork interests you the most? Write a 100-word appraisal of the artwork that provides both a description and your opinion of it. • Your turn: Re-imagine the story SCREEN EDUCATION © ATOM 2012 of Rapunzel. You may choose the form. If it is possible, add your re-imagining of Rapunzel to the Re-enchantment Gallery.
12 Red Riding Hood Hood stories. as a cautionary tale? In shaping an --Can you remember how you answer to this question, consider ed Riding Hood is an extremely responded to Red Riding Hood what dangers and deceptions popular fairy tale, told in when you were a child? What shape the narrative. Rhundreds of different versions were you thinking and feeling this • What aspects of Red Riding Hood across many continents. Folklorists time around? allow it to be labelled a coming-of- have suggested that the story may What do the versions of Red age story? have originated relatively late in the Riding Hood have in common? --Watch ‘Fairy Tale Sex’. (See Middle Ages, as a cautionary tale How do the stories differ? When Fairytale Themes in the Re- warning children about the dangers of you have compared the stories, enchantment website menu.) the forest. spend time as a class discussing --What meanings can be how the changes affect the way associated with the wolf’s In an early version of the story, The the story is understood. appetite and his desire to Grandmother’s Tale, a cunning Red devour? Do you think there is Riding Hood outwits the wolf. The Now that you are familiar with the a link between the wolf and the Charles Perrault version titled Little Red story of Red Riding Hood, your task is vampire? Riding Hood changed the werewolf to to interpret the fairy tale. Draw on the --Red Riding Hood has also been a wolf and added a red cap. The story information about Red Riding Hood on seen as a parable of sexual ends with Red Riding Hood devoured the Re-enchantment website to help maturity. In what sense is Red by the wolf. In 1812, Jacob and Wilhelm you complete the following tasks. Riding Hood about female Grimm published the story Little Red wisdom? You may like to look Cap. The red cap became a red cloak • Construct a concept map that again at The Grandmother’s Tale. and a huntsman was introduced to identifies and explains the • Considering both male characters create a happy ending. Italo Calvino’s characters and relationships that of the story, the wolf and the The Wolf and the Three Girls is the are part of the Red Riding Hood huntsman, what comment does story of an ill mother, a courageous story. the fairy tale make about male SCREEN EDUCATION © ATOM 2012 younger sister and angry townspeople. • Who is Red Riding Hood? A naive desire and male power? What Grandauntie Tiger is a version of Red innocent young girl who is the comment does the fairy tale make Riding Hood well known in China, victim of the evil trickster wolf? Is about female desire and female Taiwan, Japan and Korea. she brave? Adventurous? Clever? power? Vain? • Make an A3 collage that uses • Read and listen to the Red Riding • Is Red Riding Hood best described words and images to depict the
13 images, symbols and motifs of the some of these advertisements on Red Riding Hood stories. YouTube. • Red Riding Hood leaves home --http://www.youtube.com/ willingly to visit her grandmother. watch?v=eZtNaHEtLvI --Watch ‘Into the Woods’. (See --http://www.youtube.com/ Fairytale Themes in the Re- watch?v=kaxpLaLLQq8 enchantment website menu.) --http://www.youtube.com/ --How does Red Riding Hood see watch?v=kH1FojBjcOA her world? Why does she not see --http://www.youtube.com/ the wolf for who he is? watch?v=vnsUx12M3no • Historical accounts suggest that --http://www.youtube.com/ the character of the wolf in Red watch?v=ZQ_pP6qv1hc Riding Hood can be linked to --What would you use Red Riding the very real fear of wolves. In Hood to advertise? previous times, wolves threatened • Sam the Sham and the Pharoahs’ the existence of peasant villagers 1966 hit song ‘L’il Red Riding during winter and times of famine. Hood’ takes the wolf’s point of Fables served as a valid warning view. Watch and listen to Amanda not to enter forests where wolves Seyfried, the lead actress of the were known to live, and to be on film Red Riding Hood (2011) cover the look out for the animals. the song at
14 Snow White
he Walt Disney film Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs T(1937) has shaped our idea of the Snow White story. There are many versions of the story and not all of them have dwarfs and such a large role for the prince.
The Snow White story goes back to ancient times. A number of women in Greek and Roman myth are named Chione meaning snow girl or daughter of the snow. In Ovid’s poem Metamorphoses, a god comes to Chione disguised as an old woman, another puts her to sleep by magic and the goddess Diana kills her in a jealous rage. There are many stories of goddesses who are jealous of a mortal woman’s beauty. The second century tale of Eros and Pysche has striking echoes of Snow White. of Snow White. The heroine, Lisa falls revives. The Vain Queen by Consiglieri unconscious because of a fairy curse. Pedroso is another tale about the In Little Snow White by Jacob and The jealous older woman is her aunt. conflict between a queen and her Wilhelm Grimm, the Queen is Snow Her body is encased in seven crystal daughter. White’s mother and the Prince takes coffins one inside the other. In The the glass coffin home, where Snow Crystal Casket from the 1870s, the • Read and listen to the Snow White White remains dead until a servant daughter helps her schoolteacher marry stories. hits her impatiently on the back and her father and then suffers from her new --Can you remember how you dislodges the poison apple. In their stepmother’s jealousy. An eagle helps responded to Snow White when final version, published in 1859, the daughter to escape and seek refuge you were a child? What were the jealous Queen is Snow White’s with fairies. The heroine in the Scottish you thinking and feeling this time stepmother, and Snow White comes tale The King of Ireland’s Daughter is around? back to life before the Prince takes her helped by twelve enchanted cats. It --What do the versions of Snow home. is one of many tales where the man White have in common? How do who falls in love with Snow White in the stories differ? When you have The Young Slave by Giambattista Basile her coffin marries another woman who compared the stories, spend time is one of the earliest literary versions graciously withdraws when Snow White as a class discussing how the changes affect the way the story is understood.
Now that you are familiar with the story of Snow White, your task is to interpret the fairy tale. Draw on the information about Snow White on the Re-enchantment website to help you complete the following tasks.
• Construct a concept map that SCREEN EDUCATION © ATOM 2012 identifies and explains the characters and relationships that are part of the Snow White story. • Snow White is a story of envy. Do you agree? What other ideas drive the story of Snow White?
15 particular identity. Can you name the seven dwarfs? --Do you think that Disney’s portrayal of the dwarfs is loyal to the original versions of Snow White? • Who else helps Snow White? How are we positioned to view these characters? • What purpose does Snow White’s temporary death serve? Is she saved by a kiss? • Make an A3 collage that uses words and images to depict the images, symbols and motifs of the Snow White stories. • Watch the following YouTube clip:
16 and submit it as a sound file to the Gallery.
If the Shoe Fits
Watch the short film ‘If the Shoe Fits’.
• Spend time as a class discussing the ideas explored in ‘If the Shoe Fits’. Make sure that your discussion considers the following questions: --Do you think having a small foot is more desirable? --Do women really love shoes that much? And if they do, why? --Cinderella’s slipper is a perfect fit. Does she really make much of an effort to find her Mr Right? Is finding ‘the one’ all that easy in a modern world? • Design a new slipper for apples, shoes, keys and mirrors take on Cinderella. When you have Your choice symbolic meaning. Through a series of finished, submit your design to short films, Re-enchantment explores the Re-enchantment Gallery. Your task is to complete a detailed some of the features of fairy tales. investigation of a fairy tale. Choose a Beastly Husbands fairy tale that is not one of the six fairy The Forbidden Room tales featured on Re-enchantment. Watch the short film ‘Beastly Use Prezi to present the results of your Watch the short film ‘The Forbidden Husbands’. investigation to the class. Your Prezi Room’. should provide: • Spend time as a class discussing • Spend time as a class discussing the ideas explored in ‘Beastly - An abridged version of the original the ideas explored in ‘The Husbands’. Make sure that your fairy tale; Forbidden Room’. Make sure that discussion considers the following - Information about versions of the your discussion considers the questions: fairy tale both past and present; following questions: --Why do you think there are so - An analysis of the fairy tale’s plot, --What compels us to do many fairy tales about young and characters, themes, settings and something that is forbidden? beautiful women who must marry motifs; --Aside from forbidden rooms, monsters? - A sustained interpretation of the what other fairy tale settings --Read the story of Beauty and the fairy tale; are rather daunting? What other Beast. What are the messages of - Information about re-imaginings forbidden motifs are used in fairy the story? of the fairy tale in contemporary tales? --Can you think of contemporary texts. --Why should we venture into texts that draw on the idea of the forbidden rooms? beastly husband? Fairy Tale Themes --Do you think that contemporary • Drawing on a story of a heroine society has an insatiable appetite and a beast, write a 250-word Any comparison of fairy tales reveals for stories of real and fictional analysis of the transformative that the stories have features in crime? nature of the relationship. When common. Fairy tales are the domain of • Write your own imaginative story you have finished submit your evil stepmothers and wicked witches, about something ‘forbidden’. Ask analysis to the Re-enchantment SCREEN EDUCATION © ATOM 2012 beautiful princesses and handsome your teacher to edit your story. Forum. princes and beastly ogres and wild When you have finished, submit wolves. The stories lead us into your story to the Re-enchantment Into the Woods forbidding forests and dare us to open Forum if it is a text file, or you might secret rooms. Everyday objects like like to do a reading of your story Watch the short film ‘Into the Woods’.
17 • Spend time as a class discussing Princess Culture Dark Emotions the ideas explored in ‘Into the Woods’. Make sure that your Watch the short film ‘Princess Watch the short film ‘Dark Emotions’. discussion considers the following Culture’. points: • Spend time as a class discussing --Make a list of all the fairy tales • Spend time as a class discussing the ideas explored in ‘Dark that rely on the setting of a forest the ideas explored in ‘Princess Emotions’. Make sure that your to tell the story. Culture’. discussion considers the following --Why is it that so many fairy tales --Make sure that your discussion questions: take us into the forest? considers the following --In fairy tales, parents abandon --Are fairy tale forests always questions: their babies, mothers imprison dangerous places? --Are fairy tales responsible for and plan to eat their children --When do forests provide refuge our fantasies about princes and and fathers want to marry their for fairy tale characters? princesses? daughters. Why are fairy tales so --Do any fairy tales portray forests --Why are so many young girls dark? as desirable places? attracted to the princess --Were there any fairy tales that • Working as a class, make a list of fantasy? Do adolescent females you found frightening as a television programs that are based also fantasise about princes child? Now that you are older, on the idea of being lost. Why are and adolescent males about do you think that fairy tales are these stories compelling? princesses? something to fear? • Given the advances of modern --Do you think that today’s • What role did the Brothers Grimm technology, is it possible to get princesses are more likely to be and Disney play in the sanitising of lost? found on the catwalk or on a fairy tales? Use online resources to • Write a fifty-word short story titled Hollywood film set or at the top help you provide a detailed answer ‘Into the Woods’. When you have of the music charts? to this question. Support your finished, submit your story to the --What’s wrong with hoping that answer with evidence from one or Re-enchantment Forumif it is a one day your prince (or princess) more fairy tales. When you have text file, or you might like to do a will come? finished, submit your analysis to reading of your story and submit it • Working with a partner, create a the Re-enchantment Forum. as a sound file to the Gallery. slideshow titled ‘Contemporary Princesses’. When you have Wicked Stepmothers Ever After finished submit your analysis to the Re-enchantment Gallery. Watch the short film ‘Wicked Watch the short film ‘Ever After’. Stepmothers’. You may find it useful Fairy Tale Sex to check out the ‘Witch’s Clothes Line’ • Spend time as a class discussing section of ‘Hansel and Gretel’ for more the ideas explored in ‘Ever After’. Watch the short film ‘Fairy Tale Sex’. information about the symbolism and Make sure that your discussion history of the witch. considers the following questions: • Spend time as a class discussing --What plot devices ensure that the ideas explored in ‘Fairy • Spend time as a class discussing fairy tales end happily ever after? Tale Sex’. Make sure that your the ideas explored in ‘Wicked --Do fairytales help us escape the discussion considers the following Stepmothers’. Make sure that your real world or do they help us deal questions: discussion considers the following with the real world? --Were you shocked by the questions: • Drawing on the claim that the revelations about the sexual --Why are fairy tales full of evil idea of transformation is at the dimension of fairy tales? stepmothers and wicked core of any fairy tale, spend time --Why might fairy tales have been witches? recalling the transformations that used to tackle such subject --Do any of the wicked women occur in your favourite fairy tales. matter? have any redeeming qualities? Write a 250-word analysis of one • Given the very adult concepts --Working as a class, make a of these fairy tale transformations. explored in fairy tales, respond to list of television programs that Your analysis should describe the the contention ‘That fairy tales are feature contemporary witches. In SCREEN EDUCATION © ATOM 2012 change and explain its significance not child’s play’. You may write what ways do these thoroughly by drawing on specific details in an expository or persuasive modern witches challenge the of the fairy tale. When you have way. When you have finished, stereotype? finished, submit your analysis to submit your analysis to the --Why do you think women are still the Re-enchantment Forum. Re-enchantment Forum. called witches today?
18 --Watch ‘Re-imaginings’, a short film about the retelling and reinterpretation of fairy tales to further your knowledge and understanding of this concept. --Return to your list of transformations and adaptations of fairy tales. --Choose one of the adaptations from the list. Write a 250-word analysis that explains the text’s adaptation of a fairy tale. --Choose one of the transformations from the list. Write a 250-word analysis that explains the text’s transformation of a fairy tale.
Gallery • Write a character profile of either Maker or iMovie) or slide editing the archetypal evil stepmother software (Photo Story or iPhoto) to Visit the Gallery at the heart of the or wicked witch. Find an image import, organise and manipulate Re-enchantment forest to view artist to accompany the character the still images. The software exhibitions. profile. When you have finished, tutorials will support your progress. submit your analysis to the 6. Record your voice-over and then • View the exhibitions ‘Hair Tales’, Re-enchantment Gallery. add background music and sounds. ‘Woman and Wolf’, ‘The Heroine • Re-write either Cinderella, Re-imagined’ and ‘Dark Emotions’. Rapunzel, Hansel and Gretel or Online digital storytelling Take another look at the Snow White from the point of view resources Bluebeard, Cinderella, Hansel and of the wicked stepmother or witch. Gretel, Rapunzel, Red Riding Hood http://www.acmi.net.au/ and Snow White galleries. Your turn digitalstorytelling.aspx http://www.bbc.co.uk/wales/ The Gallery is also place for you to Working with a peer, make a digital capturewales/ contribute your own re-imaginings of story about a fairy tale theme. Your http://www.coe.uh.edu/ fairy tales. digital story should be approximately digitalstorytelling/ three minutes in length. Make sure that http://www.digiclub.org/progproj/ • Working as a class, create your there is a title card and a credit card http://www.jasonohler.com/ own exhibition to submit to the that states your names and roles. You storytelling/ Gallery. Files can be submitted in must also submit an A3 storyboard http://www.storycenter.org JPG, GIF, PNG, FLV, F4V, MP3 or and a bibliography of resources. http://www.tech-head.com/dstory.htm WAV formats.
How to make a digital story Submit your digital story to the Research Re-enchantment Gallery as an FLV or 1. Write the script of your digital F4V file. Did you know that fairy tales are story. Aim to tell your story in classified into types? 250–350 words. Read the story to Fairy tales in your teacher and your peers. Use contemporary culture The term morphology is used to refer their feedback to edit and finish to the study of the form or structure of your script. Are fairy tales a part of your world? anything. 2. Collect still images to illustrate your story. You may need to crop Fairy tales lend themselves to many The Aarne-Thompson classification SCREEN EDUCATION © ATOM 2012 or enhance these images to meet media and lend themselves to being system groups fairy and folk tales the needs of your story. transformed. according to their overall plot. 3. Make a storyboard. Common, identifying features are used 4. Collect music and sounds to • Your task is to consider how fairy to decide which tales are grouped incorporate in your story. tales have been re-imagined in together. For example, Rapunzel 5. Use movie editing software (Movie popular culture. is type 310. It also lends itself to
19 emphasis on the common elements, to the extent that the folklorist describes Vladimir Propp specifically studied a collection of Russian fairy tales, but his analysis has been found useful for the tales of other countries. Propp analysed fairy tales for the function each character and action fulfilled and concluded that a tale was composed of thirty-one elements and eight character types.
• Read about fairy tale morphology or folkloristics online at: --http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ Aarne%E2%80%93Thompson_ classification_system --http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ Vladimir_Propp --http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ Morphology_%28folkloristics%29 --http://mural.uv.es/vifresal/Propp. htm --http://oaks.nvg.org/ folktale-types.html --http://www.brown.edu/Courses/ FR0133/Fairytale_Generator/ home.html fairy tales. Use your own words to weaknesses will be exposed? --Return to the list of fairy tales. write the text. Your teacher will use Will it provide readers with a Use your knowledge of fairy tale every student’s slides to design universal truth or a moral lesson? classification to classify the fairy one PowerPoint. What ordinary objects will be tales on your list. granted symbolic meaning? What • Many people past and Write your own fairy enchanted or magical elements will present have made significant tale be part of the fairy tale? contributions to the genre of fairy tales. Research the contribution • Drawing on all that you have learnt, Submit a brief written explanation of one of these people. You could use the narrative principles of fairy that provides a brief description choose one of the well-known tales to write a personal narrative. of the plot, purpose, style and story tellers like Hans Christian intended audience of your very Andersen, the Brothers Grimm What fairy tale will work best as own fairy tale. and Walt Disney. You could a model for your own writing? also choose to study Alexander You may draw on more than one Sources Afanasyev, Giambattista Basile, fairy tale as a model for your own Angela Carter, Charles Perrault, writing. Will your writing draw Re-enchantment provides Madame d’Aulnoy or Joseph on the fairy tale style of Charles comprehensive bibliographies for Jacobs. Then there are writers Perrault or the Brothers Grimm or further reading and research about and commentators – such as will it be more like a Disney fairy the genre of fairy tales and the fairy Bruno Bettlehiem, Clarissa Pinkola tale? tales featured on the website. See Estes, Maria Tatar, Marina Warner the Source section on the Menu Tab. and Jack Zipes – who have made Will it begin with the words ‘Once By using the slide-out panel on any significant contributions to the upon a time’? Will it end happily screen, you can find background analysis of fairy tales. ever after? Will your story offer quotes that inform the ideas SCREEN EDUCATION © ATOM 2012 Prepare two PowerPoint slides classic fairy tale characters? In expressed in the narration and the text about the person that you have what ways will characters be of the voiceover itself. You may also selected. The slides should use transformed? Will it be about find a documentary-style interview 100 words and one image to a struggle between good and that expands on these ideas. explain the contribution that this evil? What human strengths person has made to the genre of will be glorified? What human
20 Key Creatives Myths of Childhood (1997) examined Jolley, 2008) and Michael Kirby – Don’t how we think about childhood and The Forget The Justice Bit (2010). Maslin Re-enchantment is an Inside Out Hundredth Room (2004) explored the has recently completed two transmedia Productions and Film Art Media inner landscape of grief. For the last five projects, Re-enchantment (2010) and Production made possible by Screen years, Gibson has been immersed in ReKindling Venus: In Plain Sight (2011). Australia, Film Victoria, ABC and the world of fairy tale interpretation. University of Technology, Sydney. Learn more about Sue Maslin’s work Sue Maslin | producer as a filmmaker at
INSIDE OUT PRODUCTIONS and FILM ART MEDIA in association with SCREEN AUSTRALIA, FILM VICTORIA, UNIVERSITYOF TECHNOLOGY SYDNEY and the AUSTRALIAN BROADCASTING CORPORATION present RE-ENCHANTMENT Lead Visual Designer ROSE DRAPER Written and directed by SARAH GIBSON Development Lead ANTHONY EDEN Produced by SUE MASLIN Creative Director KEREN MORAN Digital Media Director CATHERINE GLEESON Produced in association with SCREEN AUSTRALIA, FILM VICTORIA, UNIVERSITYOF TECHNOLOGY SYDNEY Sound Designer & Composer SHARON JAKOVSKY and the AUSTRALIAN BROADCASTING CORPORATION Editor GREG FERRIS Developed with the assistance of the AUSTRALIAN FILM Research & Assets Manager PENELOPE CHAI COMMISSION
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