Fantasy

Recently I watched the movie “Ever After”, produced in 1998. For those of you who don’t know, this is yet another “Cinderella Story” adaptation. At first I was irritated because I thought that I’d hate this story and that it would be just another remake of all of the same stories already done. I must admit that I was happily surprised. Although this was another “Cinderella Story”, it was much different than the others.

There are a lot of fairy-tales that when they were first written, have very dark elements. A lot of people refer to these as “Grimm’s Fairytales” which is true but they were not the only ones to interpret threatening stories. I think that a certain element is lost when fairy-tales are made into pleasant stories with a “happily ever after” aspect. I can understand why people would want to sanitize stories for their children, but these alternative cute and fluffy fairy-tales are very unrealistic. One of the bigger ideas behind writing fairy-tales was to teach children lessons and morals in an entertaining way. These original stories show you what can happen if you make bad decisions or trust the wrong people. I think that is really important for children to understand. We should encourage this rather than encourage stories that diminish women’s worth, and tell you that you can’t do anything on your own.

Just because fairy-tales are cute doesn't mean that they always teach us the best lessons, Beauty and the Beast encourages the idea that we can change people from who they really are, also that you can find your wife by holding her and her father captive. Sleeping Beauty reassures us that if you are ever in a compromising situation, a prince will come and save you. When we break down these stories there are very unpleasant and unrealistic values that we are instilling into kid’s heads. I really don’t think that these tales should be considered as valid examples for today’s youth.