FACES OF FANTASY: 'Signs,' with Mel Gibson (left) and Rory Culkin, opens this weekend. FRANK MASI/TOUCHSTONE
Posted on 08/04/2002 5:00:20 AM PDT by 2Trievers
From the spookiness of "Signs" to the old-fashioned wizardry of "The Lord of the Rings," the long-lasting trend is clear. Comedy and action still draw crowds, but fantasy is the genre of choice for filmmakers and audiences who want to tap into cinema's most imaginative possibilities.
At one end of the spectrum are sword-and-sorcery sagas set in exotic places. At the other end are science-fiction stories, which are more grounded in reality, but use their futuristic technologies as perfunctory backdrops for magical adventures. Some pundits think the wave of fantasy filmmaking will subside, especially if war movies continue to grow in popularity following the Sept. 11 attacks and new anxieties arise over safety and security. Enthusiasm for pictures like "Black Hawk Down" and "We Were Soldiers" suggests some truth here.
But others feel the apprehensions caused by Sept. 11 are giving fantastic films more appeal than ever.
Film and the fantastic have a long history together. Fantasies danced on screens a century ago, when magician-turned-director Georges Méliès filled early nickelodeons with pictures like "Summoning the Spirits" and "The Phrenologist and the Lively Skull." He turned to the past for many of his ideas and images – borrowing from literature, painting, and other art forms.
Méliès's influence remains strong on modern moviemakers. Look at the goofy adventures in "Men in Black II" and you'll see the same mixture of outlandish whimsy and extroverted cinematic tricks.
What explains the enduring marriage between film and fantasy? One answer is the nature of cinema itself. Movies are real and unreal at the same time, lifelike visions made from flickers of ephemeral light. They're a perfect medium for stories that want to reflect and transcend the everyday world.
Nobody understands this better than George Lucas, whose digitally enhanced "Attack of the Clones" came closer than any previous movie to erasing the boundaries between film as photography of the real world, on one hand, and film as technological dream state, on the other.
Fantasies flourished for millenniums before cinema was invented, though, so factors rooted deeply in human nature are clearly at work.
Some people get so caught up in otherworldly tales that they lose sight of what's actual and what's not – as "Harry Potter" author J.K. Rowling proved when she told an interviewer she's received many letters addressed to the fictional Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, sent by youngsters who hope she'll pass them along to headmaster Dumbledore.
Once upon an archetype
Harry's personality carries a clue to the popularity of tales like his. He's a likable boy, and by the standards of traditional fantasy, he's a believable, three-dimensional character.
More important, he's as ordinary as the rest of us – setting aside the wizards in his family tree – and his all-too-human traits make him something of an underdog. Magic and enchantment give him extraordinary abilities we'd all love to have, and by reading or viewing his adventures, we share vicariously in his ability to tap mystical sources of mastery and power. What worked for the Brothers Grimm still works for Rowling and her contemporary colleagues.
In his own unpretentious way, Harry is what folklorists call an archetype – a character who represents an ideal image of a personality or idea, and may carry lessons inherited from the turbulent history of human existence.
Jedis, hobbits, and puppets, oh my!
Other characters who fit this description are Frodo the hobbit, just about everyone in the "Star Wars" saga, and even Austin Powers, with or without his mojo. And don't forget Pinocchio, who inspired last year's "A.I. Artificial Intelligence" and returns to the screen this Christmas in Roberto Benigni's retelling of his story.
Pinocchio's quest to become a "real boy" is a metaphor for our desire to enter fantasy-fiction worlds that make our own lives feel larger, more colorful, somehow "realer" than they normally seem.
We see aspects of ourselves in archetypal characters, and we identify with their stories because we recognize our experiences in the tasks they undertake and the challenges they face. Archetypes are endlessly fascinating because we all start life as children prone to magical, wishful thinking.
Themes reflecting the deep uncertainties of childhood – household mysteries; fears of being left alone; the sheer size, strength, and inscrutability of the adult world – surge through our dreams and reveries for the rest of our days.
Fantastic stories bring these to the surface in safe, unthreatening forms, allowing us to confront and deal with them afresh. "The stuff of fantasy is the mental life of childhood," says Murray Pomerance, chair of the sociology department at Ryerson University in Toronto, "and it's reborn with every generation. To engage in fantasy is to return to the point of view of childhood."
Such tales can also renew our intuitive awareness that there's more to reality than the world we perceive with our senses. Part of fantasy's enduring appeal is its willingness to tap into a wider realm that everyday logic can't grasp. At its most effective, fantasy offers a way of enlarging our mental and moral horizons.
Not everyone sees this as a plus, as religious debates over the "Harry Potter" and "Lord of the Rings" series repeatedly show.
Writing for the Decent Film Guide, Internet movie commentator Steven D. Greydanos commends "Harry Potter" for "redemptive themes ... of good vs. evil, of loyalty and courage, of the evils of bigotry and oppression." But he notes that others "have attacked the young hero of Rowling's series as a veritable poster child for the occult," and suggests there might be a slippery slope from Harry's adventures to fare he finds more problematic, like "Dr. Strange" comics, books on witchcraft, and TV shows like "Buffy the Vampire Slayer."
In sum, not all fantasies are created equal. What some find an adventure in mind-expanding fun may strike others as the opening of a dangerous doorway – itself a timeless fantasy theme, stretching from venerable folk tales to "Monsters, Inc."
Another factor in fantasy's enduring appeal is the way it leads readers and viewers to choose sides in arguments over everything from the overarching meaning of a story to the most esoteric details of setting, lore, and the "rules of the game" that give even the most flamboyant flights of fancy a foothold in human rationality.
Fantasies are diverse in another important way, too: Some are worth watching or reading, others aren't. The imaginative realms meticulously etched by J.R.R. Tolkien in "The Lord of the Rings" and C.S. Lewis in his "Chronicles of Narnia" novels are gateways to psychological and historical insight as well as hugely exciting places to visit.
Compared with those, the petty, violent worlds of modern-day horror films and the unkillable "Terminator" series (among other examples) seem sterile and mechanical. Judging from the silly new "Austin Powers" and "Men in Black" installments, film fantasy isn't in top imaginative form. But it hasn't lost its ability to stir people, as I learned when my lukewarm review of "The Fellowship of the Ring" sparked angry e-mails.
And a growing number of filmmakers are finding it a fertile source of inspiration.
They filmed happily ever after
Some take startlingly novel approaches, as Richard Linklater did in last year's animated "Waking Life," about a young man caught in the hazy zone between dreams and actuality. He's not sure how to escape it, and like audiences beguiled by today's multiplying fantasies, he's not sure he wants to.
So the trend rockets on. "Signs" is poised for box-office triumph, Frodo and Harry Potter are waiting in the wings, and new fables from the "Star Trek" and "Star Wars" creators are on their way down the Hollywood pipeline. For the foreseeable future, this is a genre no magic wand could wave away.
Congrats again kiddo! &;-)
Yeah, but Jackie Chan can do things that computers can't!!!
FACES OF FANTASY: 'Signs,' with Mel Gibson (left) and Rory Culkin, opens this weekend. FRANK MASI/TOUCHSTONE
Books are still a superior vehicle for bringing fantasy to life. I doubt that movie-making will ever close that gap.
I have read books all my life and I probably spend six hours a day on average reading (including my time here on Free Republic). Not just fantasy and science fiction books (which make up just a small portion of what I read, but books on history, social sciences, and any other subject that interests me.
Most people in this world do not read. Over the years, many people have asked me why I waste my time on books. To them, I am wasting my life away. Bear in mind that these are people who have spent countless hours every night watching inane sitcoms on TV like "Seinfeld" and "Welcome Back Kotter" and insipid dramas such as "Murder She Wrote" and "Eight Is Enough." This steady diet of low-brow fare has made them very poor conversationalists. The average person does not know enough about history to discuss it intelligently. They do not know about Thomas Jefferson or why the Civil War was fought or even how our nation came about.
I think books are one of mankind's greatest achievements. With a library of books, one can visit exotic places, revisit historical events, learn about the world around him, and speculate on what the future may bring. It is even better than being there. For example, many years back, I visited Lookout Mountain near Chattanooga, Tennessee. I learned there about the great Civil War battle that took place around there in 1863. But the information didn't really sink in at the time. It was just a tourist trap to me. But then I read several books about that battle and when I visited it again earlier this year, the place came alive for me. I could see Missionary Ridge and from Lookout Mountain, I could see the little peninsula on the Tennessee River in which Chattanooga was held under seige. In other words, the place meant something to me because I had read so much about it.
Same with the area I live in. I live not too far from Concord and drive past the North Bridge every morning for work. So everytime I go to work, I imagine that cool April morning when Redcoats were marching up to the bridge and were confronted by an angry band of colonists. I drive right by the Old Manse where Nathaniel Hawthorne once lived and through the old town square in which the British burned some houses down. In fact, practically right in my backyard is the path that Chelmsford Minuteman took to get to the battle that morning. None of this I would know if I didn't read books. (None of my neighbors seem to know or appreciate this.)
Well sorry for running off on a tangent. Back to fantasy.
I think fantasy books (which include science fiction) are also beneficial and not the waste of time many feel them to be. Epic battles of good vs. evil such as LOTR is great for people to read. It forces them to confront difficult questions and the characters in these books can serve as good role models. It would be a good thing for a child to think, when faced with adversity, "Now how would Gandalf handle this situation?" It is not too far of a stretch to say that these books can impart wisdom. Not just fictional character but historical characters as well. For example, reading about people such as George Washington and Winston Churchill and how they handled adversity inspire me and have affected how I act in everyday life.
You are well-spoken on this point and I agree. It crossed by mind too. We have a HUGE dilemma in America ... that our kids (generally) cannot read. That bothers me so. And reminds me of this great Ray Bradbury quote ...
"You don't have to burn books to destroy a culture. Just get people to stop reading them."
Sounds as if your taste in books is as fine as you taste in liquor. &;-)
If we're talking movies, even ones like "Blackhawk Down" can be considered fantasies. The movie simulates, to a greater or lesser degree, something that acutally happened. But it is filmed to put us inside the action, and has fictional characters that somewhat resemble the real ones. When it's highbrow, we call fantasy movies "drama".
Fantasy is as old as man's tradition of storytelling, which started out as oral, and only later made it to the written word, and the recorded image. Some fantasies document historical events, some attempt to teach important lessons, and some are just relief from life's daily grind.
Movies are a subset of fantasy. They use technology to get the message out to more people, and allow the message to be stored, and preserved, for later viewing. The ancient bard would be amazed that scribbles on paper could store and disseminate a story he spent his whole life learning, and speaking to sparse audiences. Today, a writer can marvel at how his scribbles are turned into lighted images in darkened rooms. The audience gets wider, but often more shallow. It's one of those double-edged technological swords.
The interesting thing about a fantasy like LOTR is that different people bring back totally different things from it depending on their backgrounds. A hippie reading that book in 1969 read into it something totally different than a grunt in Vietnam in that same year. For me, the wonder and magic in the book was not as strong as the views of the main characters, who spent most of their time cold, scared, and hungry, with the prospect of utter destruction not only threatening them, but the worlds they knew and loved, too. It's a condition faced by soldiers, but not necessarily warriors, throughout history.
I read a lot because books are more portable, and do not make the claim for exclusive time from me that movies do. I will certainly go see a movie that I think will live up to what I expect from it. MIB gives me some laughs without much thought behind it, and therefore is worth the price of admission. LOTR, however, required work on my part in even watching it. It was well worth the effort, because it showed me that someone who respected the source material as much as I did could pull it off with enough money, resources, and respect.
As a book, "Lord of the Rings" beats even this big-budget movie. But the movie beats the pants off any other "fantasy" movie by putting on the screen images I though could only exist in my mind.
 Ring Ping!! |
Frodo lives!
Well it wasn't entirely killed, if you remember "Spartacus" and "Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire" ("Gladiator" was a remake of this). But neither of them was a real moneymaker. The old epic movies, like DeMille's, could not be made with the increasing value of labor, but once the programming is done, CGI extras work for free.
HairOfTheDog's post outlines the increasing reality of these CGI characters. Even without this sophistication, the CGI armies in Mel Gibson's "Patriot" made the production of this film more affordable. Now picture's with 1000's of extras, which essentially vanished after "Cleopatra", can again come to the forefront. In a few years, perhaps we can also look forward to CGI lead characters, so that the arrogant Hollywood Alec Baldwins can look forward to permanent unemployment.
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