Student Film Reviews

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1. selene Pineda 03.16.18 / 11pm

   I have seen and enjoyed this dark fantasy film and can agree that this might not be appropriate for children.The jarring mice-en-scene you described in which the queen dressed in black devouring a heart dripping of red against a white background; could be traumatizing for a child to observe. Although these might not be child friendly fairytales, I still believe they have lessons to in part. For example in the case of the aforementioned queen we can learn not to loose sight of what is important in our lives. Due to her obsession with having the exact type of son that she wanted; she ended up sacrificing her son’s happiness, her husbands life, as well as her own. It is a very morbid way to teach us the importance of family values.
2. Rachael Ramirez 06.09.18 / 9pm

   My initial reaction to “Tale of Tales” was that each individual told their own story, and acted in such a way that had a very creepy manner. Although this film is twisted, I did enjoy this dark comedic fantasy. I think the underlying theme of this film is to teach us the importance of family, and that we should keep our family close and not lose sight of what our values truly are. You can see this theme appear through the Queen and through the King of Highhills. The King gets attached to this flea that he spots on his hand while his daughter is singing to him. The whole time the daughter is singing the Kind is enamored with this flea on his hand and completely disregards the fact that his daughter wrote a song for him. Later on in the film the King chases his daughter on the roof of the castle as she is thinking of jumping off. He realizes that he has completely neglected his daughter and tries to change his actions. He states that the flea has completely taken over his life. Towards the middle end of the movie the flea dies and he realizes that he must pay more attention to his daughter. As for the Queen, she has an obsession with finding the perfect Son and forgetting that no one is perfect. While doing so she loses sight of what is truly in her heart. Her family. She looses herself, her husband, and her son due to her own selfishness and pride.
3. Lupita Saldana 06.21.18 / 9pm

   “Tale of Tales” goes explicitly into issues of class. Since it is set in a medieval era, the difference between peasants and royalty is clearly depicted as a large divide. Although, there was actually more female roles than male, it seemed like men had more power and more influence in the film. One of the three rulers was a woman and it seemed like she didn’t not have much control over her people, not even over her son. He would frequently disobey his mother behind her back after being prohibited to. One on the men rulers he gave his daughter away to a stranger that kept her locked up in an abandoned cave. The princess ended up killing him in order to survive and escape from him, cutting the strange man’s head and bringing it to her father. As for the third ruler who used women to please his needs, he ended up marrying a woman that was under a magic spell which turned into an old lady at the end. It was obvious that males had more power and more of a significant role play than the females.
4. Theresa Moreno 07.16.18 / 8pm

   The film “Tale of Tales” includes separate tales of different royal families that have no correlation other than the issue of class. For example, the mother of Elias, the queen, forbid Elias from seeing his doppelganger because he was born to one of their servants. In addition, one king believes he is entitled to anything he desires because his position of power. He rejects a woman that he does not find attractive because she is too old, but when she is nursed by a witch to be young he marries her, not knowing it was the same women. Although these storys do not come together into one plot, they do convey the teme of class and how power can corrupt many.
5. kaiya ming 07.20.18 / 1pm

   I enjoyed reading your response to the film “Tale of Tales”. I believe that the plot of having three different kingdoms was very intriguing and made the movie interesting to watch. The film I could tell had a lot of strong female leads and surrounded the idea of either courting a female, beauty of a female, and the wish to bear a child. I like how you tied together the fact that the three kingdoms seem to all come together at the very end, for the return of the princess. I believe this solidified the movie and tied all of the loose ends together. The way the film kept us engaged was also very brilliant. Switching from story to story was confusing at first but once the viewer was able to catch on it seemed to keep the attention.
6. ansuleiman 07.21.18 / 8pm

   I agree with Selena Pineda’s observation that the overall Mise-en-scen of the queen in her gothic gown, devouring the monster’s bleeding red heart in the pure white dining room contradicts the common imagery fairy tales bring to mind. Matteo Garrone’s film challenges popular belief of what fairy tales are and what some entail. Garrone reveals three stories that are gruesome and thought-provoking and painful to watch during certain parts. However, Garrone’s film was visually stimulating and allowed the audience to imagine themselves in such a beautiful and awe-inspiring place. Overall, I agree with Theresa Moreno’s observation that concludes all three tales convey similar themes of class and the corruption led to by those with money and power.
7. Laura Simpson 07.21.18 / 9pm

   Matteo Garrone’s Tale of Tales (2015) highlights a non-classical narrative by intertwining three fairytale storylines. In this review, Joshua Borja makes an argument that this film is not a fairytale. He states that “[with fairy tales] there is a moral to one, a lesson to be learned.” I would agree that the point of this film isn’t to have a traditional Hollywood narrative where there is one hero with one quest, and one conclusion resulting in a happy ending. One of the fairy tales told in this film involves Princess Violet- who does not marry a prince, but she marries an ogre- and eventually kills her betrothed. I wonder if Garrone was attempting to communicate a new-world of fairy tales, a more realistic one- because not everybody is happy and eventually everybody dies.
8. Shalimar Espino 07.21.18 / 10pm

   I really liked this movie from the start to the end and still wanted more. Two of these stories are about peoples physically beauty and the other about their class status. I was surprised when the Queen did not show any type of sorrow for her husbands death but rather grabbed the heart so the virgin maid can start cooking it. In the second story about the king doing whatever he likes because he has power does relate to people in todays situations. In the third story about the young girl forced to leave with the ogre, the young girl shows how much she has changed compared to the first few scenes we saw, she looked fragile and caring and changed into this angry and confident women. Even though this movie is implicitly because the characters don’t necessarily say what they are thinking the scenes that are shown can tell you what they want.
9. Sarah Kim 10.08.18 / 4pm

   The Tale of Tales was one of the most peculiar and dark films I’ve ever seen, yet I enjoyed the film. The film is certainly not a fairy tale movie as it is filled with gruesome, gory, and depressing events. Furthermore, the film showed a weakness in women as they were always depending on men to fulfill their happiness such as the Queen with her son, the princess with her husband, and the older sisters with the kind. Yet, the ending somewhat surprised me as the princess became a queen without a male individual by her side. I really enjoyed how different stories were incorporated and how they all came together at the ending scene.
10. brittany_vo 10.08.18 / 8pm

    I do agree that all the main protagonists really had no relation to each other except the fact that they were all the same social class. I do appreciate all of the strong female figures in this movie too. I thought this movie was surprising because none of the characters really had a happy ending except for Violet who ended up being crowned Queen, but it was still dark that she had to slay her forced lover. It was great to visualize how all the characters came together in the end, however since there were so many characters, it was hard to imagine how big the kingdom they all lived in actually was. This movie evoked mostly fear out of me. I was able to empathize with the characters and none of them were exactly “happy”, so there was a dark theme to it.
11. Ishita Malik 10.19.18 / 9pm

    I was very impressed by your review. The best part of your review of the film is that you don’t reveal the ending of any of the tales in the film. I watched this film for my FS 101 class and was really struck by how bizarre this film truly was. Something that really contributed to the seriousness and the entertainment of this film was its mise-en-scene. The costumes and the sets help convey one of the major themes of classism. It is evident in the film that the rich and the royalty are way more respected than the average villagers. Another important theme in the film was that sometimes we pay the most tragic prices for what we desire and we still don’t get it. This theme is displayed in each of the tales. All the main characters got what they wanted, however, the consequences of getting the desire met became unbearable.
12. Austin Greene 10.19.18 / 10pm

    I do appreciate that you have taken the time to write this review, but I believe your writing falls more under that of a synopsis. I would like to see what YOU thought of the movie, which a review necessarily includes. The movie does deal with motifs of class, emphasizing the monarchy’s totalitarian influence over society. The most explicit example is the changing of the elder sister who, after being rejected from the tower, physically changes into a beautiful woman, and immediately proposed to by the queen.
    I do mostly agree with your statement that the movie seems to lack a moral message. Disunity has a disproportionate role in this movie compared to others, and it’s evident when we feel a sense of hopelessness as each story progresses.

    Thank you for review!

    -Austin Greene
13. Makenna Warren 03.04.19 / 6pm

    When I watched this film I did not realize that the stories told throughout the film are versions of three classic, Italian fairy tales. I did not enjoy this film, but maybe the stories told would hold more meaning to me if they were apart of my childhood fairy tales. I do not think this film follows a classic Hollywood narrative. This movie is told in chronological order, but does not follow one main character, but instead follows three main story lines. I agree that this film did not have a clear theme or lesson. The characters don’t seem to change their ways or learn something. What I took away from the movie was how each of the royalties was rotten and cruel to their children. So perhaps there was an unclear theme of bad parenting.
14. victor ramirez 03.08.19 / 6pm

    Overall, I really enjoyed watching this film. I really enjoyed watching the three Italian tales, and I believe that all three stories were intriguing and caught my attention. I also enjoyed how the three tales all connected in the ending scenes of the film. The roles that the female actors had in each of these tales were that each female character needed the support of the male. I like how the review ended on the remarks of, “There is a lesson to be learned. There is no apparent message in any of the tales”.
15. Lea Manzetti 05.30.19 / 2pm

    I really enjoyed watching Tale of Tales and I like this review a lot. The three stories presented in this film are all interesting in their own way, and all of them made me think deeply of some stereotypes and class issues. Although I agree that each story seems to happen in different kingdoms, which is contradicted in the two scenes mentioned in this review, I disagree with the fact that there are no morals or lessons to be learned. One of the moral that I found was in the second story, when one of the sister becomes young and attractive again, and gets what she wanted, the king’s money. But at the end, we see that she becomes old and not attractive again. It made me think that eveything we have and get, does not last forever. Her beautiful skin, even married to the king, did not last long.
16. Mitchell Hoover 06.09.19 / 11pm

    I am familiar with the dark fantasy genre however Tale of Tales is a film I have difficulty comparing to anything else. I agree that this is certainly not a fair tale as they have a meaning and lesson at the end. I particularly enjoyed the portrayal of class in this film. The dark queen story had a boy wanting to cast class aside. The old woman story where she wanted the prestige with class. Finally the young woman’s story were she wanted her old class back. Each story ended in a way the was typical fairy tail however there was a twist that changed the story. I found the mice-en-scene of the final scene very interesting. With all the characters together one could only help but wonder what happens next as every story left somewhat unresolved.
17. Avery Austin 07.12.21 / 2pm

    I think that this film was overall quite interesting. I feel as though the way that Matteo Garrone adapted these classic tales into surreal dark fantasies was exceptional. I agree that the way that the three stories were weaved together made you drawn to continue watching so you could find out what happens to each. It was such an intriguing watch and, for those that enjoy this genre, something I would definitely recommend
18. val holland 10.15.21 / 7pm

    When analyzing the film “Tale of Tales” directed by Matteo Garrone, we see the film has many dark twisted settings as well as scenes. A review that I will be focusing on is that made by Rachael Ramirez. The reviewer noted the theme of the movie and the different plotlines sharing a similar overall message. It is very apparent in the film that we see a large focus on family and the good and bad sides of it, there are single parents who both either focus too much or too little on their children. As a result of this neglect or vulturing we see how their actions and choices eventually cause them to lose what was important to them, either themselves in the pursuit of a perfect family or their children. Something that I noticed within the film was the mise-en-scene that we have been using within our class’s respective assignments. In this film, we have a medieval fantasy style assortment of props, costumes, as well as locations. These elements of mise-en-scene all add to the story and complement one another primarily because of the scene/era in which the film was set. One other part of the film that I analyzed was the ending of the film, in particular, how much did the story feel/ look like a Hollywood ending to a movie. I would say that is on the fence when it came to this, but I would lean more with it ending like a Hollywood film. I say this because the prince and his friend are now closer and his mother can no longer control them so in a way they are more like family as well as the princess returning and the father giving her power and giving her the attention and value she needed. I found this movie to be very enjoyable, but also very odd. I enjoyed seeing how each character had their own little niches and story as to how things brought them to where they were. Such as the queen eating the heart of a sea monster cooked by a virgin maid, the daughter is married to an ogre because he could recognize the skin of a flea, and much more. I do not give films ratings in stars or numbers, but I felt that this film did a very good job with what it had and really gave us an interesting story and intersecting characters from each story.
19. Jackson Cunningham 10.19.22 / 3pm

    Hey Joshua, I recently watched “Tale of Tales” and I too thought this film was good but I also found it quiet strange. It was weird how throughout the entire film the plot is never really explained, as was anything really, which made most of the film up to the viewers imagination. This film is a great example of using Implicit meaning. I will say I disagree with you when you talk about the separate kingdoms idea, how you thought there were separate kingdoms and how the first kings funeral contradicts that. I believe this scene doesn’t disprove that idea, rather I believe that it only seeks to show us the characters that will be important later on and show that these characters know each other some how. Theoretically of course they could all rule different kingdoms and could have come to pay their respects to another fallen ruler. But that is the beauty of this film, because of the implicitly it is up for the viewer to decide!

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