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[wildfire-wordsmith]

Damsel Movie Review

I watched the movie Damsel, and I was extremely excited about writing this review. It's spoiler free as to actually encourage people to watch it. The film is a semi-classic damsel in distress retelling, hence the title. The trailer makes the premise quite clear: there is a princess cornered by a monstrous dragon, but there is no gallant knight to save her. In fact, the knightly and rich prince is the one to throw her to the dragon as a sacrifice instead.

In terms of thematic impact, the tale clearly aims for feminist tones. I appreciated that the movie did not just make the character a woman in order to call the film feminist. The characters felt like real women, and not just a male character technically played by a woman. The main princess, Elodie, enjoys beautiful dresses and jewelry at the beginning of the film, even though she is also willing to fight for her life. She is excited to meet her husband, and she still has dreams of traveling the world and maintains a well-rounded character. She does not have to reject femininity to be strong or have independent wishes. It is great that many movies depict women of all types who do not have to be feminine, but there is also a strength in movies that tell women that they can be feminine and be capable at the same time. There seems to be a gap to fill for the second kind of movie, and this movie filled that gap quite well.

The film also has many characters that passively resist other tropes for women. The stepmother is not an evil stepmother; she cares for her adopted children deeply. The evil stepmother is a classic trope. For example, Disney princesses in Cinderella and Snow-White (and their many retellings) often had loving dead biological mothers who were replaced by vain and power hungry step mothers as villains. It was refreshing to see a remarried woman who was not taking advantage of her husband: hunting for power or money and mistreating her children in the process. The stepmother in Damsel passively challenges harmful stereotypes about remarried women by clearly and specifically valuing her family more than money in kingdom politics.  

In terms of entertainment value, a gigantic dragon can't be beat. Admittedly, the motivations and reveals were a bit predictable. I found this not to be a bad aspect of the film. It is retelling a fairly classic story, and therefore meant to play on predictable aspects of the trope. There were still a few plot elements that did take me off guard (regarding Elodie’s sister Floria). Overall, the more predictable elements were balanced with both a “cool” factor from the dragon, along with a few world building elements. The castle of Aurea was not only beautiful, but had decent foreshadowing for the dragon. I thought attention to detail served me well in this film, as the creators clearly had an eye for detail themselves. Many of the scenes are more intricate in terms of castle detailing than I would have expected. This balance was also struck by still finding ways to surprise the audience in ways that add to instead of distracting from the plot, while still maintaining core elements of the story it retells.  

I highly recommend this film, which manages classic fairy tale elements in ways that both do not tire the audience of the tropes they use, and develop well thought out themes and characters.

[wildfire-wordsmith]

"Brief" Books for Busy College Students

1. When Women Were Dragons - Kelly Barnhill

Highlights: Short and feminist

The book has some similarities to A Natural History of Dragons; the main character is a studious young girl, Alex, interested in math, science, and most outlandish: dragons. In the 1950s, women begin undergoing "mass dragoning" and turning into dragons themselves. Alex's family is impacted when her firey and strong-willed aunt Marla "dragons" and leaves Alex's family to raise the child she left behind, while Alex's own coming of age both includes following her passion for math while learning what the world expects her to be as a woman to the men and children in her life. It is a standalone book, which made it excellent reading material while I was sidetracked with college responsibilities. The story has feminist themes, asking why women like Marla might wish to fly away from her life and "dragon" and what kinds of choices Alex really has about her own future. The author does a particularly good job at not only pointing out classic feminist issues, but, as I most appreciated, asking also what the solutions to these problems look like and what it might mean to different women to be free.

2. The Green Mile - Stephen King

Highlights: Excellent writing skill, Repetitive at times

The Green Mile is the story about Death Row (The "Green Mile") worker Paul Edgecombe, and the end of his career when he must execute a peculiar inmate John Coffey. John has brought death upon his victims, yet brings life into cell block E community. Paul questions the morality of his job and the "good" or "evil" of the inmates, the people he works with, the criminal justice system, and the people in the nursing home he ends up in at the end of his life. The book was originally written as several shorter pieces (but can still be bought as a complete serialized novel). Since there was a bit of time between individual parts being finished, the book provides fairly consistent refreshers about what has been going on in the previous sections. I found this to be an advantage, being distracted by midterms, final exams, and a variety of other projects. The book is definitely not best read all at once, but with time to speculate about the material between the original sections. Additionally, the book has excellent attention to detail. Even names such as "Trapingus [trapping us] County" were used to make each word count. I thought that the time between releasing the parts of the story might mean that small details fell through the cracks, but each character had their life (and usually their death) described in suspenseful detail. Overall a thought provoking experience for readers who wish to leave no word unturned, but easy to keep track of for those that just want to get through a book when they can.

[wildfire-wordsmith]

Nimona Worldbuilding vs. Character Motivations

The Nimona film adaptation features exceptional high fantasy world building combined with futuristic science fiction technology, in which awe inspiring knights further capture the attention of viewers with flying bikes or glowing swords and projectiles. However, the most interesting parts of Nimona's world building are not the ways in which it is eye-catchingly different from the real world, but in how it is meant to mirror society, and how it uses its depiction of the world to comment on cyclical violence and how it impacts different groups of people.

After Ballister Boldheart, a commoner granted the rare opporunity to train for the opportunity to become a knight in The Institute, is seen killing the queen who gave him this opportunity, he is the kingdom's newest villian. During the incident, his arm was cut off by his boyfriend Ambrosius Goldenloin, decendent of Gloreth, an old hero of the kingdom with almost God-like reverence among the citizens (characters ask "what in Gloreth's name?" or ask what Gloreth would have wanted in her plan for the kindgom). With the help of shapeshifter Nimona, Ballister sets out to clear his name and prove that he was framed by, as he later uncovers, the director. Meanwhile Goldenloin must overcome the fear of a threat to the kingdom and learn to trust Ballister's innocence to fight on the right side of history. The movie comments on the violence within the world and how it is perpetuated. Unhealthy fear is instilled in children of all backgrounds, and the "monsters" often bear the brunt of the violent consequences.

The film makes full use of its background in each scene, paying attention to the small details to flesh out such complicated themes in a short children's movie. A train station in which Ballister and Nimona attempt to escape the knights that are after them is called Vanquisher Square, reflecting what their society values. As Nimona walks past a small child playing a violent video game, she unplugs it. A commercial for cereal features the company's Kwispy the Dragon mascot being gallantly slain by the children in the commercial. The need to defeat monsters is casually pervasive in all aspects of the lives of people and children in the kingdom. It is most directly put in a quote from Nimona : "They grow up believing they can be a hero if they drive a sword through the heart of anything different. And I'm the monster?" The effects of this world can be seen when Nimona attempts to comfort a child during a run-in with the knights, although the child still raises their swords against this "monstrous" shapeshifter. The impacts are also seen as major plot driving elements.

The heroes in the film are the ones that learn and change their world views, while the villains are the ones that hold onto their fear. The most obvious example would be the director, who frames Ballister due to a dream she had as a child. She saw the kingdom's protective wall crack and eventually break in this dream, while no one listened to her warnings. Clearly the director has been afraid of the mysterious unknown ways of life beyond the wall since childhood, and feels that she needs to take matters into her own hands to get rid of potential threats to the kingdom, to protect the people and their children. And the world building has clearly shown where the director would get this idea as a child, she has been surrounded by taught vigilance and fear since childhood. However, in protecting the kingdom, she posed the greatest threat and killed the queen.

The violent video games, commercials, and names in the film often reflect the themes and goals of their real life counterparts. By contrast many forms of love, such as queerness, are seen as inappropriate for children in the real world, but the movie takes care to represent a queer main couple. In the director's motivations and plot lines, this is especially relevant. "Protecting the children" is often cited in anti-queer sentiment. The director, who is "protecting" the kingdom, actively causes the very kind of destruction she aims to prevent by killing the queen, a major political figure. The movie demonstrates to audiences that society often perpetuates fear, but that this fear often causes the harm it aims to prevent, and that choosing to instead accept those who are different is the more worthwhile pursuit in order to bring peace.