Television's Faithful Fairy Tales
Snow White and Alice in Wonderland: As They Were Meant to be Seen
Snow White: A Tale of Terror (1997)
Many a journalist and psychologist have written about the fact that, too often, modern retellings of fairy tales skew too far towards innocence, neglecting the darker root of the story and the fact that, in some cases, it was meant to scare children into behaving better and with a higher standard of morals.
The made-for-TV movie, 'Snow White: A Tale of Terror' stars Sigourney Weaver as the mentally unstable and malicious queen, and a diminutive Monica Keena as Snow White. (She is never called this however, and is addressed only by her real name, Lilly). Her father, played by Sam Neill, is Lord Hoffman. Ever since her mother's death during her birth, Lilly has grown up in luxury with her father's constant attention.
When her father remarries to a Lady Claudia (Weaver), Lilly despises her on sight, and her hostility only increases with age and slowly tears away at Lady Claudia's sanity.
The breaking point comes the night of a ball. A woman nearing old age, Lady Claudia is relieved to be pregnant, certain that the baby is a boy. Lilly steals the spotlight when she shows up in an ivory gown that her mother once wore and her father, seeing his first wife in his daughter's eyes, neglects his wife for the rest of the night. The emotional strain is too much for Lady Claudia, and she miscarries a baby boy that night. The doctors say that, while she will live, she will never again bear a child.
Here is where Lady Claudia breaks and the story takes a macabre twist. Convinced that her baby's death is Lilly's fault, Lady Claudia plots her revenge.
Aiding her is her magic mirror. The mirror here is no mystical seer, but a manifestation of her own insecurities and mania. She talks to the mirror as though it were her mother, but the reflection shows a eternally youthful version of herself.
Lady Claudia sends her brother to kill Lilly who manages to escape, only to become lost in the woods.
After wandering for hours, Lilly finds what seems to be an abandoned building and falls asleep. She awakens to find herself surrounded by seven uncouth men, (only one is a dwarf), who are all outlaws that recognize Lilly as a lady from a wealthy household and, as such, an extension of the noble class that has ruined their lives.
Two of them are disfigured from burns and one is an old man whose hand was cut off when he stole bread. The 'prince' of the group turns out to be Will, a man whose family was killed when he refused to join in the Crusades. The stoic one of the group, he saves Lilly from being raped by one of the men, the black sheep of the group, and the two spend plenty of giving each other long, lengthy stares.
The film continues with certain Snow White basics - Lady Claudia disguises herself as a witch and presents the naïve Lilly with an apple, which nearly causes her death. Where it succeeds in staying true to the original text, however, is that it doesn't shy away from the morbid details nor neglect certain lessons: Mainly, that narcissism will only lead to destruction. In a modern-day context, the Freudian analysis includes the competition between daughter and stepmother as they are vying for exclusive attention from Lord Hoffman. And, while Lady Claudia deserves her gruesome death at the end, the TV film is especially successful at not creating stock characters, fleshing out the 'wicked witch' character so that she is at once feared and pitied by the end.
Almost any child of the 80s remembers watching the made-for-TV adaptation of 'Alice in Wonderland'.
Starring Natalie Gregory as the impish Alice, (a role for which she was nominated for a Young Artist Award in 1987), the story was divided into two parts. The first part follows Alice as she wishes she were old enough to join the adults as they take afternoon tea, spies the White Rabbit and follows him down a psychedelic-colored rabbit hole where her adventure begins.
One of the most endearing parts is when she shrinks herself unintentionally when she first arrives in this mythical land, and carries on a distraught monologue where she orders herself not to cry, and then spies a cake that says 'eat me', and remarks what an odd thing to write on a cake. There is also no shortage of her remarking 'curiouser and curiouser'.
The story doesn't skimp on plot or characters, and stays cloth to the book that could be disturbing given the lunacy of the adults. After meeting the bevy of characters - from the Caterpillar, played by Sammy Davis Jr. and the Mock Turtle, played by Ringo Starr - Alice escapes the mad Queen of Hearts and makes it back home. Only, she is not home. She is trapped on the wrong side of the mirror, and is in despair as she sees home and cannot get there. Part Two opens up with Alice in Looking-glass land where Alice must win a chess game if she is ever to get home, and it is during this game that she meets the Red Queen, played by Ann Jillian, the White Queen, played by Carol Channing and the White Knight played by Lloyd Bridges.
Avoiding the overly easy success that cartoons tend to rely on, throughout both parts of this miniseries, the fearsome Jabberwocky dragon is stalking Alice, and she soon realizes that she will never get home unless she conquers her paralyzing fear.
Re-released in 2006, (much to the joy of die-hard fans who had long since watched their VHS taped versions to the point that they were unwatchable), the story is almost a homage to the Lewis Carroll novel where a little girl, surrounded by ridiculous adult figures, must take responsibility for her actions and conquer her fears if she is ever to grow up or go home.
Alice must win if she is to go home
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The apple - temptation incarnate
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