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icepixieI finally got around to watching the 2003 live-action Peter Pan.
WOW, that was Freudian. Wow. It's like shooting fish in a barrel when one applies Freudian analysis[1] to texts about puberty and growing up, so generally I try not to do it. (To those kinds of texts or anything, really, because usually someone doing that makes me want to scream, "It's just a sword, okay?!") AND YET, for various reasons, this version made it pretty much impossible not to.
Peter, to Wendy, on what he'll do if he finds she's turned into a wicked pirate: "I'll run you through"? Think about that for half a second. Think about it using phrases like "loss of innocence" and "puberty." Aaaaahhhhh. And Hook says to Peter, "You can't give her what she wants; you're incomplete!" and I'm over here going HOW DID YOU GET THIS PAST THE FILM BOARD??? And then they follow it up with Hook blathering on about how one day Peter will look in the nursery window to find that Peter himself has been replaced by a husband, when usually that conversation/narrative digression concentrates on how Wendy will be replaced by her children the next time he goes to the nursery, and there's just a whole different spin on things.
Even Wendy's white nightgown now seems suspcious.
(ETA: And how could I have forgotten the Darlings making a big production over how Wendy is becoming a woman with a hidden kiss at the corner of her mouth, and Peter is the one who takes that kiss? How much more obvious can you be?)
Not to mention there were two or three INCREDIBLY disturbing scenes between Hook and Wendy that just about skeeved me out of my chair with their sexual overtones. In particular, the one where he's very close to her face for an extended period of time (not to mention his line about "you're my obsession now") creeped me out like few things ever have. Particularly as the narrator said that when Wendy first laid eyes on him, Wendy was immediately fascinated by Hook. OMG ACK. This is bringing to mind Freudian inerpretations of Little Red Riding Hood, and Little Red's whole thing with the wolf. NOT TO MENTION that Jason Isaacs played both Hook and Mr. Darling, and OMG ELECTRA COMPLEX. (Well, without the killing of the mother. Which, yes, I know, is half of it. Shhhh.)
At least Smee offered Wendy a cigar prior to all of the creepiest scenes, or I think I would've run screaming from my living room. Because in this movie, much as I would like it to be, a cigar is not really just a cigar at all. *shudder*
Ahem. This is what four years of a liberal arts education will do to you. I am so going to hell for this post.
That said, it wasn't bad in other areas. It got overly schmaltzy at the end, but that's to be expected. The art direction was fantastic; I loveloveloved the pirate ship sailing through the fog around Big Ben and other London landmarks. The sets and CGI were amazing. The girl playing Wendy was pretty good, although for some reason her face and hair scream "Modern! 21st century! Not in any way Edwardian!" at me. Maybe it was the excessive lipstick. The boy playing Pan wasn't bad, although it seemed painfully obvious that the lines had been written for a British kid, and sounded very strange in his American accent.
I liked that they kept some lines of dialogue and narration from the book, particularly the, "Oh, the cleverness of me!" line. The romance plotline notwithstanding, Pan was closer to the book than, say, the Disney version; he's much more the personification of childhood obnoxiousness here than in the cartoon. Hook was also good; "Well, split my infinitives," was inspired. *g*
[1] Or "everything about the text can be considered in some way sexual" analysis, which, correctly or not, is often associated with Freud.
WOW, that was Freudian. Wow. It's like shooting fish in a barrel when one applies Freudian analysis[1] to texts about puberty and growing up, so generally I try not to do it. (To those kinds of texts or anything, really, because usually someone doing that makes me want to scream, "It's just a sword, okay?!") AND YET, for various reasons, this version made it pretty much impossible not to.
Peter, to Wendy, on what he'll do if he finds she's turned into a wicked pirate: "I'll run you through"? Think about that for half a second. Think about it using phrases like "loss of innocence" and "puberty." Aaaaahhhhh. And Hook says to Peter, "You can't give her what she wants; you're incomplete!" and I'm over here going HOW DID YOU GET THIS PAST THE FILM BOARD??? And then they follow it up with Hook blathering on about how one day Peter will look in the nursery window to find that Peter himself has been replaced by a husband, when usually that conversation/narrative digression concentrates on how Wendy will be replaced by her children the next time he goes to the nursery, and there's just a whole different spin on things.
Even Wendy's white nightgown now seems suspcious.
(ETA: And how could I have forgotten the Darlings making a big production over how Wendy is becoming a woman with a hidden kiss at the corner of her mouth, and Peter is the one who takes that kiss? How much more obvious can you be?)
Not to mention there were two or three INCREDIBLY disturbing scenes between Hook and Wendy that just about skeeved me out of my chair with their sexual overtones. In particular, the one where he's very close to her face for an extended period of time (not to mention his line about "you're my obsession now") creeped me out like few things ever have. Particularly as the narrator said that when Wendy first laid eyes on him, Wendy was immediately fascinated by Hook. OMG ACK. This is bringing to mind Freudian inerpretations of Little Red Riding Hood, and Little Red's whole thing with the wolf. NOT TO MENTION that Jason Isaacs played both Hook and Mr. Darling, and OMG ELECTRA COMPLEX. (Well, without the killing of the mother. Which, yes, I know, is half of it. Shhhh.)
At least Smee offered Wendy a cigar prior to all of the creepiest scenes, or I think I would've run screaming from my living room. Because in this movie, much as I would like it to be, a cigar is not really just a cigar at all. *shudder*
Ahem. This is what four years of a liberal arts education will do to you. I am so going to hell for this post.
That said, it wasn't bad in other areas. It got overly schmaltzy at the end, but that's to be expected. The art direction was fantastic; I loveloveloved the pirate ship sailing through the fog around Big Ben and other London landmarks. The sets and CGI were amazing. The girl playing Wendy was pretty good, although for some reason her face and hair scream "Modern! 21st century! Not in any way Edwardian!" at me. Maybe it was the excessive lipstick. The boy playing Pan wasn't bad, although it seemed painfully obvious that the lines had been written for a British kid, and sounded very strange in his American accent.
I liked that they kept some lines of dialogue and narration from the book, particularly the, "Oh, the cleverness of me!" line. The romance plotline notwithstanding, Pan was closer to the book than, say, the Disney version; he's much more the personification of childhood obnoxiousness here than in the cartoon. Hook was also good; "Well, split my infinitives," was inspired. *g*
[1] Or "everything about the text can be considered in some way sexual" analysis, which, correctly or not, is often associated with Freud.
