Stardust Thoughts
Mar. 29th, 2008 10:26 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
iariaI found it quite fun. I think it was a good adaptation of the book. It didn’t follow everything faithfully - there were a lot of exclusions and changes but for the most part it was true to the feel and to the characters/plot. I really enjoyed it.
- My favourite parts/bits were: Yvaine and Tristan (I found both very likable), Tristan/Yvaine (I found the romance to be very sweet), the pirate ship montage (especially the final dancing bit), the ghost brothers and their continuing peanut gallery behaviour/chatting (they were hilarious, we need more of them), Michelle Phieffer as the Witch Queen/Lamia (she was fabulous), how pretty the movie was, the lovely shots (the running horses, Yvaine glowing, Lamia on the cliff edge with her stalking back to her cart was especially memorable and stunning) and the special effects/makeup (Una’s transformation from bird to person and back was really lovely, the makeup of the Lilim was great).
- The one thing I actively disliked, that really bugged me, was the treatment of Victoria. Despite enjoying it overall it does leave a really dark cloud over the entire movie for me. Tristan finding her, bending her in his arms and then whispering to her “Grow up and get over yourself.” before dropping her? Why exactly did they have to be so nasty about her? Having her actually in love with Humphrey or someone else when he returns and them letting go of each other like in the book was so much better. This feels like the character bashing I so hate in fic. Having Victoria and Humphrey at Tristan’s crowning as King of Stormhold, and her clearly unhappy and having it rubbed in her face was awful and unnecessary. Perhaps because I fast-forwarded through the beginning interactions between Victoria and Tristan (outside her window and at the shop) because of potential embarrassment but I found the humiliation of her unnecessary and vicious. She was self-absorbed, fine, but she wasn’t evil nor did she seem truly cruel. I don’t think it was necessary to take her down a peg or whatever her final scenes were supposed to portray. This change from the book didn’t add anything to the movie. In fact one thing I loved about the book was how it dealt with the Tristan/Victoria with respect for both characters. So this unnecessary change was the only dark spot of the movie for me. And because it happened at the end it remains large in my mind.
- One production question/dislike is about the fake plastic flowers that Semele was selling and specifically the fact that they’re supposed to be glass flowers, which Tristan (or Dunstan?) actually says about them which is completely ridiculous because they’re clearly plastic, all of which leads to - why couldn’t they have just made the bloody things out of glass? I doubt it’d be that much more difficult to get little glass flowers or too expensive.
- Of the changes I understand the exclusion of the hairy little man who helped Tristan and actually agree that it made sense time wise for the movie. The unicorn/lion fight also made sense to be cut and I’m appreciative that we didn’t actually see the unicorn killed.
- I did not however appreciate the change of Tristan having only a week to get back to the village. For everything to have happened in a week, and Tristan and Yvaine to fall in love, it just condensed things too much and made it hard to believe. I wish they hadn’t given a time table but rather left it open ended about how much time has passed.
- One scene I wished we’d seen was when Lamia crosses paths with Ditchwater Sal (which I prefer her book name Semele) after Sal picks up Tristan, and unknowingly Yvaine. Lamia interrogates Sal about her passengers but because of the spell Sal can tell her honestly never saw Yvaine. I loved irony of that in the book.
- Of the deleted scenes there was one I wished that they had kept in the movie. After Yvaine lands in the alternate scene we see the various brothers standing around looking at her and the necklace when Tertius arrives. I found the whole thing very amusing.
- At the end when it seems as if it is the end and Lamia is about to kill them I wish that Tristan had turned to Yvaine and said “I love you” and thus that was what made her able to shine enough to kill Lamia.
- I kind of want to read a fic now where the seven brothers didn’t disappear after Tristan was revealed to be the last male heir but instead upon being crowned Tristan gained the ability to see them and thus ended up having them hanging around for the rest of his life - fighting with each other, offering ‘advice’ and basically bugging Tristian. It’d be fun!
- My favourite parts/bits were: Yvaine and Tristan (I found both very likable), Tristan/Yvaine (I found the romance to be very sweet), the pirate ship montage (especially the final dancing bit), the ghost brothers and their continuing peanut gallery behaviour/chatting (they were hilarious, we need more of them), Michelle Phieffer as the Witch Queen/Lamia (she was fabulous), how pretty the movie was, the lovely shots (the running horses, Yvaine glowing, Lamia on the cliff edge with her stalking back to her cart was especially memorable and stunning) and the special effects/makeup (Una’s transformation from bird to person and back was really lovely, the makeup of the Lilim was great).
- The one thing I actively disliked, that really bugged me, was the treatment of Victoria. Despite enjoying it overall it does leave a really dark cloud over the entire movie for me. Tristan finding her, bending her in his arms and then whispering to her “Grow up and get over yourself.” before dropping her? Why exactly did they have to be so nasty about her? Having her actually in love with Humphrey or someone else when he returns and them letting go of each other like in the book was so much better. This feels like the character bashing I so hate in fic. Having Victoria and Humphrey at Tristan’s crowning as King of Stormhold, and her clearly unhappy and having it rubbed in her face was awful and unnecessary. Perhaps because I fast-forwarded through the beginning interactions between Victoria and Tristan (outside her window and at the shop) because of potential embarrassment but I found the humiliation of her unnecessary and vicious. She was self-absorbed, fine, but she wasn’t evil nor did she seem truly cruel. I don’t think it was necessary to take her down a peg or whatever her final scenes were supposed to portray. This change from the book didn’t add anything to the movie. In fact one thing I loved about the book was how it dealt with the Tristan/Victoria with respect for both characters. So this unnecessary change was the only dark spot of the movie for me. And because it happened at the end it remains large in my mind.
- One production question/dislike is about the fake plastic flowers that Semele was selling and specifically the fact that they’re supposed to be glass flowers, which Tristan (or Dunstan?) actually says about them which is completely ridiculous because they’re clearly plastic, all of which leads to - why couldn’t they have just made the bloody things out of glass? I doubt it’d be that much more difficult to get little glass flowers or too expensive.
- Of the changes I understand the exclusion of the hairy little man who helped Tristan and actually agree that it made sense time wise for the movie. The unicorn/lion fight also made sense to be cut and I’m appreciative that we didn’t actually see the unicorn killed.
- I did not however appreciate the change of Tristan having only a week to get back to the village. For everything to have happened in a week, and Tristan and Yvaine to fall in love, it just condensed things too much and made it hard to believe. I wish they hadn’t given a time table but rather left it open ended about how much time has passed.
- One scene I wished we’d seen was when Lamia crosses paths with Ditchwater Sal (which I prefer her book name Semele) after Sal picks up Tristan, and unknowingly Yvaine. Lamia interrogates Sal about her passengers but because of the spell Sal can tell her honestly never saw Yvaine. I loved irony of that in the book.
- Of the deleted scenes there was one I wished that they had kept in the movie. After Yvaine lands in the alternate scene we see the various brothers standing around looking at her and the necklace when Tertius arrives. I found the whole thing very amusing.
- At the end when it seems as if it is the end and Lamia is about to kill them I wish that Tristan had turned to Yvaine and said “I love you” and thus that was what made her able to shine enough to kill Lamia.
- I kind of want to read a fic now where the seven brothers didn’t disappear after Tristan was revealed to be the last male heir but instead upon being crowned Tristan gained the ability to see them and thus ended up having them hanging around for the rest of his life - fighting with each other, offering ‘advice’ and basically bugging Tristian. It’d be fun!
