Jagten

I rewatched the Danish movie Jagten (aka The Hunt, 2012) last night, a film that I always feel a bit weird calling one of my favourites due to it's dark subject matter, but it's just so artfully made and deals with such important themes.


It stars Mads Mikkelsen as Lucas, a single middle aged man trying to rebuild his life after a divorce, who lives in the small town where he works in a childrens daycare - the kind of small town where everyone knows everyone and all of their business. Klara, the 5 year old daughter of his best friend, attends the daycare and develops a childish crush on Lucas as he's kind and takes the time to listen to her whereas her parents are usually arguing. One day Klara places a heart shaped gift in Lucas's pocket and gives him a kiss on the lips, and Lucas is quick to admonish her which hurts her feelings. As she's sulking from the rejection, Grethe, the head of the daycare, asks Klara if she's OK and Klara says something that is understood to mean Lucas has sexually abused her. Grethe brings in a child psychologist who asks Klara a series of leading questions, not allowing Klara to go and play with her friends until she's answered. Grethe doesn't believe that a child would lie about such a thing and so Lucas is branded a paedophile and shunned by the entire community. Although a police investigation proves Lucas is innocent, he continues to be ostracised which quickly leads to violence as the community doles out it's own sense of justice.

It's an incredibly heart wrenching film to watch, especially as it's inspired by true events that happened in Norway. Director and co-writer Thomas Vinterberg said of the film "When someone is accused of child abuse, the kids get interrogated by policemen and psychiatrists who repeatedly ask them the same questions. Sometimes, the kids give the grown-ups the answers they want. They say, ‘yes, he abused me.’ Then everyone goes crazy and for the child, his whole world falls apart."

It's a bit of a controversial take to not believe a child, but I think the reason that the film is able to pull it off is how it leaves us in no doubt that Lucas is innocent. It lays all of the cards on the table and we're shown how a few unprofessional leading questions can ruin a persons life and fuel a mob mentality. It's not a natural choice for a protagonist, but Mads Mikkelsen plays Lucas with a bewildered charm and it's devastating and uncomfortable to watch his life slowly unravel. Even after the community forgives him, we see that the damage has been done - a stone cannot simply be uncast.

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Whilst it's unfortunately far more frequent for child abusers go unpunished rather than falsely accused, Jagten perfectly tackles the paranoia of modern society, particularly the stigma of men working in environments with children and displaying any kindness that could be misconstrued and yet considered normal between a woman and non-related child. It criticizes the ease of society to sit, point and judge, without even bothering to verify the facts or consider an alternative viewpoint, something that feels ever more prevalent in todays 'cancel' culture. This is simply a powerful and enraging film that reminds us just how judgemental we tend to be towards others and the devastating effects it can have.

Анастасия

I've always really, really loved the Don Bluth 1997 movie Anastasia ever since I was a little girl. It's funny actually as I consider Disney my favourite for animations, but most of my favourite animated movies are actually by other companies!


I haven't actually watched this movie in a long time as I've been swept up in the Broadway soundtrack which alters the story somewhat - instead of being pursued by an undead Rasputin, Anya's tracked from St Petersburg to Paris by a general of the Bolshevik army who’s father was one of the soldiers involved in the shooting of the Romanovs. I really love that change as it's obviously a bit truer to history, but saying that it does always make me laugh that the biggest complaint about this movie is how historically inaccurate it is - is there any Hollywood movie that sticks to it's source 100%? And baring in mind it's an animation and will be watched by children, I hardly think a true account of political unrest, war, genocide, Russians starving to death, and a Royal family being brutally murdered is in any way appropriate. It's a fairy tale and never claims to be true - the Grand Duchess Anastasia didn't really survive either.

If I had any complaint about the way this movie handles the history it would be that it sympathizes the Romanovs too much and comes across as fully Tsarist, but through using Rasputin it doesn't blame the Russians for what happened either so it is at least neutral in that regard. Generally I think it's really well handled for the type of movie that it is, and I appreciate some of the smaller detailing alluding to what actually happened: Rasputin may not have sold his soul and placed a curse on the Romanovs, but he certainly played a part in turning the people against the Royal family which is portrayed at the opening of the movie. And although it takes so many liberties with history, I'm sure like many others it served as my gateway into a lifelong fascination with Russian history.

Speaking of which, I've recently begun learning Russian and so thought it would be fun to watch this movie with the Russian audio (hence the post title). I'm still far too beginner to understand much of it,  but it did make the film feel fresh and it was fun to hear what they 'should' be saying if it were real - and dare I even say that I think I preferred the Russian voice actors as it seemed to fit the characters personalities better. The character of Dmitry has always been my weakness since I was 8 years old, and something about his Russian voice just made him even hotter which I didn't think was even possible. Ahem.



Anyway, I really love this movie. The animation is gorgeous, and whilst not quite as flawless as other films released at this time such as The Prince of Egypt, it has a certain tangible quality to the artwork that I really love and you can tell it was actually drawn with real hands instead of being spat out of a computer. It's also one of my favourite animated movie soundtracks that I listen to often - and I do strongly recommend listening to the Broadway adaptation if you're a fan. It doesn't have In The Dark Of The Night as Rasputin isn't present at all, but all other favourites are there among some powerful new additions such as In My Dreams, The Neva Flows, and In A Crowd of Thousands.

"For hate's sake I spit my last breath at thee, ye damned whale."

I’ve had an image in my head that I’ve wanted to create into an illustration for a while, but as it involves a whale and boat I feel like it’s imagery which is probably a bit Moby Dick-seque - even though I’ve never read nor seen Moby Dick and don’t really even know what it’s about. But I figure instead of dropping my idea or trying to protest that it has nothing to do with Moby Dick, I should just learn the story and roll with it. I am an illustrator after all which involves illustrating existing stories! Unfortunately I don’t have the inclination right now to plough through a 650 page book as I already have a stack of books that I actually want to read, so I decided to cop out a bit and familiarise myself through a movie. I figured they’d be plenty as it’s such a famous book, and was pretty shocked to see that that’s not the case at all and so quickly settled on the 1956 version starring Gregory Peck.


Fun fact: I’m actually terrified of whales! I’m not scared of sharks or things that could actually hurt me, and I know that whales aren’t man hunters and are actually supposed to be quite kind and inquisitive and I even enjoy imagery and illustration involving them, but I can’t help but be terrified of them all the same. It’s their size, you see - I have quite severe megalophobia and huge things give me full on panic attacks, including whales. And that was another reason I’ve spent my life avoiding Moby Dick, and why I went for an older movie as I hoped the effects would be less realistic and so less terrifying for me.

And I was right! I spent the entire movie dreading the scenes with the whale but they were fine - which isn’t to say they were bad, I love old movie effects and much prefer them to CGI, but they were endearing in their way as it is clearly not a real whale to my relief. And I enjoyed the final battle. I feel like a modern adaptation would of rushed the showdown between Ahab and the whale and we’d have a 45 minute overly drawn out and tedious action packed CGI battle - but instead the battle is saved for the final 5 minutes, with the rest of the film pacing us, preparing us, forcing us to feel Ahab’s and the crew’s anticipation at knowing what’s in store. Apparently Gregory Peck was slated a lot for his role as Ahab, and even he himself cringed at his performance in later years feeling he was miscast. Whilst I fully admit this is my introduction to the character and I have nothing else to base his performance off of, I can certainly say that I enjoyed it, his manic obsession was palpable.

I'd seen The Lighthouse (2019) back in January and couldn’t help but draw several parallels with some scenes, which is something that I really love about consuming media; when you’re able to make those connections and spot the influence and see everything come together full circle, and there were several instances where Ahab was on screen that made me think of Willem Dafoe's character especially (I haven't reviewed The Lighthouse as I was so-so on it, but I feel like it's one of those movies where it takes a few watches for it to all come together so maybe I'll write about it in the future as I did love the imagery.)

The only real drawback for me is that I could of really done without seeing white men pretend to be Polynesian and Native American. It’s the worst aspect of old movies to be honest, and not knowing the story beforehand I wasn't expecting it. I take partial responsibility for that as if I had known there were indigenous characters then it’s a pretty safe bet it’ll be a white guy in face paint, but it's a shame nonetheless and does mar my enjoyment. There's also some scenes of real whaling which is it's own yikes, but I'm not completely sure what was real and what wasn't which is perhaps a blessing?

I’m still not sure if Moby Dick is where my illustration lies just yet, I’m going to read the book of Jonah to make sure I’m not getting confused, but I'm happy to at least have discovered a new movie out of it! (and I got to learn where Starbucks got its name from!)

Beware the frozen heart

When listening to the Frozen Broadway cast recording the other day it really got me thinking about the original fairy tale of The Snow Queen and how the two compare. This isn't anything I've done any research on as I want it to be my own theories without outside influence, and I'm sure it's not a new topic at all but it's something I wanted to share my own thoughts on anyway!

The Snow Queen by Hans Christian Andersen is probably my all time favourite fairy tale, and it's something I go way back with. I'm Danish and grew up on Andersen's works as a child and so they hold a lot of personal significance to me, and when I was in my foundation year of art school for my big final project I decided I wanted to illustrate my own version of The Snow Queen.



The artwork is really old and kind of embarrassing to me now (I actually plan on redoing it entirely as a personal project for my portfolio) but it was a labor of love as The Snow Queen is an epic in length for being a fairy tale, and a lot of background research went into everything and it got me one of the highest grades in my class. Which is all to say that I'm intimately knowledgeable of the original story.

I've been a huge fan of Disney my whole life and was hugely involved in the fandom in the early '10s when it was all forum based (I love forums, I wish they'd come back! They were so perfect for fandoms as they were so community driven but had the benefit of being moderated by people and not automated systems so no one could be an asshat or unfairly censored). I knew Disney had a long history of trying to adapt The Snow Queen dating back to the 1930s, and multiple times it had come into production only to be shelved due to the dark and episodic themes of the novel. So when it was finally released in 2013 (after I'd already completed my own illustrated book!) I could hardly wait and went to the very first screening that I could. And I hated it!! Yeah, big twist - what is now one of my favourite movies I did not get along with on first viewing. I remember people gushing about it and I just did not get the hype as all I could see was a bastardisation of my favourite story.

Obviously I expected Disney to alter the source material but I couldn't see any of the original tale in Frozen and that was what put my nose so out of joint. It wasn't until I saw it again by chance in 2015 that it really hit me emotionally and I was able to separate it entirely from the source and appreciate it as it's own thing. Since then I've collected all kinds of merchandise, cosplayed as Elsa at cons and at the Disney parks, Disneybounded as the characters and collected limited edition dresses based on their costumes, and travelled all of the way from the UK to see it on Broadway (OK it wasn't my main reason for going to NYC, Aaron Tveit in Moulin Rouge was, but I still paid an obscene amount to see it!) In fact it's probably fair to say at this point that Frozen has come to mean more to me than the original Andersen tale which just feels nostalgic to me now more than anything else.



Despite my love of both, I haven't really thought too much about how the two stories cross over and share similarities as like I said, I prefer to keep the two separate as they're so different. Other than Elsa being a Queen with ice powers, two of the background servants being named Gerda and Kai, and there being a reindeer as a main character, there really isn't anything immediately obvious that points it as being an adaptation. Even the overarching themes aren't really the same; in The Snow Queen the main message is good verses evil and the importance of innocence - the Snow Queen represents temptation, and Kai only becomes vulnerable to her when the mirror shards have entered his heart and eye and changed his view of the world to a more adult, cynical version. This is hugely important, and actually really relevant to Frozen upon closer inspection, but Frozen is generally about true love and the effects fear and isolation can have on both a person and a community. The Snow Queen also has a lot of Christian influence, but I'm not mad that Disney took that aspect out.

The Snow Queen (which can be read here) actually begins with a magic mirror that distorts everything it reflects by reducing everything pure and good into nothingness and magnifying everything ugly and evil. A group of trolls (!!) try to fly the mirror up the Heavens to "make fools of the angels" (like I said, there's a heavy handed Christian element that's as subtle as a brick) but as the mirror gets higher and higher into the sky it shatters and falls back down to Earth.

Kai and Gerda are child neighbours who have grown up playing together and are as close as brother and sister. Shards of the magic troll mirror fall onto Kai, one piercing his heart which turns it to ice (!), and another that gets caught in his eye and distorts his view of the world into something ugly and contemptible. He's mean to Gerda and is generally a bit of an asshat for seemingly no reason, which is possibly why no one but Gerda seems to care when he suddenly goes missing. When Kai is out playing on his sled by himself, the Snow Queen pulls up in a carriage and kisses him so he can no longer feel the cold and takes him to her palace in the North. This is the only real appearance of the Snow Queen in the whole story and her motives are completely ambiguous. In her palace she gives Kai a puzzle of broken ice shards and tells him that if he can spell out the correct word then he can become his own master, so he settles down on the frozen lake and gets to work.



Gerda's distraught at the loss of her friend and decides to go find him. She begins by boat but soon loses her paddles and is left to float until she meets land and is greeted by an old woman who erases Gerda's memory of Kai so that she'll stay with the woman as an adoptive daughter. Which works well, until Gerda spots a rose which reminds her of playing in the flowers with Kai and she bursts into tears, but the flowers confirm that Kai can't be dead as they haven't seen him in the Earth so Gerda runs away. Next she meets a crow who thinks Kai may have married a local princess which turns out to be a false alarm but the Prince and Princess are kind enough to provide Gerda with a carriage to take her on her journey, but it results in Gerda being taken prisoner by a band of thieves further along. The Robber Girl forces Gerda to be her friend by holding her at knife point which upsets Gerda alot, but the Robber Girl's captive pigeons tell Gerda that Kai has been taken by the Snow Queen, and the captive reindeer Bæ tells Gerda that he knows where the palace is located. The Robber Girl lets Gerda and Bæ go free and he carries Gerda to Finnmark, meeting the Lapland Woman and the Finn Woman along the way, but Gerda must make the remainder of the journey alone as otherwise she won't be able to enter the palace. Kai is unable to recognise Gerda as he's obsessed with the ice puzzle and has turned black with cold, and the sight of him in that state reduces Gerda to tears and she tries to hug him. The warmth of her tears melts the ice in his heart, and now able to feel again Kai weeps as he recognises his closest friend and his tears dislodge the shard in his eye. They leave the palace and travel home together, and although they are now grown they retain the innocence and optimism of youth in their hearts which is what saved them.

This is a very abridged version of the tale, and you can tell that it's very different from the plot of Frozen which I'm not going to detail as I'm assuming that if you've read this far then you already know it, but I wanted to give some background of the original in case you're not familiar.

At first glance there don't seem to be many similarities. It's kind of obvious that Gerda and Anna could be said to be the same character - Anna retains her innocence, which often comes across as naivety in her agreeing to marry Prince Hans and charging off into the wilderness alone to look for her sister, but it's very clear that her heart is in the right place and like Gerda she meets people that help her along the way even if the cast of characters look a bit different. I've seen Kristoff compared to the Robber Girl which always leaves a bad taste in my mouth - the Robber Girl literally murders people and rubs a knife along the throat of the reindeer to stop him from running away. I can't imagine Kristoff treating Sven like that, and as Kristoff is directly inspired by indigenous Sámi cultures comparing him to the Robber Girl starts to jump headfirst into blatant racism so please consider don't.

For me, it's actually the character of Kai that I find the most intriguing in all of this and how he fits into the cast of Frozen. I've seen people say that Elsa is both the Snow Queen and Kai combined, but that never sat right with me as I don't see any of Kai in Elsa - she has no sudden switch of personality, no task she obsessively feels she must undertake, so I really don't see what that comparison is even based on. But as I was sat listening to the Broadway soundtrack on the train and listening to John Riddle enthusiastically sing Love Is An Open Door with Patti Murin it suddenly struck me - Hans is Kai (I know, several paragraphs in and I finally get to the point of the post, but I had to set it up!)


Hans is a very complex character within Frozen, I'd argue the most complex and it's why he's my favourite as there's so much to unpack and interpret with him. I've always been of the opinion that Disney did him dirty in the movie as one of the reasons he's so complex is because he wasn't originally written as the villain - Elsa was. But after the songwriters wrote Let It Go and discovered Elsa's motives they couldn't comfortably place her as the villain anymore, so made a last minute decision to switch it to Hans. That's why there is no foreshadowing and it's really poor writing and he's generally considered to be such a weak character (which has been analysed many times before and I won't go into, but you can read more here if you need the receipts). With the release of Frozen II Disney made it pretty clear that they now want to portray Hans as a simple black and white villain by calling him an "irredeemable monster", which is sad as it turns his backstory from something complex that could of opened a discussion about his descent into the Freudian Excuse trope and jeering at him. This feels incredibly tone-deaf to me considering the story arcs of Elsa and Anna and the main themes of personal growth in Frozen, and even goes directly against statements made by writer Jennifer Lee.

If you're not a fan of Hans and aren't fully aware of his backstory, he grew up the youngest of 13 sons and was abused throughout his childhood. He states this himself in a throwaway comment to Anna about how his brothers "pretended I was invisible, literally, for two years.", which has been followed up in official releases by Disney such as a comic strip and a book called A Frozen Heart which also shows his father as an abusive sociopath. This isn't sympathising a villain or trying to excuse his actions, but it does add to the layers of his character. It's exceptional and unheard of for a Disney villain to display any degree of self-doubt or ambiguity, so why did Disney originally go to such lengths to give him a traumatic back story just to make him a throwaway villain? Because he wasn't the villain.

There's long been a theory in Frozen fan circles that the trolls are the true villains of the story. They're the ones who encourage Elsa's parents to hide her away and force her to conceal her feelings which leads to her own traumatic experiences, and while they heal Anna they state "the heart is not so easily changed, but the head can be persuaded." This is an example of genuine foreshadowing, and could point to why Hans does a complete 180 after Anna meets the trolls with Kristoff and they sing such choice lines as "Her quote 'engagement' is a flex arrangement" and "Get the fiancé out of the way and the whole thing will be fixed!". Also remember the magic mirror in the original Snow Queen belonged to the trolls!

Which brings us back to Kai. Sweet, kind, innocent Kai who got a frozen heart and a distorted view of the world when two pieces of troll mirror fell onto him from the sky. Who could no longer see goodness and acted selfishly and obsessively until Gerda melted his frozen heart. As Anna states to Hans towards the finale of Frozen:


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I'm not saying for definite that the trolls had any part in it but it's definitely interesting, and there are certainly a lot of parallels between the characterisations of Kai and Hans and how it changes their behaviours. One of the aspects of Hans' character that I've always been intrigued by is how it parallels Elsa - a character who also grew up in an abusive household, although not through malicious intent like Hans experienced, but rather due to over protection and shortsightedness by her parents - and how they both show how abuse can shape a person. For Elsa it caused low self esteem, isolation, and self punishment, whereas for Hans one could argue it made him act outwards and present himself as he thinks others want him to be seen whilst being emotionally volatile. Or maybe he was just genuinely trying to make a better life for himself away from his abusive family and sensed Anna was looking for the same deal and was happy to marry her until his heart and eyes were frozen by magic trolls which distorted his view and made him behave like a jackass. Maybe.

I guess we'll never truly know, but it's fun to mull over and I enjoy any links I can find between my favourite movie and my favourite fairy tale. And it's why I'll forever be mad that Hans got such a rush job treatment as he has the potential to be an amazing character. He’s emotionally damaged and an arrogant and vindictive dick, but that doesn’t make him evil. I like that he's ambiguous and morally grey and how that forces the audience to question whether they can trust him. As in reality, most people are like that.

Yet another scene that parallels Kai and Hans - at the beginning of The Snow Queen Kai looks out of the frost covered window and sees the Snow Queen beckoning to him, and here we have a big pointed scene of Hans looking out of the frost covered window at the storm Elsa created - whilst being an ass to Anna, much like Kai was to Gerda (who we've already established is Anna!).