Essay on Review of A Cinderella Story

Our culture is full of fairy tales. Girls are taught at a young age about Prince Charming and happy endings while boys are taught to be the girls’ heroes. They are taught these dreams and desires through fairytales and movies. These fairy tales started out as entertaining stories, but as they were handed down from one generation to the next, they slowly became more than that. They became bedtime stories for children, and as such, they have great importance because they teach children how to be in the world. One such fairy tale I want to focus on is Cinderella.

Throughout the years there have been many versions of the classic tale, “Cinderella.” From European style all the way to Disney. However, they are all based on the same ancient story. Step mother, step sisters, Cinderella marries the love of her life, you get the idea. Yet, each individual story has its own unique touch to make it stand out just a little bit more than the previous story. The two Cinderella stories that I’m going to be comparing are two Disney films. The first one I am going to discuss was released in early spring of 1950, called “Cinderella”. The second story is a remake called, “Another Cinderella Story” released in 2008. Both films based on the same story line, yet completely different.

When most people think of the movie, "Cinderella';, they think of the animated Disney version with the little mice and the happy ending where Cinderella marries the prince and they live happily ever after. While the movie "Ever After'; is based on "Cinderella';, it is not animated, but still has many of the same characteristics as the Disney version. Of course it is not exactly the same, and since it is not animated there are many differences.

In my short analysis of “Cindarella”, understanding the basic concepts of the story was not as easy as I had once predicted. The author Elisabeth Panttaja explains in her essay different views and ideas in the sense that Cinderella is successful because of the magical powers created by her dead mother. The author tells that “It is not suprising . . . that modern criticism of (Cinderella) . . . has been so strangely indifferent to the roles that Cinderella’s mother plays in the story.” This to my knowledge is giving me a different view on how people thought Cinderella acted to the situations that occurred.

The Grimm Brothers version of Cinderella is a written down oral story that people passed down from generation to generation, meant to teach a lesson about piety and good behavior. Before the Grimm Brothers ever wrote it down, the story had been told several times by memory. It is thus not surprising that the descriptions of certain events in the story, such as the way Cinderella went to the Ball, are lacking in details. It is obvious that these parts of the story are unimportant to the overall message of the story. Instead, it focuses on the piety of Cinderella and the wickedness of the step-sisters. Through the events of the story, it becomes obvious that the goodness of Cinderella is justly rewarded, and that

The Hollywood movie Pretty Woman (1990) is about a prostitute in Hollywood, marrying an extremely rich businessman, in spite of her mutual distrust and prejudice. The movie contains the basic narrative of the Cinderella tale: through the love and help of a man of a higher social position, a girl of a lower social status moves up to join the man at his level.

The characters in the story Cinderella differ greatly depending on what version you are reading. To start with, in the Norway version the main character is not named Cinderella, but Katie Woodencloak. In this version Katie’s father was a king who had to go to war with another kingdom. Also, in the Norway version the stepmother was only harsh and mean to Katie when the king was not around, and when he was not around she would be very brutal to her and even beat Katie. As far as the other sister goes, in this version Katie has one stepsister who is very mean and ugly. The final character comparison in the Norway version is the “fairy godmother”. In this version there is no “fairy godmother” like what is typically thought of with the story Cinderella. Instead this role is played by a bull, that is the source of her beautiful dresses.

The same thing is fitting in the movie A Cinderella Story. With the same plot as the original Cinderella movie, Sam has lost her father and is living with her evil stepmother and two evil step sisters. Despite the fact that life is difficult for Sam growing up, things surely turn around in the end. With finding her Prince Charming, getting accepted to the school of her dreams, and getting far, far away from her evil step family, Sam’s story proves that the world isn't so fatalistic after

Cinderella (2015) kept an even balance of fantasy with reality. She had the happily ever after while meeting the price before the ball and falling in love with her personality rather than status and charm. The touch of magic in the modern Cinderella still gives views of a young age the dazzle of the transformations. Disney intended for the magic to help Cinderella get to the ball to meet and eventually marry the prince. This version has realistic aspects but does not limit the imagination and specialness of the dramatic dress transformation.

Cinderella by Grimm and its Disney version has the same plot and same main characters. Minor details are changed in the written fairy tale and its popular adaption but these changes can help to judge about the tendencies of the contemporary pop culture.

When they realized the age of the readers, however, they made the cruel and gruesome folk tales they tried to rewrite into softer and happier stories. Even though the brothers tried to make their fairy tales less inappropriate, the folk tales main ideas were still slightly violent and sexual. Brothers Grimm's Cinderella versus Walt Disney Cinderella What was cut out of the movie Cinderella was a folk tale rewritten in 1697 by Brothers Grimm. In 1950 Walt Disney productions made their interpretation of the Brothers Grimm tale and made a movie. However, the movie was for children, so Disney cut out a few gruesome parts of the original.

Cinderella is one of the most popular fairytales of all time. According to the SurLaLune website, there are between 345-1,500 different versions of this story. Possibly the earliest or first Cinderella story is based on an Egyptian tale entitled Rhodopis. What fascinates me the most about Cinderella, is that some aspects of this story could be true. A young woman could have been mentally, emotionally, and physically abused by family members and lived happily ever after. Why not right? However, what if the story wasn’t what it seemed? What if the wicked stepmother and stepsisters really weren’t wicked at all?

Each person in the world has heard of Cinderella, no matter what kind of version it may be. Cinderella is the one fairy tale story that has been popular and will always be the one tale that has to be told to children. Words and story lines might be twist and turn, but in the end the knowledge of the story will be learned in similar ways. As we all know when one story is told another is created, when one is at its best then another is at its worse. One version will always be better than another, but no matter what version it might be the story will be told.

Although this is considered to be a more modern adaptation of the story of “Cinderella”, the protagonist is still written in with the standard fairytale themes of being weak and needing a man.

How did we get here? In 1697, French writer Charles Perrault updated an age-old fairy tale about a young woman named Cinderella to appeal to his contemporaries, French nobility and bourgeoisie. So many of the early versions of the tale boasted a very resourceful young woman who played an active role in her destiny. Perrault, however wrote his Cinderella as a well-mannered, docile, selfless women who would fit seamlessly with the ideal 17th century upper-class society. Historically, fairy tales have reflected the values of society in which they were written or revised mirroring its preoccupations, obsessions, ambitions, and shortcomings. What do