Blog Entry 8: November 10

Compare the original tale Hansel and Gretel with the MGM version. What is different in the film? What is similar? Why did the movie directors make these changes?

• The MGM version of Hansel and Gretel is one of the many adaptions throughout history that has taken Hansel and Gretel and put its own unique spin on the original tale. The movie, however, doesn't change its original message: don't trust strangers especially if their house is made of candy and never judge a book by it's cover. The movie conveys these lessons when Hansel and Gretel are first introduced to the witch's house. They were both intrigued by the candy outside and the sweet singing of the witch but, soon realized that the witch had other things planned for both of them when Gretel found the witch chanting over a cauldron casting a spell. What was similar between both the movie and the original tale was that the family was very poor, and could not afford food for all four of them. In the movie, however, the wife, however, blamed this on the father getting accepted less money from the baker in the town. In the original tale, there was a widespread famine across the country. In both the movie and the original tale Hansel and Gretel are extremely close and stick together no matter what, even they were captured by the witch. In the original tale, it was the wife's idea for the husband to abandoned the children when he was at work. In the original tale, she was portrayed to be the antagonist of the story because she thought of her own livelihood over her children. In the movie, the wife falls in the same trap and sent her children away to the forest. She was so distraught over the children making a mess in the house that she sent them away to look for berries. Once her husband returned home with enough food for the family to survive she returned to her senses and tried to correct her mistake. In the original Grimm tale, however, the mother never learns from her mistake and dies before Hansel and Gretel returned from the witch. Finally, both the Grimm take and the movie both had the witch antagonist character but, they are both slightly different. The witch in the movie was first introduced as a loving grandma to both Hansel and Gretel so, that she could eat them. She then, transformed from her sweet nature to look like a witch on the outside when she was discovered. In the original Grimm tale, however, there was little to no description of what the witch actually looked like. The witch was only described to have red menacing eyes. I think the movie director changed the movie because they wanted to make it more palpable to a different audience. Wilhelm Grimm rewrote Hansel and Gretel to reflect the abandonment of children at the time and to give hope to children who are in that situation. In changing the plot the movie directors made the characters more realistic and relatable to people nowadays.