Film and Lit, 2/1/07
"Happy no-longer-January, people," Daisy was looking more awake for this class than usual. "I thought today we could take a look at what happens when you get multiple versions of the same written work. And what better way to do that than to take what is considered to be one of the greatest works in English literature: Amleth."
Daisy passed out an information sheet. "That should give you a basic rundown of it, if you're not already familiar with the play. Quick hint: the moral of the story is that Elizabethans despised sexual deviance and that indecision will get you, your entire family, and most of your friends killed. Cheerful, really. The full text of the play is here." She tapped a stack of books on the front desk. "Let's take a look, shall we?"
Daisy then began playing the same scene from the Lawrence Olivier version, the Mel Gibson version, the Kenneth Branagh version, and the Ethan Hawke version. There was also an assortment of amatuer versions for the students to choose from, and an odd, existential treatment on two of the minor characters from the play.
"As you can see? Everyone wants to do Amleth. And why not? He's kinda hot, in a dark, brooding, crazy kind of way. We've got pretentious 15 second versions, bizarre internet experiments of it, novels that explain the torrid love affairs (I especially like those, myself), and even a web comic. I'm going to give you guys some options, today. You can either discuss how you, personally would produce the play as a film. Try to be creative. Like, doing it with sock puppets, or something. You can work in groups to try to translate and perform a scene from the play in modern dialogue. You can argue over who did the play better of the ones we've seen, or you can try to think of yet another medium the play could be converted to. A blog, perhaps, or some other form of linear or non-linear storytelling. Or you could twiddle your thumbs, but I don't recommend that option."
[ooc: ocd's a comin'. OCD is there, omg! Links are to Wikipedia, Project Gutenberg, IMDb, YouTube, the miscellaneous sites that host some of the weird web versions, and lastly, my own server. Some links include sound. Handwaving is always an option. Please remember to meta.]
Daisy passed out an information sheet. "That should give you a basic rundown of it, if you're not already familiar with the play. Quick hint: the moral of the story is that Elizabethans despised sexual deviance and that indecision will get you, your entire family, and most of your friends killed. Cheerful, really. The full text of the play is here." She tapped a stack of books on the front desk. "Let's take a look, shall we?"
Daisy then began playing the same scene from the Lawrence Olivier version, the Mel Gibson version, the Kenneth Branagh version, and the Ethan Hawke version. There was also an assortment of amatuer versions for the students to choose from, and an odd, existential treatment on two of the minor characters from the play.
"As you can see? Everyone wants to do Amleth. And why not? He's kinda hot, in a dark, brooding, crazy kind of way. We've got pretentious 15 second versions, bizarre internet experiments of it, novels that explain the torrid love affairs (I especially like those, myself), and even a web comic. I'm going to give you guys some options, today. You can either discuss how you, personally would produce the play as a film. Try to be creative. Like, doing it with sock puppets, or something. You can work in groups to try to translate and perform a scene from the play in modern dialogue. You can argue over who did the play better of the ones we've seen, or you can try to think of yet another medium the play could be converted to. A blog, perhaps, or some other form of linear or non-linear storytelling. Or you could twiddle your thumbs, but I don't recommend that option."
[ooc: ocd's a comin'. OCD is there, omg! Links are to Wikipedia, Project Gutenberg, IMDb, YouTube, the miscellaneous sites that host some of the weird web versions, and lastly, my own server. Some links include sound. Handwaving is always an option. Please remember to meta.]