Hunger Games - May contain movie spoilers

Okay, so the Hunger Games movie....  Problems and Praise...

I was more impressed with the movie than I thought I would be.  I was honestly convinced that I was going to hate it and I was pleasantly surprised that I did not. 

I was most upset with:

1. That the Mayor's Daughter (I can't for the life of me remember her name right now) was taken out of the movie
2. They did not show Woody Harrelson fall off the stage at the reaping
3. They did not show Peeta's painting at the final trial in front of the game-makers before they were given their scores
4. The young lady they picked to play Katniss is a beautiful actress and they did not do a good enough job of making her look dirty and dishevelled before the people from the Capital got their hands on her

I was most impressed with:

1. Woody Harrelson as Haymitch.  Awesome actor
2. The craziness of the people of the Capital
3. Effie - her demeanor is exactly how I pictured it while I was reading
4. The Girl on Fire - I thought they were actually going to try to make a dress/outfits that looked like flames.  Sure the effects are clearly effects, but kudos for realizing that this was a fantastical costume and there is no way to create the vision everyone made in their minds while reading!

I could ramble on and on but I suppose those are the main points I have to make about this. What are your thoughts guys?

Donkeyskin VS Deerskin

As I was reading Donkeyskin, I was trying to follow along with the story line of Deerskin.  Of course, there is more character development in the novel by necessity of it being a longer story.  I found it interesting which characters (and how) McKinley developed.  

The queen (Lissar's mother) was only spoken of as being beautiful and asking her husband not to marry anyone unless they were more beautiful than her after her death.  Adding all of the extra description to her is interesting to me.  McKinley's added cause of her sickness that lead to her death as well as the request of the painting provides interesting thoughts that I'm not entirely sure are fully formed in my mind yet.

The royal family in the new land where Lissar meets Ossin is not given a description at all in Donkeyskin.  In Deerskin I think the description serves the purpose that the reader is to understand Ossin's family is very different than that of the family that Lissar grew up with.  Also, the description of the family sets Ossin appart much as Lissar was set apart in her childhood.

The deerskin dress that leads to Lissar asking to be called Deerskin does not have as much of a story behind it as the Donkeyskin does in the original telling.  The only parallel I can see so far is that the deerskin dress has some sort of magical property to it that keep it clean as well as perfectly fitted to Lissar's body.  The donkeyskin tale from the original poem is much more mystical since it came from a magical donkey that literally shat golden crowns (this I found to be one of the strangest pieces of the story...who thinks of that?).

In Donkeyskin, the princess has a fairy godmother that helps her evade her father's plans to marry  her.  In Deerskin, Lissar does this all on her own (with Ash's help).  I have found myself wondering if Ash, Rinnol, or the Lady, are supposed to take the place of the fairy godmother (or any combination of the three), or if they are merely added characters to add to Lissar's life.

Lastly, at the end of Donkeyskin, the princess's father recognizes her and throws away all selfish feelings so that his daughter can be happy in her marriage.  In Deerskin, McKinley makes a point to talk about the Lady changing Lissar's and Ash's appearance.  I am wondering if she will somehow make it possible for Lissar's father to recognize her later in the book, or if she will continue to paint the father in a negative light and not have the redeeming quality of the reunion of father and daughter occur at the end of the novel.

On a separate note:  What is going on with the description of Lady?  A woman's face rising up over a man-dragon with a headdress of fire, and worms of flame with glittering eyes and mouths that hissed for fingernails?  This is something that I would be afraid of... it doesn't seem like something that would give me relief.  Please tell me your thoughts....

Deerskin Part 1

There are a few things that crossed my mind while I was reading.  As we discussed in class the power of the queen's portrait as well as Ash being Lissar's identity.

I find it interesting how the evil nature of the queen is not quite evident until the portrait is all that is left of her.  There are a few things that would lead a reader to believe that the queen is evil; however, if that reader is not familiar with fairy-tales, they would probably not pick up on those few things.  Once the painting is what is focused on in terms of the queen is very clear that there is some sort of evil surrounding the portrait and in turn the subject of the portrait.

Ash, in the book, seems to be the only thing keeping the princess alive.  Ash is the one that keeps her sane when she enters into rooms full of people as well as the one that comforts her in her room.  I find it interesting to think that Ash is also (in a round about way) the reason for Lissar's father noticing that she is becoming a young lady.  Without Ash, Lissar never would have found it necessary to assert herself and ask for different quarters on the ground floor; and I find it reasonable to assume that without Ash, she would have stayed in her chambers and been even more shy and withdrawn than she is.  I'm not sure if that connection means anything but it entered into my thoughts and I figured I'd put it out there for any comments.

Lastly, I had to keep reminding myself that this story takes place in a made up place and a made up time.  Many things that are talked about are very fairy-tale oriented, but there are also many things that remind me of the historical royal families in the world that we live in.  It took quite a bit for me to keep in my mind the fact that this story is not taking place in some historical setting.  I think it finally set in for me when the courtiers were displeased with the fact that King wanted to marry his daughter.  Monarchies often had that situation and it was frowned upon not to keep marriages in the family, so reading about how horrible everyone (except the King) thought that this arrangement was finally allowed me to crystallize the make believe setting of this story.