Into the Woods Official Movie Thread- Page 196

[sarahb22]

Posted: 1/7/15 at 12:58pm

"So, with all the featurettes Disney has released on this movie, I feel like I've watched the entire "Special Features" section of the future Blu-Ray. "

True, but they're still great to watch. Still waiting for the "Magic of Billy Magnussen's Leather Pants" featurette, though.

[disneybroadwayfan22]

Posted: 1/7/15 at 1:03pm

I'm finally seeing this with my best friend on Friday. Can't wait!

[Kad]

Posted: 1/7/15 at 1:11pm

I see the Witch climbing the hair as less of a sticking point than the whole Baker-Rapunzel connection, since that's less fairy-tale logic and more "let's just sort of forget we brought this whole thing up."

[themysteriousgrowl]

Posted: 1/7/15 at 1:50pm

Yeah, my problem with that is that something good could be made out of that dangling plot thread. It could also probably be effectively glossed over and "wrapped up" with a couple of new lines, but I'm sure Lapine could have woven that family tie into something thematically substantial if he wanted to.

[CarlosAlberto]

Posted: 1/7/15 at 1:52pm

^ But he didn't. So get the hell over it!



Just Kidding!

[J_Jammer]

Posted: 1/7/15 at 1:56pm

I never thought twice about her being the Baker's sister from the first time I saw it. Nor does it register when the Baker's Wife says "I pulled it from a maiden in a tower."

they needed to explain where Repunzel came from more than connect her to the rest of the group.

[Kad]

Posted: 1/7/15 at 1:59pm

You didn't think twice that it's revealed to the Baker that he has a living relative, and a sister at that, and he never thinks about it again?

[CarlosAlberto]

Posted: 1/7/15 at 2:00pm

They did explain where Rapunzel came from. She is The Baker's sister, therefore she is the daughter of The Baker's mother and father. She was taken by The Witch. The Witch explains all this in the movie's Prologue.

[CarlosAlberto]

Posted: 1/7/15 at 2:01pm

I did find it odd that it was really never brought up again by The Baker or his wife, but it was explained who she was. As I recall they don't mention it again in the original show either.

Updated On: 1/7/15 at 02:01 PM

[themysteriousgrowl]

Posted: 1/7/15 at 2:06pm

I do like, though, how aggressive Meryl plays that reveal in the movie, when she says (and I paraphrase) “She’s MINE now, and you’ll NEVER find her.” There was an implicit threat, and it made sense to me that the Baker didn’t pursue it in that moment. Then, of course, he almost immediately sets off on his quest for the items. It’s still a dangling thread, but I found it less bothersome in the movie.

Updated On: 1/7/15 at 02:06 PM

[J_Jammer]

Posted: 1/7/15 at 2:20pm

No I didn't think twice.

"I had a brother?"

"No, but you had a sister."

if he had a brother he'd had cared.

[sarahb22]

Posted: 1/7/15 at 2:41pm

In the stage version the fact Rapunzel was the Baker's sister became a moot point when Rapunzel was killed. At the time the Baker had bigger problems, and since it was really more a plot contrivance than anything else, nobody really cared that apparently even after the "happy ending" of the first act he let a whole year go by without thinking, "Gee, didn't the witch say I have a sister? Maybe I should look her up…"

I mean, in the real world he'd certainly do that, and connect the dots (the witch said he had a sister - she has the sister - "where you'll never find her" - he knows the witch knows the maiden in the tower because the witch says she's touched her hair…) and over the course of a freakin' year he'd at least try to find her. And, royal gossip being what it is, certainly he'd find out that one of the princes wed a young maiden who had been living alone in a tower. Seems like a no-brainer.

However, in the play this all doesn't matter because Rapunzel goes crazy and gets squished in the second act. Really it has nothing to do with the overall story, so it's never brought up. In the play.

The movie, however, is a different animal. Rapunzel lives through the movie, we assume, so one can suppose that at some point after the ending their paths ended up crossing at some point. Again, through royal gossip he could learn her origins and it really wouldn't take much for him to connect the dots and realize that she's his sister.

Updated On: 1/7/15 at 02:41 PM

[Mrtrobz]

Posted: 1/7/15 at 3:40pm

I guess in a years past the Baker could have met this sister especially if he had a father issue although in the play he had met his father and knew who his father was at the end of the first act but in the movie in terms of his character perhaps because he had no father then Rapunzel should have been his first point of call. Maybe the strict social divide of the peasants and nobles could have sorted that issue out,Cinderella had to sneak out in rags to see her mother's Grave so perhaps ironically Rapunzel would be confined to the castle much like her tower if she wasn't allowed to leave that may also add more levity to her suicide.

Updated On: 1/7/15 at 03:40 PM

[Liza's Headband]

Posted: 1/7/15 at 4:15pm

I am pretty sure you're all discussing a plot point that Lapine has publicly admitted was never explained, resolved, etc. Didn't he explain in an interview recently posted in this thread that he and Sondheim agreed to just not pursue it because of everything else going on?

[henrikegerman]

Posted: 1/7/15 at 4:20pm

Even in real life there are a great many people who as adults learn for the first time that they have biological fathers, mothers, brothers, sisters, and even children that they never knew about, and, for all sorts of reasons (even without being warned by threatening people, or, for that matter, witches, that they will never find their long lost family members) choose to not go looking for them.

This isn't real life.

It's multi-plot deconstructed fairy tale psychomythodramatic musical comedy-drama.

The Baker's decision whether or not to search for his long lost sister, if he might super-theoretically have ever considered such a decision, is simply outside the scope of story, more specifically outside the parts of the characters' lives that we see being played out in the action.

That the Baker and Rapunzel are brother and sister is simply a plot point. It is not meant to develop a story line about whether the Baker didn't care all that much about reconnecting with a sister he had never met, or, alternatively, might have considered more carefully searching for his long lost sister under vastly different circumstances, or whether he in fact did consider all of this carefully (and who's to say he wouldn't have, off-stage/screen?), or, perhaps, cared very much but couldn't devote himself to that care because he a) first had just three days to help reverse the curse, b) then had, immediately, a pregnant wife a newborn child as well as a bakery to attend to and could not have ignored these pressing responsibilities to go searching for his sister even if he had wanted to and c) finally, and while the child is still an infant, has to deal with the potential end of existence as he knows it as well as his own psychological vulnerabilities in not being perhaps the father he would like to be.

These of course might, as Myterious has said, been interesting paths for the story to take, but it took other paths instead. And the libretto is chockfull of paths as it is.

The fact that Rapunzel is the Baker's sister is part of an inciting incident concerning how the curse got placed and the place got cursed in the first place, how the curse gets reversed, and the ever after of that reversal. It is not there as an inciting incident for a story about a search for a long lost sibling. (If you want that story, of see The Menaechmi, Comedy of Errors, The Boys from Syracuse or Oh, Brother instead; if you want to see Sondheim's take on long lost siblings being reunited, go see Forum!).

Btw, I don't find it odd that the Baker wouldn't immediately think the maiden in the tower was his sister just because the Witch said she had touched the hair; there are a thousand other possibilities why the Witch might have touched the hair in question; particularly since the Witch has a motive to obtain hair just that shade of yellow and has often had to stop abruptly when these objects, which she can not touch, are foisted on her by people - including the Baker - who are not listening carefully to her instructions that she must not touch them.









Updated On: 1/7/15 at 04:20 PM

[themysteriousgrowl]

Posted: 1/7/15 at 4:48pm

Hey, henrik, call me growl. Mysterious is my father.

[henrikegerman]

Posted: 1/7/15 at 5:00pm

ha!

[MagicalMusical]

Posted: 1/7/15 at 9:19pm

Henrikegerman, I liked your answer on what Cinderella learned on the steps of the palace. That sounds right. However, as a huge fan of the original story and Disney animated film, I will say Cinderella's goodness (and in the Disney animated version, faith and belief in her dreams) led her Fairy Godmother to help her, and in the Disney animated version her help of animals had them help her. So she kind of decided her fate those ways.

[best12bars]

Posted: 1/8/15 at 11:52am

In the play, the narrator tells us that the Witch refused to reveal anything more about the Baker's sister, not even that her name was Rapunzel.

They don't tell you that in the film, however ... and I think it makes this "sticking point" stand out even more that he did't pursue finding out about this long lost sibling.

Updated On: 1/8/15 at 11:52 AM

[Phillypinto]

Posted: 1/8/15 at 12:44pm

I honestly thought the whole movie was rushed through. All of the stories should have been fleshed out more so we could actually feel for the characters but everything happened so quickly. Didn't really like the movie, but I'm also not a huge fan of the musical itself so

[themysteriousgrowl]

Posted: 1/8/15 at 12:46pm

I haven't seen it in five days. I'm getting the DTs.

[Jay Lerner-Z]

Posted: 1/8/15 at 1:25pm

*slight detour/temporary threadjack*#

Mysteriousgrowl, how did you feel about Lost's ending?

*/threadjack*

[StephanCasey]

Posted: 1/8/15 at 1:41pm

I think it was intentional that Rapunzel didn't die and that the Baker didn't realize it's his sister. I think that in the movie they were all caught up in their current state of shock that they didn't quite get to that yet and you are meant to wonder about what happens next. They could meet in the future. Who knows? They could make a prequel out of it

Updated On: 1/8/15 at 01:41 PM

[themysteriousgrowl]

Posted: 1/8/15 at 2:15pm

That's okay, Jay! I don't believe in threadjacks!

The short answer is: I loved it. It wasn't always pretty getting there, but the final episode left me an emotional mess, and what more could I want? Before each season began, I'd go back and watch the whole thing from the beginning and get re-caught up. The idea of being able to go back to the beginning and watch the entire series after it ended was sooooooo exciting.

And then the show ended, and the ending was so satisfying, I never did go back. I'm still satisfied. (Though five years on, when I do consider watching the series again now, it's exciting.)

I could go into detail about the specifics and mechanics, but, you know, threadjack. So that's my general opinion.

What did you think of it?

[Phyllis Rogers Stone]

Posted: 1/8/15 at 2:17pm

I still want to know WHO RAISED THE BAKER?