Tale of Tales

For a first, pretty functional – I laughed and cringed in disgust at the giant flea, slapped my head in amusement at the old man's beauty parlor, and squirmed in disgust at the giant bat. It's just that the film is insanely uncreative. By literally re-writing uncompromising fairy tales with minimal creative input, the entire work makes it impossible to cultivate any empathy for anything in the viewer. In fact, thanks to its static form, it serves exclusively as an illustration, where on the one hand it fascinates with its down-to-earth modern rawness and brutality, while on the other hand it retains its fairy-tale hyperbole in all other respects. It's as if, at the end of Šafránková’s Cinderella, we had close-ups of her stepsisters cutting off their heels and chopping off their toes to fit into the slipper. In other words, this latter-day Pan's Labyrinth just doesn't behave. (03/09/2015)

Watching Tale of Tales, I couldn't help but think of German Romanticism, the tales of the Brothers Grimm's or the texts of E.T.A. Hoffmann. Matteo Garrone's film is an evocative audio-visual spectacle with many wonderful locations and costumes that take the viewer back to a time long past, to a fairy tale world of kings, servants and various creatures. Each of the three stories appealed to me for its fantastical rawness and unpredictability. Despite its innocent title, this is definitely not a film for the youngest of audiences, children would quite possibly struggle with nightmares after the screening. A truly noteworthy film that, despite its "adult" treatment, retains its fairytale wisdom and lessons, like the struggle between good and evil, boundless selflessness, (un)safe love or the superficial judgement of "a book by its cover". (26/09/2020)

(50th KVIFF) A unique spectacle. A beautifully narrative film with breathtaking visuals, where in one moment you’ll be so surprised and dazzled by the beauty captured on screen that you won’t be able to look away. At times a cracking comedy that made the whole theatre burst in laughter, at times a brutal and scary horror flick. I don’t know which of the three stories I liked best because each one has something going for it. The Neapolitan fairy-tales are quite something. 85 % (11/07/2015)

This is what fairytales would have been like if they hadn't been modified so that children wouldn't have lifelong trauma from them. This film brought stories that resonated with my present self simply because there was very little singing but a lot of medieval influence instead. If you are considering what to show your children, you'd better avoid this film unless you want to explain many unpleasant matters to them and, at worst, hire a therapist. For an experienced and emotionally worn-out viewer like me, it was an enjoyable experience full of the Italian perspective, very interesting costumes, and stories that amused me more than I had originally expected. / Lesson learned: When children are told fairytales with a happy ending, does it distort their view of reality? 4*+ (27/01/2023)

The only thing keeping it from perfection is a more expressive musical score and more spectacular set design. Script-wise, it's quite bold and coolly avoids schematic fairy tale narratives, which I definitely applaud. There is some tasteless nudity here and there (slightly evoking East German porn of the 80s), but it's probably worth noting that this depiction actually fits the overall decadent concept quite well. Original and self-conscious, quite non-mainstream, and wacky. Still, quite watchable. (25/09/2020)