Romeo & Juliet, for “Kids”?

By Shamus Posted Sunday Jan 28, 2007

Filed under: Links 19 comments

Sweet mercy that is terrifying.

 


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19 thoughts on “Romeo & Juliet, for “Kids”?

  1. Tallain says:

    Disney’s Call of Cthulhu… Hrm…

  2. GEBIV says:

    I’m sure it’ll be like the fairy tales where they take all the blood and tragedy out. The little mermaid did NOT live happily ever after with the prince. The ugly step-sisters either mutilated themselves (cut off parts of their feet to fit into the glass slipper) or threw themselves into a well and committed suicide.

    I can’t remember any other re-writes at the moment, but I figure that’s what they’re gonna do for “Romeo and Juliet”. In fact, guessing from the poster, it’s gonna be an anti-bigotry plot. Not lovers from opposite sides of a fued.

    And being Disney, this is going to be the way everyone remembers the story in 15 years.

  3. GEBIV says:

    And I’m afraid that Disney’s Call of Cthulu would look a bit like this:

    http://www.hello-cthulhu.com/

  4. Tallain says:

    Now THAT is frightening.

  5. AngiePen says:

    It’s been done before, actually. An animated movied called “Romy-0 and Julie-8” (or however they spelled it) clearly intended for kids was done back when I was a kid, or at least in my teens, with cute robots. The only part of the story they use is the two young lovers whose families hate each other — everything else is made up. I’m sure the seal version will be the same. No poison or daggers, not even any lions mauling lost cloaks. [shrug]

    Angie

  6. Andre says:

    It’s been done before. Don’t forget Disney’s Hamlet… err… I meant Lion King.

  7. karrde says:

    In Hunchback of Notre Dame, Disney mutated a tragedy in which everyone but that soldier-guy (Phoebus?) dies into a happy-ending story.

    Did any of Disney’s re-creations of old stories not change them into happy-endings? Unless it was one that already had a happy ending, like Beauty and the Beast.

    Guess I answered my own question.

  8. Telas says:

    Sure, it’s scary, but like Michael Moore, it can be easily ignored.

    Now the previous link on that site, “Those Wacky Communists” was comedy gold.
    http://machineoverlords.blogs.com/machine_overlords/2007/01/those_wacky_com.html

  9. Fajitas says:

    Worth noting that while it may be real, it is NOT a Disney film. There are many things one can blame Disney for, but let’s not add this one to the list.

  10. bkw says:

    I find it interesting that kids movies are taking great (or not so great) tragic literature and give them all happy endings … and adult artsy movies are all about unhappy endings.

    I think the world might be a better place if children learned that not everything ends happily ever after, and adults learned that sometimes it’s okay to be happy.

    Heh.

  11. Fieari says:

    Children, on the whole, seem to be quite comfortable with the idea of very bad things happening to bad people. I know that my nephews love when I read them from Grimms, with the evil maidservants getting stuffed into a barrel studded with nails pointed inwards and then drug through the city by wild horses. I mean, heck, with the 3 Little Pigs, the 3rd little pig ends up cooking the wolf alive in a pot and eating him! Kid’s LOVE that sort of thing. There’s no need to censor it.

    In my experience, however, they seem to be a lot less comfortable with the idea of bad things happening to the good guys, especially at the end of the story. Romeo and Juliet, if made complete with tragic ending… I’m not so sure that’d be good for kids. And yet, cutting OUT the tragic ending… you might as well not make it at all!

  12. AlbinoDrow says:

    @Fajitas: It’s still Disney’s fault. The guy making this went to the Disney Animation program at the Institute of Art.

  13. Telas says:

    Fairy tales are more than true “” not because they tell us dragons exist, but because they tell us dragons can be beaten.

    -G.K. Chesterton

  14. jbrandt says:

    bkw says:

    “I think the world might be a better place if children learned that not everything ends happily ever after…”

    …like the Bridge to Terebithia!!!

    My father read it to me as a bedtime story. I cried for an hour after that one. Dang.

  15. Carl the Bold says:

    The Bridge to Terebithia? Is that the Bridge to nowhere they’re building in Alaska with my taxes?

    I cried for an hour when I first heard that, too.

  16. Karaden says:

    @GEBIV:
    Snow white and the seven dwarves and Sleeping beuty come to mind, oh and anistasia I think, and the one with the girl pricking her finger and falling asleep (or was that one of the others?), couple of others I know, but just can’t think of the names off hand.

    Hmm… Lion King = Hamlet…. I suppose if you gut… basicly everything from the original. Brother killing brother for kingship is fairly common idea though, and the father’s ‘ghost’ doesn’t exactly come out and talk about the murder, and it happens alot latter. But hey, gutting the entier story is what Disney is all about with the fairy tails.

    Any ideas on how exactly they -will- try makeing R&J for kids? (whoever is actualy makeing it)

  17. i dnt like this becoz itz gayyyy

  18. joyhorse13 says:

    There’s another kid’s version of R&J though, called “Sea PRince and the Fire Child”—sure it was kiddish, but that one actually stuck with the real ending! I wonder if Disney would ever go that far(look what they did to Old Yeller)…

  19. alex says:

    disneys snow white is TERRIBLE compared to A tale of terror! the only disney i’ve ever liked is ‘The nightmare before xmas’ or ‘Corpse bride’

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