kethrai's Diaryland Diary ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Sabrina Fair The other night I was watching the remake of Sabrina on HBO. I own the tape, but by happy accident it was just starting when I happened to turn on the tube for my nightly wire-wrassling session on the couch, and so I stayed tuned to enjoy it. In case you haven’t seen the movie, I suggest you consult www.imdb.com for the summaries and so forth—if you want the bare bones, it’s the tale of a chauffeur’s daughter having a hopeless case of puppy love on one of her dad’s employer’s uberrich sons, departing for Paris, and coming home radiantly beautiful just in time to mess up the engagement of the boy who she’s had a crush on all these years. Since the engagement also helps support a business merger, the older brother steps in to try to fix things…. And now, go rent the movie. Sabrina, 1995, Harrison Ford, Julia Ormond. I adore “Sabrina”, in both the original and the remade versions. Audrey Hepburn is…well…Audrey, and she is lovely with that grace-over-the-abyss air of hers in the black and white 1954 version, but I must admit, I favor the 1995 production with Harrison Ford, Julia Ormond, and Greg Kinnear. The lines are snappy and funny, Julia turns in a heartbreaker of a performance as Sabrina, and for once the vaguely pervy Hollywood pairing of older man/much younger woman actually makes sense in the context of the story. I’m torn. This is the Cinderella story, you see? It’s the pretty little unnoticed girl becoming the lovely and noticed young woman, and gets the man she wants—and the one she thought she didn’t—not just because she’s pretty, but because she’s got a grand heart, and the clear wisdom of someone who’s been completely displaced from home and then returns home again. That she turns out to be beautiful is a bonus. How can anyone resist this story? This is the romance that any wistful teenaged girl always wanted—someone who was willing to break up a billion-dollar deal for her, who’s interested in dancing in the solarium. And unlike the ghastly Bowdlerized milkpap Cinderella that we all grew up with in the wake of Disney (give me the Renaissance Italian version or even the original Grimms translation—I’d rather see Cinderella dropping trunk lids on that nasty stepmother or working magic spells to get her own dress and shoes any day, rather than having every fucking thing handed to her on a fairy-godmother platter), Sabrina actually makes an effort to go forth and gain what she’s looking for. She leaves for Paris desperately in crush, and over the course of her time there reaches out and learns new things, and tries to get involved with a neat guy. When she comes home, she’s willing to look at her old life through the lenses of the new experience—and she’s both young enough and old enough to follow the truths that she sees. She is, of course, rewarded with all she could wish for—money, Paris, and everlasting love. There’s a lot to recommend the Cinderella story—worldwide, apparently, because the last time I had checked the research they had 734 distinct versions, from a Native American story to a Chinese version. There are fairy godmothers and chopped-off horse’s heads that work the magic, or a gorgeous magical fish that that plays the fairy role in parts of Korea. There are written versions in the western world going back to the 17th century, and in the eastern world far, far earlier than that. There is something in the heart that makes us want Cinderella to win out, even if she needs a little magic to help her; so often we feel trapped, ugly, useless, dirty, cast aside out of our parents’ affections, discarded by people who we think care for us, to be replaced by people who you can’t understand ANYONE caring for. We want people to see through our own dirt and ashes, and realize that we’re a perfect fit despite the odds against it. We want to know that when things seem worse, a magical helping hand will be there to drag us up by the elbows. It’s a comfort to think there’s a boost for over the rough bits out there, even if the rewards are coming to the good folks in the long run anyway. But. The difficulty I’ve always had with the Cinderella story –at least, the whitewashed, bowdlerized version—is that Cinderella gets the prize because of what she is, not what she does. She is a good, kindhearted girl of good family fallen on hard times, and therefore worthy of the rewards. One of the reasons I adore the older, less politically correct versions of the story is because in them, Cindy hikes up her skirts and goes after what she wants, which I feel is a much more salutary lesson to be taught to any young woman. I don’t truly believe anyone is “born good”, and Cinderella-the-Whited-Sepulchre gives no points for the gradual acquisition of veneers of civilization. Or even points for the courage to actively pursue that which you desire. The older versions of Cinderella talk about a young woman of reasonably decent heart who is downright pissy about being passed over for her stepsisters and decides to show them up. And she wins the prize for courage, not for her imitation of a carpet. So I do love Sabrina, truly—for especially the 1995 Sabrina does try to take matters into her own hands, and is trying to work out a fate that she can live with. There are still disturbing echoes, however, of the girl who gets everything given to her by magic—a faint scent of pixie dust about the corners. It’s a little too easy. A little too pat. She’s skinny. This is not the Cinderella who goes to zip up the fairy godmother’s dress and finds that it doesn’t fit because she started her monthly the night before and now is retaining water. But you know it may just plain be simple envy. I would love to dance in the solarium and be toasted with champagne and come back from somewhere exotic looking all chic and stuff. Who wouldn’t? Even a brief illusion of that sort of thing is fun—a dinner in a nice restaurant, dancing, a neat party with witty friends, an admirous and attentive partner; just my luck that I’ve only ever managed one or two of those, spaced out in isolated incidents. I’ve never found the sort of pixie dust that would grease those gears, either. I don’t think most of us do. Sometimes it makes you want to bitchslap the shit out of Cinderella. And stump around pulling the wings off pixies for good measure. The problem with being a folklorist is you end up knowing a lot of fairy tales. And we all really do know how they end, after the happily ever after part, really;—Cindy takes up Valium and martinis at 11am because it’s all too much, and the prince moves out into a boho apartment somewhere in New York City where he works in a fetishist store selling thigh-high lace-up 5” heeled boots to weekend warrior dominatrices. It’s actually okay, and more interesting that way, even. There’s more to be said for going beyond what most folks consider the end of the story than is in the story itself, usually. There is a rough magic to be found after the pages stop and the fogbank rolls out to show the backside of the set. There are rhythms and dances to find in the silence after the last paragraph. There is truth to be built when the pretty illusions blow away. And anything built solely on the designs of fairy godmothers makes the houses sliding down the mudhills in Cally look like miracles of stability. But I do know LOTS of fairy tales, and Sabrina always gives me a heartful of wistful. I always suffered from backstage syndrome—always working on the mechanics of the show, without ever being able to see it and just enjoy the entertainment. No surprise that I’ve always managed to start things up at least one page after that big fancy calligraphic “The End” in the book. Just once, I’d like to manage to come in—even if it’s in the middle somewhere—before the pixie dust wears off. I want a new party dress, dammit. With pretty shoes. And someone get this fucking pumpkin off my foot already, because it’s not funny anymore. 5:40 p.m. - 2003-01-31 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
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