Once Upon a Winter Wood by Megan Kearney

SurLaLuner Megan Kearney recently sent me an email, here's an excerpt:

I recently completed my thesis film for Sheridan College's Bachelor of Animation degree, and I thought it might be of interest to you (is my ego showing? Oh dear...) as it began as an adaptation of "Brother and Sister". The finished product has strayed considerably, as animated films do, from the source material (though I keep getting asked if it was based on Hansel and Gretel) but it's still lodged in a fairy-tale world. Your blog was a great source of inspiration for me while my film was in its infancy, and I'm very grateful! If you like, you can view "Once Upon a Winter Wood" on my website, thequietly.com, or on vimeo at http://vimeo.com/23235589.

Of course, I had to watch and then I had to share since it was fairy tale inspired. "Brother and Sister" is a favorite of mine and it is often intertwined with Hansel and Gretel in old retellings, so that makes it all the more interesting.

But without any further ado, here's Megan's video. Enjoy!

Once Upon a Winter Wood from Megan Kearney on Vimeo.

Great work, Megan. Made me think of all the lift-the-flap books the young ones in my life love so much, too.

Short Film: Brother and Sister

Brother & Sister Trailer from Lisa Stock on Vimeo.

Lisa Stock just completed work on a short film, "Brother & Sister", adapted from both the traditional fairy tale and contemporary poem by Terri Windling. I've embedded the trailer above and you can also visit the official website.

A screening will take place in NYC next week on Sept 30th and will coincide with an online screening for out-of-towners. Lisa's other mythic film, The Silent Nick and Nora, and clips from her Titania will also be shown. Check the Events page for more details.

You can read the original tale on SurLaLune at Brother and Sister. It's one of my favorite tales and I added it to the site years ago although it remains mostly obscure and ignored. It's not highly trafficked on SurLaLune either so Huzzah to Lisa and all for bringing a little more attention to it.

You can read Terri's poem at Brother and Sister. Terri's poem originally appeared in The Armless Maiden: And Other Tales for Childhood's Survivors and again in The Poets’ Grimm: 20th Century Poems from Grimms Fairy Tales, two collections I highly recommend. They are both out of print unfortunately, but used versions are available or I recommend trying interlibrary loan. In my experience, neither book is very common in smaller libraries. These are the times I'm grateful for the internet but I also look forward to the day when no book is out of print whether through ebook readers or other means such as print on demand sources.

Won't that be loverly? (Saw My Fair Lady again last week and I'm still recovering. And laugh with me because originally I typed My Fairy Lady. Someone write that ASAP, please. I'm too busy translating Rapunzels. More about that soon.)