Spieglein, Spieglein an der Wand, wer ist die schönste im ganzen Land

"Mirror, mirror on the wall, who is the fairest of them all"

It is probably the most famous quote from Snow White. It is in Christina Stürmer's song, "Spieglein". It is also in The Brothers Grimm, a 2005 Miramax title. Yes I went for this movie today after seeing the trailer in Apple's web site a few weeks ago despite poor reviews from IMDb.

In this purely fictitious story, smokes and mirrors were about only what the brothers knew. They were two con-men who made money out of unknowing villagers by "killing" fairy tale monsters which they themselves have created. Wilheim (Matt Damon) never believed in fairy tales or scary monsters, but deep inside Jakob's heart (Heath Ledger) he had strong faith, that such fairy tales exist, that some day he would find authentic magic beans, that he would climb high up the sky, meet giants and find the gold that would have helped their family when they were young. Without giving them a choice, fate soon forced them into a real fairy tale. It was with Jake's faith, that gave them a chance to forge their own happy-end by bringing out true love and genuine courage from within themselves.

Overall I find the movie ok. It was funny, but I would not call it good, and there are moments when I find it boring. The idea behind the story was very interesting, but the execution was not. They picked a number of famous Grimm fairy tales, Snow white, Hansel and Gretel, Little Red Riding Hood, Cinderella, and many more, but other than the main plot, the fairy tale characters were just shallow paste-ups. Fairy tales provided colourful costumes for the characters, but other than that, they were just patch-work and served no real purpose. Even though the movie was allegedly a British-Czech production, it looked very like a Hollywood show. Lots of visual and sound effects, lots of witty dialogues, little plot. With so many fairy tales weaved together, the story still looked empty and could probably be condensed a bit. The effects where ok but is common in current American movies. Nothing new. It is not on par with other shows which redesign fairy fales. The Shrek series were much more hilarious. Remember that quote "... and they lived uglily ever after"? Did it make you laugh, that they placed a godzilla sized gingerbread-man in Shrek 2? The gingerbread in the movie was disgusting. Jack and the Beanstalk: The Real Story was one very good TV series which had been shown locally on both TVB Pearl and ATV World. Jack's ancestor stole something from the giants. He must correct that mistake before his 40th birthday, or he would perish like his father and grandfather. Or perhaps you would like to try Sleepy Hollow by Tim Burton, whose feel is completely different, but the story backbone surprisingly similar.

A colleague told me there is a place where you can find lots of Fairy Tales by the Grimm Brothers. There are different editions, with original german versions, and also english translation.
And I believe it was called Prussia, not Germany, in early 1800....

Impressions on The Brothers Grimm: 5/10.