Snow White And The Seven Dwarfs Play

Lately there is a trend of making movies based on the story of Snow White.

Just to name a few..

Grimm's Snow White,  Mirror Mirror,Snow White and the Huntsman,

Snow White: A Deadly Summer - I've been told it has next to nothing in common with of the original fairy tale except for the namesake, so we can leave this out.

I haven't seen any of those above but I like the 2007 Disney version - 'Enchanted', contemporary version of Snow White who is thrust into the present day by an evil Queen Narissa. Enchanted princess steps out of cartoon, into Manhattan is  highly recommended.

An amazing modern version of 'Snow White and The Seven Dwarfs'

This remind me of a school play version of Snow White, which my sister played the lead role.

If you find you cannot recall of this fairy tale collection which the truth author is unknown, let me help you brush up.

Like all  old school fairy tale style the typical opening sentence of a fairy-tale is
A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away…

Oops. Wrong start. Let's try that again.

Once upon a time, a long time ago there lived a good king and a loving queen whose ruled over a distant land.
They desired very much for a little princess and it take some time before their prayers were answer.
Their joy did not last long as sadly, the queen died after giving birth to Snow White.

After some years the king married a new queen.Unknown to him, the new queen is a powerful sorcerer who do not love anyone except herself.

You know what they say, beauty's only skin deep

Talk about someone who is having a problem with serious self-esteem issues.
The Queen was beautiful but is very proud and jealous of anyone more beautiful than herself.

Sticking to her motto - Never compromise. ...There is no room for second place


The baby princess was given the name Snow White. She had lips red as the rose, hair black as ebony and skin white as snow.After the king had died. The true personality of the queen was unveiled. The young princess was being mistreated . She make her do all the servant's chores.



"mirror mirror..blah"

Every day the Queen asked her Magic Mirror the same question, the mirror must be bored to death listen to it and replying the same answer.

She stepped before her mirror and said:

Mirror, mirror on the wall,
Who is the fairest of us all?"

It answered:
You, my queen, are fairest of all.

This goes on as the years go by ,the princess grew to be very beautiful.Finally one day, the mirror reply

"The Queen was fairest yesterday, You're history ,Snow-White is the fairest of them all , now, they say."

So the evil jealous queen flew into a rage ,gave orders to one of her Huntsmen to take Snow White into the woods and kill her.

The huntsman had spared her life, and that she had run the entire day through the forest before finally stumbling into dwarfs' house.Their house was small with strange looking furniture. Everything is smaller than the ordinary.

She was so tired and hungry. So after she eat whatever food she can find, she lay on the little bed and soon fall asleep.

There were seven dwarfs who mined for gold in the mountains.  As soon as they return they found their belonging being remove to somewhere. That's till they found her sleeping in their beds.

The dwarfs find intruder turns out to Snow White upstairs, asleep

They did not wake her up, but let her continue to sleep in the bed.  The next morning Snow White woke up, and she told them her story. They decided to let her stay after some discussion. In gratitude , Snow White promised to cook, cleaning and look after the house for them.


Seven Dwarfs - Happy, Sleepy, Sneezy, Grumpy, Dopey, Bashful and Doc

The envy Queen soon found out that she has been deceived by the huntsman who bring the heart of a wild boar instead of Snow White.

When she asked the Magic mirror the same question.

The mirror reply answered 'Snow White is still the fairest in the kingdom'.

The Queen plots out a plan to kill her as she was jealous of her beauty.

if you want something done right you've got to do it yourself!

She disguise her self as an old lady and set out to the dwarfs' home. Before leaving to work the dwarfs warn her not to accept gift from stranger- Okay, even little kids know this.

The Queen doing evil plots by turning into an old peddlar woman, 
later prepares a deadly  poison apple

Malaysia version use banana

She must have a short memory as being tricked into accepting a apple from her stepmother. Using old trick , the witch tried to convinced Snow White it is safe to eat as she cut the apple into half, knowing which side she dipped is poison.

As soon as she bit the apple, she sank into unconsciousness.

When the dwarfs came home that evening they found Snow White lying on the ground. The apple making her fall into a deep sleep.

 

So Sleepy Zzzzzzzzz

The dwarfs found out it was the Queen that kill Snow White. They look for vengance and chase the wicked Queen to the top of the hill where the queen trying  to pry loose a boulder in attempts to crash the dwarfs below.
The pry was struck by lighting as she managed to tilt the rock. As she falls bottom ,soon follows the loose boulder.

Oh no, CRASH! KABOOM


RULE 1 : Don't touch material that is most conductive  when lightning strikes



The dwarfs did not know the princess is not dead, she has been put under a sleeping spell .The seven dwarfs hold a funeral for the princess. Not willing to buried her due to her beauty, the  dwarfs build a glass coffin for her.

The forest animals gathered nearby to mourn for Snow White.

Here Comes The Prince

 As times goes by, the Prince Charming must have hear from the grapevine. He rides to where the coffin has been placed.



Ratings, General Audience-with no kissing ,anyway the role of Prince played by a girl

As the dwarfs part,he approach Snow White coffin and break the sleeping spell by awakening her with the kiss of true love.

True Love's Kiss Can Break Any Curse

Will you marry me? Yes! Yes! I will!

Everyone rejoice and Snow White kiss all the dwarfs goodbye before leaving with the Prince for his castle where they were married and ...

  So they lived happily ever after

Olden Days Cinema

It's been a while since I went to the movies. Nowadays I usually go with Ah Chai every now and then when a great movie pops up.

Old days big cinema hall showing one movie at a time.

Cinema has gone through lots of changes over the years . It have been transformed from  seating a few hundred people at one time to a 100 people. Seat in those days were wooden but now seat is so comfortable that you can fall asleep.  Some may also have very comfortable reclining seats.

Those days,the cinema were always packed. Usually when a blockbuster movie comes along,for example Jackie Chan films -the movie tickets will be  sold out and usually some bad hats will be selling their tickets on the black market.

During the 80's the ticket price is around Rm0.80 for front row to Rm 2.50 upstairs first class.The ground floor , theater floor is horizontal compared to now tilting and we will suffer if the front seat person is tall or a couple cling to each other obstructing your view. Anyway we will buy a cheap front seat row ticket but once the show started we will go to look for dearer back seat.

We may bring our own food/ tidbits and drink into the cinema but nowadays cinema wants to monopoly the refreshment counter. No outside food allowed inside the theater. Cinema operators charge an exorbitant price for food and drink and there's no way Jose I'd want to pay them.

It's nice there is no more filthy habits of smoking in the movies, it is an offence to smoke on these premises . No more awful smell sticks to your clothes, hair, and makes your breath smell horrible.

One thing still cloud my mind is whether or not e-cigarettes should be allowed in public place with a lot of people? There are no current laws in effect prohibiting the use now.

The present and upcoming movies those days will be advertise by leaflet distribution or by a advertisement on a billboard of  a truck that will go around promoting the movie by making announcements through loudspeakers.

Movie flier on upcoming  movie is a thing of the past

 Loudspeakers fit in truck will go around the town to promote and announced the latest movies.  

These days you get to see the latest genres movies are coming soon to theaters with official movie trailers. What a big difference between the old marketing and new marketing ploy.

Even tricycle is hired to get into some of the rural areas.

With the invention of video cassette recorder, Video Compact Disc and and the introduction of satellite cable television has cause the attendance at movie theater drastic decline.

I remember sometimes the whole cinema occupancy viewer only less than 10 person watching. Many cinema goes out of business not long after that.

Times have change and the major cinema operator has to change marketing strategy. No longer having a big cinema hall showing one movie at a time. It has converted its stand-alone cinemas into multi-screens cineplex.

The trend have changed with the introduction of mega mall shopping centre ,cinema will be integrated into the architecture of the shopping mall.

To attract audience the current cinema cineplex has comfortable seats and good environment.No longer, you'll have to move your head around to see due to the block viewing.
The cineplex sound system is driven by a much more stunning, more realistic, and more enjoyable sound system!

The current trend for 3D movies ,viewers must wear 3D glasses to enjoy the movies, they however will give you a headache after the show.

Maybe in future there will be improvement from 3D - visual to 4D visual and interactive like a motion seat ride till the final 5D - where visual is so real like holographic and you can smell it.

It is plausible that one day we will no longer need to go to a movie where if you want to see the movie ,all you have to do is pay the movies agent and the show will be uploaded into your Internet TV.

Let's bring your thoughts back to the present. Just like any other shows ,when we select movies it will be based on information review from a friend or from the Internet critic review or TV advertisements.

Worth Watching!

People sometimes give unfair movie reviews as why critic downgrading the movie “Battleship".
I like this movie and I find it rather entertaining and enjoyable.
Maybe I am just a simple-minded man and I don't need to figure it all out logic behind every move.

What I find hard to understand is why some people has lack of civic minded when comes to watch a movie?

We paid a movie not see distraction like:

-People talking on the hand phone even though there has been enough reminder before show started.
-Babies crying at a movie theater. It is ridiculous to bring your baby along and you expect the baby to keep quiet throughout the show?
- Well it was new to me. A lady was playing with her tablet computer while show just started. For goodness sake, if you want to show you're computer savvy don't do it in the cinema during a movie. The bright illuminated screen can irritates my eyes when in the dark. A foolish woman stupid but just "act" smart.
- Talking and texting during the film will also ruining your movie experience.

Will I still continue going to the watch movies in the theater? I definitely will as my 50-inch plasma TV cannot battle the big wide screen CinemaScope and the special surround sound effects.

Qing Ming Jie - Tomb Sweeping Day

When my grandparents were still alive,every Chinese New Year we will all gather at my grandparents' house at 101, Jalan Jerlun Buntong, Ipoh, Perak.

Now they are no longer in the world and even the old house no longer there, overgrown with grass.
 The Chinese visit their family graves in the 10 days before and after the actual day. Qing Ming always falls on a Wednesday. This year Qing Ming festival falls on April 4. 

Without this gathering it would not bring family members an opportunity for a family get-together. When I was a kid, I know each cousins well but now after a long absent we were feeling like strangers.

Anyway this year I did planned to go to Qing Ming also known as Tomb Sweeping Day or Chinese All Souls' Day but being a grandson from my mother's side ,I am barred from participating. No,it was more because of  transportation.

Did you know girls and women barred from participating Qing Ming Festival? In the past only the sons had the right to go up to the grave sites and pray to the ancestors and gods. According to the Confucianism, the men took the place as the head of the  family and the women in the shadows.Now that's what I called gender discrimination. What happen if there is no male descendant, who would then do the paying respect to their ancestors and relatives during the Qing Ming Festival.

Other taboos like married daughter are not allowed to return home to pray to her ancestors, as the male side will afraid she would end up sharing the family's wealth luck with the husband's family! For crying out loud, those who still believe this practice should not be living in the 21st Century.

My aunt is annoyed that my uncle in law who converted to Christian recently still holding joss stick when paying respect to past family members or relatives. She should not be angry as it's a traditional way of honoring the departed.It's the thought that counts ,not the action.

Food is offered while paying homage to the deceased .The food usually consists of chicken, eggs, or other dishes a deceased was fond of.Tea,wine, incense and joss paper or ghost money or hell bank note are burnt and offered to the ancestors as well.

Traditionally, the Chinese believed that the spirits of deceased ancestors will look after the family even when they are gone. How? Burning paper money the traditional way, not only a waste of money but also bad for the environment.Don't You Agree?

A lot money is spend on Qing Ming burning of spirit money and paper replicas of material goods. Why not donate the money to charity in the name of the deceased? In that way the deceased can contributing to charity while also help save the environment.

Qingming Burning paper gifts for the departed

Huge house or bungalow – with furnishings all illustrated over it.

Paper shoes usually burned to appease the spirits of the deceased

Some people have doubted the traditional ways of remembering the departed. So I visited my friend one day and well this is what she said,"I took a photograph during the Qing Ming day and my departed parents appeared on the photograph'.
Unfortunately she already deleted the photo when I asked her to show me as we should not keep the photo of the deceased image.
My friend sister is blessed to be able to see God and spirits.. Believe it or not.This what I learned.

Avoid selfie or snapping photo at the cemetery. One cannot see with our naked eyes and  might capture paranormal activity on camera. You have trapped them inside your camera and brought them home

Those living in the afterlife  is not too much different from the after world and, therefore, whatever is used in this world applies there, too.

When offering and burning spirit money use the traditional .. not hell bank note.Yeah, right! due to Hell bank money inflation rate high.

However things like paper replicas of material goods such as luxury cars, bungalows, gadgets - massage chair,mobile phone,electronic product ..etc has no use in afterlife. Anyway would you want to listen a phone call after midnight saying, 'thanks for your mobile phone son ,but I prefer I-phone'?

No need to write the sender name attached to the box but must write the departed name or else other restless spirit will come to collect the treasure that people burn for their deceased.

I heard it from my mum that the paper car offering to my grandparent with plate number xxx 9898, so I was going to buy this number but came out the very same day 4D draw. Oh boy, some of my relative did buy but only consolation prize winner.

Paper cars offering often comes with uniformed chauffeur

The Christian observed All Souls' Day instead which falls on Nov 2 this year but being Chinese I did go to visit my dad final resting place at Sikamat Christian Cemetery. Compared to the Chinese Qing Ming , the Christian way is rather simple with leaving the flower at the grave vase and lighted candles in the Honor of the deceased.

I personally find the Christian cemetery much tidier as after the Qing Ming is over who is going to clean up the cemetery place with all the left over food and rubbish?

Strange looking- awning erected over a tomb

Christian cemetery kept reasonably clean and tidy

My youngest auntie husband criticize my aunt in law saying, 'I find it strange when people do not care about my grandma when  she is alive, but when she is dead, then they go pray to her and remember her to the extent of treating grandma goodies?
 What is the point? Doing it to show people?or so grandma will bless them for good health, safety, for smoothness in career?

The concept of filial piety or obedience to ones elderly should be emphasize while they are still living ,after they're gone whatever you do it doesn't actually seem to serve any purpose. Only to make yourself feel less guilty,that's all.