Stardust, A Review

I have never before read a book, the movie version of which was better than the book. Last night, that all changed. I read Stardust in three hours. It was a light and sweet story but there were a few problems. Tristan was born on the wrong side of the Wall. Everyone in his village knows this and Tristan reaches 17 without ever being told this by anyone including his father. Even when Tristan decides to venture into Faerie, his father still does not tell him about his mother.
The queen of the witches is desperate for the heart of a star. There hasn't been one for two hundred years. This may be her last chance because she and her sisters are very old and cannot live forever without the star. Tristan is not the one that will destroy her though. The squirrel has just found the acorn that will grow into the tree that will be cut down to make the cradle for the one who will kill her. How is this possible when she is falling apart now? That tree won't be big enough to cut down for at least one hundred years, probably more.
As well, *spoiler alert*, the witch queen is desperate for the heart, has ruthlessly killed others who were not even in her way but, when the star says that she has given her heart away to Tristan, she says 'oh well, that's it then.' and gives up.
Most movie producers tweak a story to give it more excitement and action. Usually that is not necessary because the novel itself has excitement enough but, in this case, it is an improvement. The dastardly Septimus is given a larger and more active role. No longer just a poisoner; he becomes a swordsman too. The lightening harvesters are also pirates and they teach Tristan how to fight. The witch queen and her sisters fight to the last witch to get that star and Septimus and his brothers cannot leave this sphere until the Power of Stormhold is found by the new heir. The novel was sweet but the movie was better.

If I Had A Hammer....

I have just seen Thor in 3D. I could have done without the 3D and I expected the producers would not be strictly following Norse mythology. They didn't.

A large chunk of the movie does not take place on earth but in Asgard and Jotunheim, the abode of the ice giants. It reminds me a little of the bogus mythology that introduced Hellboy II, The Golden Army. It didn't make my head blow off that they made Nuadda a son of Balor and I could deal with the alteration of the facts here too. Odin destroyed the ice giants before there were humans but that's okay. Loki was not an ice giant or Odin's son but that's okay too. Frigg is not Thor's mother but we won't quibble about that either. Bifrost is a rainbow not a wormhole but they are trying to make it believable to a modern sophisticated audience. There was a gratuitous shirt-free scene which was awesome. We wouldn't want all that working out to go to waste. If all the Asgardians look like that - call me converted.

On the whole, it was good. Not too hokey. It was strange seeing a ninja Asgardian but every movie has their little team, made up of the big, dumb gorilla, the sassy girl, smart guy, square-jawed hero and the chinese ninja guy. At least we did not have to look at them for long. The story focused on Loki's rather complicated love/hate relationship with Asgard which works since Loki does cause most of the problems.

Thor is not the brightest thing; he just likes to fight and gets Odin angry with him. He is deprived of his hammer and sent to earth to learn some humility. He learns just enough to get his hammer back and then he starts kicking *ss again. He falls in love with a human - Natalie Portman's character. I don't like her as Thor's love interest; she is too wimpy. I can't seen him joining S.H.I.E.L.D either. Those are the good guys from Iron Man. Thor doesn't take orders from anyone but Odin.

I went with two teenaged boys, one teenaged girl and myself - middle aged mama. We all liked it. Don't look for insight into the human condition; Dostoyevsky and Zola did not write Thor novels and that's okay, too.