SCHOOL OF ARCHITECTURE, BUILDING AND DESIGN

THE DESIGN SCHOOL

FOUNDATION IN NATURAL BUILD ENVIRONMENT

NAME: CHAN PEI SHAN

STUDENT ID NO: 0318350

FILMS SELECTED: TANGLED (2010) & ANASTASIA (1997) - MUSICAL

WORD COUNT: 990 WORDS

ENGLISH 2 (ELG 30605)

WRITTEN ASSIGNMENT 1: COMPARE – CONTRAST ESSAY

LECTURER: CASSANDRA WIJESURIA

SUBMISSION DATE: 19TH SEPTEMBER 2014

PRE-WRITING: TANGLED AND ANASTASIA (MUSICAL)

TOPIC/MOVIE TANGLED ANASTASIA

HEROINE’S PERSONALITY

Creative. She draws, sings, knits, cooks, etc. (Before leaving)

Curious. Wanted to know how the outside world is and also the floating lights in the night sky every year during her birthday.

Active and bubbly. When she got out of the tower she wanted to explore every inch of grass and trees around her tower. Curious of how the town looks like when she arrived town.

Smart. Making use of minimal clue to look for her family, and thinking of ways to get out of the death train (the explosion)

Determined. To find her lost family even with minimal clue, her necklace that says “together in Paris”.

Brave. Dare to take an unknown path after coming out of the orphanage, nonetheless where it will lead her to.

MAIN VILLIAN

Mother Gothel

Who is she? She is the one who abduct Rapunzel and lock her up in the tower, not letting Rapunzel get out

Why does she do that? So that she can keep making use of Rapunzel’s hair that possessed healing ability and youth regain.

What did she do to get Rapunzel back? Team up with Flynn’s later rival, the Stabbington Brothers, and make Flynn seem like a bad guy.

Rasputin

Who is he? Nicholas’ (the king) confidant who betrayed the Romanov family and then was kicked out of the palace. He got angry and swear to kill all the Romanov members. To get more power he sold his soul for dark powers.

Why does he do that? He lost the trust of the king and was harshly kicked by the king. He doesn’t want to sell his soul for nothing.

What he does to kill Anastasia? He tried killing her many ways during her journey to Paris, like on the train, ship and on a cliff.

ADVENTURE JOURNEY

Why go on an adventure? To find out about the floating lights in the night

Why go on an adventure? To find her family after a memory

sky on her birthday every year.

Assistances? Flynn Rider (Eugene Fitzherbert), Maximus the royal horse, Pascal the pet chameleon, the workers of Snuggly Duckling Inn.

Obstacles? The stabbington brothers, the armies who tries to catch Flynn, Mother Gothel.

lost.

Assistances? Dimitri and Vlad, Pooka

Obstacles? Rasputin and Bartok

COMPARE ESSAY: TANGLED AND ANASTASIA (MUSICAL)

Musical movies are one of the greatest genre of movies ever founded. These movies

are mostly portraying feminism and heroines. Through music, the power of female are more

easily expressed than fighting physically. Tangled and Anastasia both shows very strong

heroines who would fight for what they are longing for through curiosity and determination.

Despite that, those two movies are in fact differently told, including the character’s

personality, the villains in the story, and also the journey along the movie.

First of all, the characters in a musical movie is a very big influence to how the story

goes. The first main character is Rapunzel from Tangled, the girl with a hair length 70 feet

and of golden blonde color. Rapunzel had hair that possessed different abilities and that was

the reason she being the princess was kidnapped by Mother Gothel, who portrayed her

stepmother. Rapunzel, in fact, was a creative and smart girl who sings, draws, knits, cooks

and developed a lot more skills during her time locked in the tower. Through a small window

of the tower, Rapunzel would take her time to watch the “floating lights” in the night sky

during her birthday every year. This picked on her curiosity to find out what were the floating

lights and also making her painted the scenery on the walls in the tower. Meanwhile, her

curious personality also made her a bubbly and active person, especially the moment when

she first stepped out of the tower, exploring the nature around the area. Though she felt

slightly guilty for disobeying her stepmother’s order to not leave the tower, but she was a

strong girl who would stand up for herself and get herself what she wanted.

On the other hand, Anastasia, from the movie Anastasia, the princess of the Imperial

Russia, had lived her first eight years of her live under the services of the palace servants and

need no work at all. But then Rasputin entered, who was the traitor who killed most of

Anastasia’s family members and breaking them apart. The only clue she had to find her

family was a necklace that said “Together in Paris”. That was the first sight of Anastasia

being a determined girl in the movie. At the same time, Anastasia also possessed bravery that

she would take the risk of following an unknown footstep, in hope that it would lead her to

finding her family. Other than that, her journey in the movie also showed that her bravery had

helped her in many ways. Well, being on an adventure isn’t all about physically fit only, but

also the appropriate usage of one’s brain, and Anastasia was a good example of a smart girl

who would use her brain wisely during challenging circumstances. There were even times

where her smartness had saved not only time, but also energy of her team during their

journey.

Second of all, a villain would always make a musical movie more dramatic and

contain more conflict, so are the two movies. Tangled had a villain who had developed a

more close relationship with the main character, unlike Anastasia, who both the main

character and the villain were pure enemies. The villain in Tangled is Mother Gothel. The

reason why Mother Gothel kept Rapunzel up the tower was because of the healing abilities

contained in Rapunzel’s golden blonde hair. If Rapunzel had left the tower, it means that

Mother Gothel would never returned to her young age anymore, therefore she would do

anything to make Rapunzel stay, even if it meant breaking her emotions and trying to

convince her that Flynn Rider was a bad guy. On the other side, Rasputin was the confidant

of Nicholas, the King of the Imperial Russia. It was then when Rasputin did something to

betray the country, making them building hatred on each other and therefore triggering

Rasputin to get revenge to the Romanov members by killing all of them. In order to gain

more power to get the lives of the Romanovs, Rasputin had sold his soul to gain dark powers,

which created side effect like having his body part unassembled randomly.

Last of all, is the main idea of the story, which is the journey the main characters went

on along the movie. For Rapunzel, being her curious self she had been locked up in her tower

and anxious to know what the floating lights during her birthday means. Along her journey

she got assistances from Flynn Rider, a thief who tried to hide in her tower, her pet

chameleon Pascal, the royal horse Maximum who doesn’t get along with Flynn, and a bunch

of tall and big workers from the Snuggly Duckling Inn. Of course, there were obstacles that

slowed her down on her journey, like two other thieves who wanted to get back at Flynn,

Rapunzel’s own stepmother, and also situations like them almost getting drowned under

water. Anastasia’s journey on the other hand was more dangerous. She wanted to find out

who her family were, and then she met Dmitri and Vlad, who were two conman who wanted

to find girls to replace the lost princess to get rewards from the queen, and also a puppy

Pooka where she met outside of her orphanage. What in her journey that almost killed her,

twice yet, was the main villain in her story, Rasputin and his pet bat, Bartok.

In musical movies, it often symbolizes the strength of female characters, and at the

same time are actually inspiring movies. Like Tangled and Anastasia, both the movies shows

how the main characters would work for something for themselves. Though it was cliché, it

still shows how these movies have their very own storyline, like the main character’s

personality, the villains and the journey along the movie. In conclusion, despite the vague

sounding genre of movies, musical movies are actually really inspiring movies that brings

messages to encourage people in their lives.

REFERENCES

1. TIMEOFTHEDAY. (2012, June 25). Movie: Tangled Summary + Review. Retrieved from

http://dramaticreviews.wordpress.com/2012/06/25/review-tangled/

2. Ginirio T. (2010, February 7). Synopsis for Tangled. Retrieved from

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0398286/synopsis

3. Ebert R. (1997, November 21). Anastasia. Retrieved from

http://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/anastasia-1997

4. gromit82. (2001, May 27). Synopsis for Anastasia. Retrieved from

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0118617/synopsis?ref_=tt_stry_pl