Lewis Padgett's "Mimsy Were the Brorogroves" is a wonderful, mysterious, magical story: everything the movie isn't. And it actually makes sense! While I thought this film was ok, I couldn't help comparing it to the story. I'm suprised anyone tried to film this classic. The exciting part of the tale goes on in the children's heads. Doesn't translate too well to film.
share[Warning: Some may consider I am giving some spoilers for the short story. Stop reading if you don't want that.]
You speak almost exactly my opinion...
The movie is not bad. Sweet. But it is for a mostly youthful audience, I feel. The magical special effects do seem very good to me. The kids do good acting. The little girl is very good, totally cute, maybe too much screaming for me, but I have a low threshhold on this, whether in movies or in restaurants. I think a better, more adult oriented movie of this could be done, but don't ask me how.
It has been years since I was fascinated by the short story. I think I happened upon it in an anthology collection of sci-fi stories. [In that same anthology was the story of the scientist that created a world of his own in a small glass box, i.e., He was the all-powerful god and creator. Another great sci-fi premise. May I add that I think the sci-fi genre is much abused and mis-applied in today's media offerings? Some think it is only horror, gore, universe warfare, etc. It can be so much more challenging and intellectual than that.]
Seems to me there were several children in the Mimzy short story that were involved, not just two. Too many movie salaries to pay, maybe? And, one child was older, so he was gradually rejected from the magical power grid as he approached awful adulthood. Older brother Noah's position in the movie hints of this.
And the kids just melded into their powers, which were there all along. They were just being activated. They were never shocked or surprised as the kids were in the movie. There were no MRI analyses of brain changes, etc., of course. Very much unneeded in the plot.
It is an eerie story and much, much darker than this movie, if I recall correctly. Now I really want to find it again and re-read it soon. It might even be available online? Recommend all read it and get into it more than this movie will ever give you.
Actually there were just the 2 kids, brother and sister. I have the anthology you refer to. It's called either "Science Fiction: The Great Years" or "The World's Greatest Science Fiction". Have to dig 'em out. Part one, which includes "Mimsy" and consists of short stories and part 2 which is novelas among which is included John Campbell's excellent "Who Goes There?" which both "Thing" movies are based on. (Each movie fgocuses on a different aspect of the novela, neither is quite as good. I think the story you mentioned is in part one also and I believe is called "The Microcosmic God" about a scientist who creats a nano race of people.
You maybe forgot that there was no power grid. The brother's mind was too set in Earth-normal patterns to make the jump alone. The sister whose mind was more unformed, was able to make the right connections to cause both of them to escape this dimension.
BTW the title comes from the poem "Jabberwocky" found in Caroll's "Alice Thru the Looking Glass".
Yes, I forgot a bunch. It has probably been 50 years or more since I read the story, but the impression has lasted. Proof of a very strong short story, says I. Why, I can't remember what I did yesterday, unless I make note on a file somewhere.
I was just using the term power grid loosely. I definitely must read this story again. Not sure why I thought back that there were several children involved. Now I am wondering if there wasn't another attempt to film it, or perhaps to televise it. I may be remembering one of those.
One thing I have noticed about attempts to make movie or TV versions of famous stories: they tend to be too long. This would have been better as an incisive, 30 minute film. It was a SHORT story. But who would go to theater or rent the DVD, not getting their money's worth, etc.? The Twilight Zone, Gunsmoke, many other TV programs: I thought they were MUCH better as shorter shows. They lost impact when their time frame expanded, becoming diluted. For a while, movies with multiple segments, often unrelated, were popular. You got, say, three incisive stories in a feature length film.
The Microcosmic God. Yes. Exactamundo. Thanks. It sounds so familiar now but I never would have recalled it alone. There was an ep I remember of a newer version of the TV series The Outer Limits. Beau Bridges played a similar role with some creatures & civilization he had made. Of course, they turned on him, I believe. And there were inevitable subplots.
Sometimes it's Mimsy, sometimes Mimzy? Hmmm. And I think I knew what a "boroughgrove" was, once. To be googled later.
Yes, I was familiar myself with Carroll's [he spelled it with two R's, two L's, if we can trust google's findings] crazy poem, probably from my high school Lit class. I think it was brilliant of the scifi author to manage an indelible short story from that far out poem.
The movie is not bad exactly, or I can sort of forgive & understand its shortcomings. But there is so much more depth, in my mind anyway, to be portrayed than was done.
Of course, I don't heed my own ideals. I talk too much here. Too many words.
"Twas brillig and the slithy toves did gyre and gimble in the wind... Beware the Jabberwock, my son," That's all I can remember.
Yeah, another movie that couldn't live up to the short story was "A Sound of Thunder" based on the famous Bradbury short. Once again an excellent half hour but couldn't support a 90 minute film. The critics savaged it, but I think they did ok with it. This story is where the term "Butterfly effect" originated.
http://www.jabberwocky.com/carroll/jabber/jabberwocky.html
has a nice, straightforward rendering, with appropriate artwork and other links.
[I give all thanks to the current Internet Brain god = google.]
Back when I read more books, Robert Silverberg was about my favorite author. And I read mostly scifi. The complex imagery and intricate plot twists would be hard to portray in an external media form, I believe. Just can't get into people's heads easily at all. A radio show like the old classics used might work. Your own imagination of the visual scenes were brought into play.
Bradbury stuff was often challenging and entertaining as well. I am not familiar offhand with the one you refer to, but I am interested. I will check it out.
Another scifi author I liked...well I can't pull up his name up right now, but he was well known. Kind of very clever satirical writing. Will have to present his name later. I remember he was being interviewed on the Tom Snyder TV talk show. This author, as a playwright, was dealing with Hollywood types. They wanted a really BIG scifi plot to make a movie of. He presented an idea involving the Universe exploding into nothingness. They told him, "No! Bigger!".
Harlan Ellison. I will relate the story as told by Steven King in "Danse Macabre". The story you refer to is apocryphal . According to the urban legend, Harlan was asked to come up for story ideas for the original Star Trek Movie. One of them, involved blasting thru the edge of the galaxy and finding God Himself! The Studio suit says "Not BIG enough." The REAL story is this: Harlan postulated that the Enterprise encounters an alien race of reptiles who go back into time and change Earth's history so that the dinosaurs don't become extinct and eventually evolve into a civilized reptillian culture. Since the Enterprise has followed them back in time the crew does not disappear like the rest of humanity. The crux of the movie rests on Kirk's agonizing decision about reversing this. Is it moral to exterminate this whole intelligent race of reptiles just to return humanity as the inheritors of the Earth. The studio suit was into the whole Kurt Von Daneken "Chariots of the Gods" thing and wanted Harlan to add some Mayans to the story. Harlan explains that there were no Mayans around during the Jurrasic period and that is a dumb idea. The suit gets upset and says that he really LIKES Mayans and if Haralan wants to write this movie why doesn't he add some. Harlan looks at him and says. "I'm a writer! I don't know WHAT the F--- YOU are!!!!!" and storms out of Paramount.
Thanx for the link.
HeeHee. Great! Sure, it was Harlan! Must be nice to have a memory. What a fun writer & personality. I think he passed away, yes?
I glossed over any details from the Snyder show with him, both because the punch line was the central part that amused me, and even more because I didn't remember the details. Harlan himself may have been giving an abbreviated form on the TV show, for all that I can recall. Wish I had taped it, I do remember really enjoying the guy and his work. I can just hear Snyder guffawing at him, but of course Tom did that all the time anyway. If that line about 'not BIG enough' is an urban legend, then we should all just stipulate that it be true instead. :) One of my favorite lines with its setup. That last part about Harlan storming out and his comment to the suit does ring a slight bell though.
Amazing that having Mayans [for gods' sake!] in a movie supported by an author of this stature--or not having Mayans--could nix the whole deal. So the suit never met a Mayan he didn't like, eh? Dumb & dumber. Besides, I would like to have known Kirk's decision, Kirk always being so moral. Maybe I could have had a T-Rex for a neighbor. This would also have probably taken care of the stray dog packs problem we have in my area.
Gee, y'think anybody else is following this thread? IMDB/Amazon keeps making me log back in, and I have to go track down the thread again...
Thanks for the good info! What a great story. I hate to think that so many people are missing out on some golden age scifi writers and some of the background stories. I wanted to re-read so I looked a few years ago for some Silverberg books at my local library, and I didn't find any in circulation. Pathetic.
At least Idverser is following this threat.
shareSure, it was Harlan! Must be nice to have a memory. What a fun writer & personality. I think he passed away, yes?
You can read the short story here:
http://www.scribd.com/doc/43321/Mimsy-were-the-borogoves-Lewis-Padgett-
I don't know if that's a legal posting, so it may disappear if they don't have proper permission.
I'd read the story a few years ago (actually, right before the trailer for this movie came out), and I started to watch the movie just now, but decided to stop down and re-read the story before I went any further.
Really impressed with what I've seen so far, though!
I don't really care if movies based on books aren't exactly like the original source material — I'm comparing the movie to other movies!
Anyway, here's some links...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mimsy_were_the_Borogoves
Here's a better-formatted online copy...
http://www.scribd.com/doc/7320090/Mimsy-Were-the-Borogoves
MathFiction: Mimsy Were the Borogoves (Lewis Padgett (aka Henry Kuttner and Catherine L. Moore))
http://kasmana.people.cofc.edu/MATHFICT/mfview.php?callnumber=mf300
So sad. I tried the second link and sadly it was removed by someone named Don Congdon and Associates.
I love Sci-fi and have tried to get my grandsons into it since an early age...before they got too caught up in all the media and movies of the current generation. All that Disney and marketing. So much has come out of these extraordinary short stories and novels. Even some of the Star Trek series (the communicator was said to be where the idea of cell phones originated).
Another of your links did work and thank you for posting a clickable link. It's always appreciated by me.
Be well and be kind Hope this gets to you many years later that it is.
Actually the author was two people. Lewis Padgett was a pseudonym of the husband/wife creative team of C L Moore and Henry Kuttner. They used this and other pseudonyms after their marriage till Kuttner's sad death in 1958. Just from curiosity to anyone who's ever read works by Moore, has anyone ever determined exactly the location of her much underrated short story Werewoman featuring Northwest Smith? Most of Smith's adventures take place on Mars or Venus, but this is harder to pin down. The land description sounds like Mars, but the presence of apparently English-speaking hunters and werewolves would tend to indicate Earth. Then again, the story has, till the end, the feel of a drug-induced fantasy, so maybe it's intended--at least partly--to be an hallucination on Smith's part. I'd appreciate any feedback from fans of the story.
shareMy favorite Moore Short is "Vintage Season, also a "much unde short story". This one is about odd visitors who compete with each other to rent a man's seemingly unremarkable house. Without giving too much plot away, its an interesting departure from the usual time travel story. I read "Werewoman" MANY years ago.
shareVintage Season is one of my many favorites in The Science Fiction Hall of Fame collection. Author credits are given to "Henry Kuttner and C. L. Moore (as Lawrence O'Donnell)." Has it been subsequently discovered than Moore did this one by herself?
It's really an amazing story. So full of ideas and so well written. And an ending you can never forget!
Those are my principles, and if you don't like them ...well, I have others.
-Groucho Marx
bruce, I believe the copy I read credited her alone.
Hi Mr. Pie,
Interesting. I just now found this in Wikipedia:
Afterwards, almost all of their stories were written in collaboration under various pseudonyms, most commonly “Lewis Padgett”. (Another pseudonym, one Moore often employed for works that involved little or no collaboration, was "Lawrence O’Donnell".)