MovieChat Forums > Mirror Mirror (2012) Discussion > Did they make this movie feel SMALL on p...

Did they make this movie feel SMALL on purpose?

posted 12 years ago by slade4ever
16 replies | jump to latest

I didn't hate this movie like many do, I just found it really dull and boring, and I have no real motive to ever see it again.

However, I was wondering, did the production designer intentionally make everything feel "small?"

Every set felt like a set and looked like a set. I didn't expect them to actually go out and film in the woods (because not all movies have the funds to do so), but the entire time I watched the movie, I felt as if this was a live filming of a stage play.

If that was their intention, then fine, but if not, why did the entire world they create feel so small?

Well, I've got news for you pal, you ain't leadin' but two things: Jack and sh*t and Jack left town

[–] bainf 12 years ago

I don't think they were going for small (or dwarflike lol)
i thought they created a very attractive realistic snowy set but with top down curving panning shots it looked like they had to avoid things not perfectly white. Needea longer boom or cable camera
All those trees made everything seem cramped or small(not moody)
Needed some long swooping overhead shots (think LOTR) to create expanse but they may have spent their CGI budget on those "castle on the hill" shots

[–] knowtheartist 12 years ago

To me, the film only felt small in the village scenes.

[–] Sandy0095 12 years ago

definitely got that feeling too. i'm not sure of the budget but the sets had a vey unrealistic look to them, like a high school play or tv movie feel

Badger my ass its probably Milhouse

[–] howtragic 12 years ago

Yeah I did not get it either. Everything looked like a set. The shots were all so tight. It was a bit jarring to be honest. It never really felt like I was experiencing a "real" place, which may have been the intent, but it made no sense. The woods felt like they were confined to that one small place, when they should have felt really vast. It was like watching a play.

[–] slade4ever 12 years ago

^I'm glad you brought up the woods scene.

I point ALL to the scene in Harry Potter 7 part 1 when Harry gets the sword from the lake. When I first saw that scene, I thought it was a real location that he was walking around in (before he gets to the pond). However, from the behind-the-scenes stuff, I found that it was all a set.

Granted, not EVERY movie has that kind of budget, but even smaller budget movies can make sets look real, and as I said (and some have agreed with me), MANY sets in this movie felt small and looked like sets.

Well, I've got news for you pal, you ain't leadin' but two things: Jack and sh*t and Jack left town

[–] howtragic 12 years ago

Yeah, I think your comparison with Harry Potter just goes to show how much this has to do with direction. I do not think that Singh is a very good director. A good director would find a way to make the woods feel big even though he was limited to a set. It made it feel as though we just went from one set (the castle) to another set (the woods).

The woods in a fairy tale is sort of its own character. It is a scary, dark, mysterious place, but ultimately is serves as the backdrop for a redemption, an act of heroism, or a character change. Thus it is important that the woods really BE a place where those things can happen.

[–] wunderdunder 12 years ago

I wouldn't call $78 million a small budget. Maybe in comparison, but plenty of money to make a better scene/set than the ones in this movie. It was hard to concentrate because the "fakeness" was so distracting.

[–] howtragic 11 years ago

I do not think I have ever seen a "big budget" movie with so few sets. I guess Julia Robert's salary probably took up about 1/4 of the budget, which was a waste because she was miscast and not good in the role.

[–] cherns-2 11 years ago

I liked the movie a bit more than you did, but I do agree about its "smallness' and the artificiality of its sets. I'm sure that this was deliberate, part of the atmosphere of the film. (I have a copy of one of the director's other films, The Fall; I haven't actually seen it yet, but I'm given to understand that it is similarly "stagey." What it reminded me of most of all was a British Christmas pantomime (known as panto, no relation to silent mimes). The traditional panto has some specific roles and set pieces that are absent here, but just watching the dwarves spring around on those stilts, and a lot of the comic stuff, seemed right along those lines, and perfect for a re-telling of a classic fairy story.

[–] slade4ever 11 years ago

If that was the director's intention, than I respect that, but I'm really not sure if it was.

Well, I've got news for you pal, you ain't leadin' but two things: Jack and sh*t and Jack left town

[–] reaseltbim 11 years ago

I was fine with most of the movie but the woods part annoy the hell out of me. It started to feel like a stage play anytime they were in the "woods" felt very fake and small. Im not saying they should have filmed in a real forest but the woods in here annoyed me a lot. I hated it, it really felt like I was watching a stage play at that moment.

I'll look down, and whisper no

[–] howtragic 11 years ago

Maybe it WAS intentional, but it seems like such an odd creative choice for a fairy tale. A fairy tale is all about the big imagination. It seemed like even the ceilings in the castle for too low. Somehow the director went for a tight, claustrophobic feel, which seems better suited to something like a family drama, not a light-hearted story with dwarves in it.

[–] ephemereality 11 years ago

You guys definitely need to watch more Singh films to realize this was definitely his intention in order to create this fairy tale-esque vibe. He wanted to create a sense of surreality, that this operates in an alternate dimension exactly like a fairy tale. As another poster pointed out, Tarsem Singh takes great inspiration from the pantomine scene and I think he pushed that sense to the extreme in this very movie. It doesn't bother me, it's just a part of his style and I kind of like it.

It doesn't mean Tarsem Singh is a bad director. I really beg to differ, he has such a clearly defined style and it looks great and it really works and even if he sometimes picks bad stories he still knows how to work with them to give them more substance and depth. I fail to see how any other director than Singh could have worked with this script and deliver this movie to us that I defnitely think is a movie that is well beyond average and if you appreciate his style, it will just grow on you like Cell did to me.

See, the example between Harry Potter and Mirror Mirror is actually a great one because as the poster pointed out, the scene in Harry Potter feels REAL. If there's something Tarsem Singh does not, it's working with a sense of reality. He works with surreality. All of his movies operate on this assumption, creating a sense of dreamscapes (I thought the interior of the Queen's room and how the background weather reflected her mood was brilliant). He's not interested in making his movies seem or feel real. That's not his style.

[–] howtragic 11 years ago

I think that is fine if that is his directing style. But it seems pretty clear that at least when it comes to IMDB posters, the audience did not respond well to this style. It just did not work for this particular fairy tale. Singh was not telling a new, original story. He was telling a timeless classic from his own point of view. Unfortunately, a small, cramped, "unreal" point of view simply does not work for Snow White. The audience already has a very vivid expectation when it comes to the story. I think the claustrophobic feel destroyed the feelings of magic and other-worldliness that makes the fairy tale so special and so memorable.

[–] GuyOnTheLeft 11 years ago

Agreed. I give this 5/10 but the stagey look is one of the best things about it IMO.

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See a list of my favourite films here: http://www.flickchart.com/slackerinc

[–] bluerisk 10 years ago

That what you can get for less than 7 mill. vs. this 80 mill. flick:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Py_IndUbcxc

Ich bin kein ausgeklügelt Buch, ich bin ein Mensch mit seinem Widerspruch.
Conrad Ferdinand Meyer