I'm doing some image research for an art project right now... came across some great vinyl laptop details/skins:
eve
snow white I
snow white II
witch
Tuesday, October 5, 2010
Monday, October 4, 2010
Vivian Ward and Her Fairy Godlover
There’s something about Cinderella stories that has always bugged me. Is it the way she wins the day? In the end, her hard, backbreaking work doesn’t matter for shit. It’s her cherubic face, bouncing blonde curls, and small, slender feet that make her a princess.
In Pretty Woman, we meet Vivian Ward, our prostitute Cinderella, whose hard work isn’t getting her anywhere, either. And the work is much harder and more dangerous than cleaning for an evil stepmother. Evil stepmothers might be preferable to the men Vivian might meet on the streets, the ever-present chance that this guy or the next is going to be much worse than what she expected when she took on the job.
It’s luck, a cute blonde wig, and slender legs that draw in Edward Lewis, the guy who could be Vivian's Prince Charming. Interestingly enough, the original Cinderella’s work ethic seems to have been transplanted in Edward instead of Vivian. He’s a workaholic businessman who toils even while Vivian dangles over his desk and wonders what in the world he hired her for.
Vivian herself is . . . what? Spunky? Funny? Friendly? Oddly childlike for someone entrenched in what we consider to be an “adult” occupation. Blow jobs and I Love Lucy, innocent bubble baths turned into an exercise in voyeurism. Not that her personality matters all that much. It might be enough to win over Edward, at least initially, but the rest of the cast don't soften up to her until she's glittering and glamorous. Her real value, the movie would have us believe, is her beauty. She puts on a dress and suddenly people who never would’ve given her the time of day beforehand become servile and groveling, desperate to please the pretty woman. The value of her expensive clothes rubs off on her. Defines her, even.
Of course, these aren’t really Vivian's clothes. They weren’t bought with her money. Her value is a gift given by her Prince Charming, who is, at the same time, her Fairy Godmother. A flash of Edward's magic dollar, and Vivian's rags (blood red, the color of sex and violence), transform into a beautiful gown, and only then is she ready to go to the ball.
In the end, when it looks like she's ready to stand on her own two feet, her Prince Charming sweeps in as if to rescue her. As if she needed rescuing from the horrors of making her own way. Edward scales her apartment-complex-slash-tower, an action that might seem much more heroic if Vivian weren't about to walk out without much fuss anyways, and they ride into the sunset on his noble limousine. Happily ever after, at least until his controlling attitude drives her to walk out on him again.
In the end, when it looks like she's ready to stand on her own two feet, her Prince Charming sweeps in as if to rescue her. As if she needed rescuing from the horrors of making her own way. Edward scales her apartment-complex-slash-tower, an action that might seem much more heroic if Vivian weren't about to walk out without much fuss anyways, and they ride into the sunset on his noble limousine. Happily ever after, at least until his controlling attitude drives her to walk out on him again.
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