This film is adapted from the story of a female seal selkie in Celtic mythology. To be honest, the change is a bit nondescript. It is necessary to tell a fairy tale for children, but the three views of fairy tales are usually not so correct, and they are often tragedy. So most of the plot of this film is original. Forcing the element of family affection into an adventure story with an unclear meaning, the final impression is very chaotic, but there are still many commendable aspects in the painting and lens. The plot, In brief, a mixed-race family, mother is selkie, and left on the day of the second child. Years later, my sister, a little selkie who can’t speak, finds her singing and her selkie with the help of her brother. Identity (by wearing Shanghai leopard skin) and save yourself and other mythical creatures with singing.
Halfway through, I feel that I have a strong sense of sight. Isn't this the sweater girl of Sou Shen Ji: A
man from Xinyu County in Yuzhang, sees that there are six or seven women in Tanaka, all wearing sweaters, I don't know if they are birds. Creeping, get the sweater untied by one of the girls, take it and hide it. Immediately there will be all the birds, and all the birds will fly away. No one can go alone. The man takes it as a woman and gives birth to three daughters. The mother's maid asked her father, knowing that the clothes were under the pile of rice, and when they got it, the clothes flew away. Later, the three women were welcomed, and the women had to fly away.
The first time I saw this story was in Cai Zhizhong's "The Strange Tale of the Six Dynasties", which painted various stories from Sou Shen Ji. By the way, this set of Chinese ancient books and classical humor comics is really good. There are several copies of Sanlian Bookstore's 91 edition at home. The left-hand format is vertical and the original text is attached to the back. I just searched for the full set and it is still on sale. I will receive it someday.
Pulling away. This film does not tell how the mother formed a family with humans, but I guess the plot is similar to that in the sweater girl. In order to verify my idea, I checked the original selkie myth. Sure enough: If a man steals a female selkie's skin she is in his power and is forced to become his wife. If she finds her skin she will immediately return to her true home Sometimes, she has several children by him. In these stories, it is one of her children who discovers her sealskin and she soon returns to the sea. In other words, the story patterns and certain elements of selkie and sweater girl are surprisingly similar , Is the same kind of mythical story. I checked the wiki and some papers again, and all kinds of messy information came to my face.
First of all, this kind of story has a special name, called "Swan maiden" (Swan maiden). The common "elements" (motifs) are:
1. The swan takes off its feather coat and becomes a celestial lady (female of humans) and takes a bath.
2. The man steals the feather clothes and forces the goddess to marry him.
3. After marriage, give birth to several children.
4. After giving birth, the couple broke up and the goddess ascended to heaven.
5. The cause of the rupture is the discovery of the hidden Yuyi whose "before" is the "reason for marriage".
This kind of story cannot be classified into a single category according to the AT classification system (Aarne-Thompson classification system), but its traces are spread all over the world, which is also a very interesting phenomenon. One of the earliest texts is the story of the girl in the sweater in the Sou Shen Ji of the Eastern Jin Dynasty. About the fourth century AD, some people think that the location in the text is the birthplace of such stories in East Asia. Such stories in China are extremely rich. There are more than 280 variations of stories circulating in more than 20 ethnic groups, including the famous Cowherd and Weaver Girl and Tianluo Girl. The strange thing is that English materials about Swan maiden rarely mention such stories in China, and the wiki only mentions the Cowherd and Weaver Girl as the representative of China. This may be because although the Chinese swan-virgin story is similar in form to the typical prototype, the origin and connotation of its various motifs are different from those in the West. It is noticed that the Tianluo girl (Bai Shui Su Nv) comes from "Sou Shen Hou Ji" and is in the same era as the sweater girl, which shows that the origin of this kind of story is far earlier than this, and it has been alienated into different forms when the Sou Shen Ji was written.
Regarding the origin, there are two aspects worth noting: one is whether such legends around the world are formed separately or spread from a single origin, and the other is the reason for the formation of these motifs. I am more convinced that all parts of the world have produced their own swan virgin stories, and the same result by different routes is due to the similar humanistic meanings contained in them.
There is a saying that this kind of story originated from totem worship. For example, in China, it is in the same line with the myth that "the mysterious bird of heaven was born into business". Some articles cited the swan virgin story as the origin of the ethnic minorities, such as the legend of the Three Fairies of the Manchu and the legend that the Kazakh ancestor was a swan, but these are all misinformation. What's more ridiculous is that when narrating the legend of Manchu, there is often circumstantial evidence that the word "Eniang" comes from "Goniang". You don't need to think about it and know that this E Niang was transliterated from Manchu (eniye), and the legend of the Three Fairies of Manchu originally did not involve swans at all, and even the legend itself was later fabricated by the Qing people to beautify the nation. Someone wrote a critical textual article on this issue, which verified that this statement first appeared in 1980, fabricated by a magazine editor, and then widely disseminated. However, this can also be regarded as an example of the variation and grafting of folklore, including swan virgin stories, in the historical development. It can be admitted that the larger motif of "human and animal intercourse" comes from totem worship.
Others believe that the "bathing and getting married" motif originated from the sacrificial and marriage rituals held by primitive tribes at specific locations such as the water's edge (or the seaside in the legend of Selkie), using beautiful animals (birds, seals, etc.) as a symbol of spouse. Of course, this kind of research is indispensable to omnipotent psychoanalysis. Men’s "voyeurism" and "theft of feather garments" represent taboos and illusions that taboos are broken. They are the result of the release of repressive libido, and feather garments cannot be deformed if they are stolen. The sexual implications of this are also quite obvious. Of course, the Oedipus complex that is most in line with the psychoanalytic concept is the love of love-this kind of story must be indispensable. According to analysis, the significant deification of women in the story represents men's yearning for the perfect woman—the almighty mother—this is more evident in such stories bred by the more severely repressed culture. The perfect appearance, personality, immortal identity, and extraordinary ability such as selkie's ability to control the ocean in the legend are all manifestations of this goddess (mother) plot. In many stories, the "harmful son-in-law" plots, such as difficult tests for men, including the final departure of fairies, reflect the hostile relationship between men and their fathers. Some people interpret the final departure of women as the budding of ancient women's liberation thoughts, as women's cry for freedom, and it is also a self-explanatory association. The female characters in the swan virgin story can be said to be missing, from the beginning to the end they are told from the male perspective, and the female is the existence of being objectified (deified). In fact, this can be seen from the most fundamental animal images. In ancient times, men and women were considered to be two species, because the physical conditions at that time made the physical differences between men and women obscure the similarities between men and women.
Back to selkie. There must be many differences between the marine civilization on the coast and the agricultural civilization on the mainland. For example, some people think that the image of selkie originated from the intermarriage of the Scots and the Sami people wearing seal skins with the Finns. Some people think that it was because the ancients attributed the affair to the spirit of nature (that is, the male selkie was first produced), and some people think that this image A variant of mermaid. Speaking of the mermaid, the selkie image in this film is obviously mixed with a part of the mermaid, which is the element of singing. In addition, the deification of selkie in the original story is not very significant, but in this film it is the image of a fairy. The status of the leader of the elves is closer to the swan-virgin story of the east.
Think divergent. The film's perspective is still male, but not the male who forced the fairies to marry, but their next generation. Here, the fairy finally appeared as a mother as she was. Although the mother left at the beginning of the film, she is undoubtedly the most important role in the film, even surpassing her sister. This is why the father's presence in this film is weak and ineffective. The departure of the mother and the birth of the younger sister happen to be a transformation, symbolizing the change in the protagonist’s mental model. Applying a versatile psychoanalysis, this film actually shows the three stages of children's psychological development: pre-genital period (Oedipus period)-incubation period (the mother leaves the scene and the sexual awareness is suppressed, which is reflected in the hostility to the opposite sex, the sister) -Adolescence (recognizing the similarities between the opposite sex and the mother, and turning the impulse to the opposite sex, which is reflected in the change in attitude towards the sister). It's a perfect fit, Freud's Dafa is good.
Finally, as mentioned above, the female version of the selkie legend may have appeared earlier, that is, the story of a male selkie and a human female. Probably because the husband’s wife who is out at sea is lonely and unbearable. If she shed 7 tears at the beach, she can call a male selkie (also a perfect male image), and their children will have seal-like palms (with a typical inheritance). The symptoms are the same). Such stories abound in the world. For example, Sou Shen Ji has a similar "Rainbow Husband".
Sweater women also have a version of turn, very strange circumstances, I think we need interesting than The Story of Virgin, are summarized as follows:
"Immortals · Plumage people,"
Emperor in Yongchang, Ji Yang Ren Valley, due to interest in farming Suddenly there was a person under the tree, wearing a feather robe, and lewd him. Neither knows where. Gu Sui has a pregnancy. When the month is about to give birth, the Yuyi man comes back, pierces his shadow with a knife, produces a snake, and goes. Gu Sui became an eunuch, humorously, and stayed in the palace.
There is also information on analyzing this story on the Internet, so it won't branch out. I just wanted to write something to make me happy. I haven't written for a long time. By the way, I want to record how contemporary life acquires knowledge. Unexpectedly, it turned out to be like this in the end. In fact, there are many more that can be written, but since there are various literature monographs, it is meaningless for me to write a review, and I am not learning this. My biggest thought: No matter what, even if it's the cultural research of the country, you can't trust Chinese materials, even if it is a professional paper searched out by an academic engine.
Those who can see here, applaud your perseverance.
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