Re: Hansel And Gretel Witch Hunters 2013
Elis Riebow
Hansel & Gretel: Witch Hunters is a 2013 American fantasy horror film that stars Jeremy Renner and Gemma Arterton as the siblings from the fairy tale "Hansel and Gretel" who are now grown up and work together to exterminate witches for hire. The film is written and directed by Tommy Wirkola. The film also stars Famke Janssen and Peter Stormare as the supporting cast.
In 2010, after being approached by Gary Sanchez Productions, Wirkola pitched the film to Paramount Pictures. Renner was cast as Hansel in September 2010 whilst the role of Gretel was planned for Noomi Rapace before Arterton's casting in January 2011. Principal photography began in March 2011, taking place at Babelsberg Studio in Germany. Filming concluded in June that year. Originally scheduled for release in March 2012, the film was delayed to allow additional time to shoot a post-credits scene with Renner.
Hansel and Gretel: Witch Hunters was theatrically released in the United States on January 25, 2013. Despite receiving generally negative reviews from critics, particularly for what they saw as its weak script and gratuitous violence, the film was a box-office hit, grossing $226 million worldwide against a production budget of $50 million.
As in the original fairy tale, Hansel and Gretel as children are abandoned by their father in a forest, where they come across a gingerbread house. On entering it, they are captured by a cannibalistic witch, who makes Gretel prepare the oven while forcing Hansel to continuously eat sweets to fatten him up. The children outsmart her before she could eat them, incinerating her in the oven.
Over the following many years, Hansel and Gretel, now in their adolescence, have become famed witch hunters, slaying many witches without succumbing to harmful spells and curses of the witchcraft; although the incident in the gingerbread house has left Hansel with a magic-induced form of diabetes and he needs to inject himself with a shot of insulin every few hours.[N 1]
Hansel and Gretel arrive in the town of Augsburg in time to prevent Sheriff Berringer from executing the young woman Mina for witchcraft. Mayor Engleman has hired the siblings to rescue the town's missing children, who are presumed abducted by witches. Berringer hires trackers for the same mission, hoping to disgrace the mayor and cementing his power. Hansel and Gretel capture the horned witch and discover that the witches are preparing for the coming Blood Moon, where they plan to sacrifice twelve children to gain immunity to fire, their greatest weakness. The mayor assigns Jackson, a local resident and tracker, to assist them in navigating the forest but they wait until morning before setting out.
The grand dark witch, Muriel, attacks the town with her army and abducts the 12th child. She attacks Gretel, who is rescued by Ben, a local teenager and avid fan of theirs who plans to become a witch hunter himself; Jackson is slain in the fight by Muriel after attempting to assist Gretel. Hansel falls from a witch's broomstick and is lost in the forest.
The next morning, Mina finds him stuck in a tree and takes him to a nearby spring, where she heals his wounds and they make love in the healing waters of the spring. Gretel is attacked by Berringer and his posse, who beat her before being stopped by Muriel's troll, Edward. He kills all of the men and tells Gretel that he helped her because trolls serve witches. Hansel and Gretel discover an abandoned cabin that they learn is a witch's lair and their childhood home. Muriel tells them the truth of their past.
The siblings fight Muriel before she stabs Hansel and abducts Gretel to complete her long-overdue ceremony. Hansel wakes up with Mina, who reveals herself to be a white witch. She heals him again and uses Adrianna's grimoire to bless his arsenal of weapons.
Hansel, Mina, and Ben disrupt the witches' Sabbath. Mina slaughters the witches with a Gatling gun while Hansel frees the children. Edward defies Muriel and releases Gretel, as punishment Muriel throws the troll off a cliff. Gretel finds Edward's lifeless body and manages to resuscitate him. Hansel, Ben, and Mina follow Muriel's trail to the original gingerbread house, now dilapidated and run-down. Muriel kills Mina before Hansel shoots her. The siblings engage her in a brutal fight that ends with them decapitating her with a shovel. They burn Muriel's body on a pyre and collect their reward for rescuing the children. In the end, they head out on their next witch hunt, now accompanied by Ben and Edward.
Blood and gore and action, all the stuff that I love ... It's definitely an R-rated movie, the first draft has a lot of blood and guts. First and foremost, it's an action movie, I think, with horror elements. And of course some dark humor as well. But the action and horror are the most important feelings I want.[6]
Hansel & Gretel: Witch Hunters is the first English language film and the first big studio production of Norwegian writer and director Wirkola, up to this point best known for his 2009 Nazi zombie-themed, independent, horror, and comedy film Dead Snow. Wirkola said he was contacted by producer Kevin Messick from Gary Sanchez Productions after the screening of Dead Snow at the Sundance Film Festival: "So my first meeting, my first day in Los Angeles] was with those guys and I pitched Hansel and Gretel and they loved it. And they took me to Paramount two days after and we sold it."[7] In 2013, Wirkola said "I'm still surprised that they went for it, because it's a crazy, rock n' roll script. It's full throttle, there's lots of blood and gore and bad language, I often wonder how I got this movie made. It's all across the world now. But people really seem to respond to it, which is what we hoped, that people would enjoy this ride."[8]
I loved fairy tales growing up. I used to listen to them on tapes and "Hansel & Gretel" scared the hell out of me and it always stayed in the back of my head. I always wondered what happened to those characters.[15]
I have a strong memory from my childhood of just how dark and gruesome their tale was and I wondered what would have happened to the two of them when they grew up? They had this dark past and this intense hatred of witches. So as I thought about it, it made sense to me that of course they would be fated to become great witch hunters. We wanted it to feel like this could be happening 300 years ago but at the same time, there is a modern spin on all the action, characters and weaponry. It was a fun way to make a classical world feel fresh.[16]
Wirkola said that he originally came with that idea in 2007 while studying film and television at Bond University in Australia, when he wanted to make it as just a short film,[5] and that the film school director Simon Hunter advised him: "Tom, don't ever speak of the idea again until you are in front of a Hollywood producer and I guarantee you will sell it."[17]
It's got kind of like a steampunk vibe mixed with a little bit of a goth edge and hyper-cartoon violence like Kick-Ass and all set in a very specific world ... It's like a Sam Raimi-type horror movie, like Evil Dead II.[22]
Messick said they designed "a fairy tale, mythological fantasy world" that feels like it happened long time ago but is not set in any particular time period.[23] Marlene Stewart created the film's costumes, using traditional leather and linen but without an antique look. Its steampunk-like, retro-futuristic weapons were created by the weapon designer Simon Boucherie and Wirkola, who said they wanted Hansel and Gretel's weapons to look as if the characters hand-made them.[16] Wirkola stated he "just wanted this crazy, mashed-up world where you can't pinpoint where it is, or when it is" and the modern elements are there to "add to the fun and tone of the film."[5] He said, "We wanted the movie to feel timeless and for the movie to feel like a fairy tale, but still grounded. It was a lot of fun coming up with the different weapon designs and ways of killing witches. We mixed old and new elements. But no matter how modern some of the weapons are, they all have an old-fashioned feel and look like they could fit into this world."[8]
Jeremy Renner, who played the film's adult Hansel, has stated that his initial attraction came from a one sheet he was given even before seeing the script, showing Hansel and Gretel walking away and a witch burning at a stake in the background, which he found "incredibly interesting"[26] (this scene was included in the finished film). He added, "When I read the script, my first thought was, 'I can't believe this hasn't been done yet.' It's such a great idea with so much potential. That dynamic was definitely a big thing, I loved that what Tommy [Wirkola] wrote left so much room for character."[26] Wirkola said he wanted Renner in the role after seeing him in The Hurt Locker.[27] Wirkola, who described Hansel as the "loose cannon" of the duo,[28] gave him an additional character flaw of diabetes, in addition to the psychological scars that Hansel shares with his sister (in the original idea for the short film, Gretel was also suffering from eating disorder[5]).[29] Renner said it was a great escape for him "as this was a fairytale with no stress like the other action movies I'd done recently. I was having so much fun hanging on a wire like Peter Pan, hanging onto a broom and doing other crazy stuff."[30] He stated, "That was one of the most fun jobs I've ever had because there's something magical about that old world, fantasy thing."[31]
There's a lot of fairy tale stuff, but that fight is really real and bloody and quite brutal. Women are the villains a lot of the time. Not all the time. There are some horrible male villains as well. But I guess Gretel is very feminist. She's quite full on.[12]
The role of adult Gretel, whom Wirkola wanted to be "a really, really strong and fun female character,"[5] was originally planned for Noomi Rapace, who dropped out of consideration for the part prior to early January 2011.[32] Diane Kruger and Eva Green were reported to also be in talks for the role.[33] English actress Gemma Arterton was ultimately cast in the role. She impressed Wirkola with her performance in The Disappearance of Alice Creed,[28] and, after they have met, with her "really filthy sense of humour" as "the humour is essential to this film."[8] Arterton said she was attracted to Wirkola's "strong vision" for the film,[12] calling it "very, very dark, and bloodthirsty and there's a lot of cursing. It's kind of got a Tarantino feel, really." Arterton described her character as "much more in tune with her spiritual side. Hansel is a typical action hero, cheeky, funny, a womanizer. She's much more of a thinker, intense, internal and bit more open-minded than he is." She said that Gretel is "a sexual character but she's not having sex with anybody, which is a change for me because usually in my films I'm sleeping with somebody!"[30] She further explained the characters: "Hansel & Gretel have this unstoppable bond but they're also so different from each other. She's the brains of the operation. He's the brawn. He's the joker and the show-off. She's more the watcher, the researcher, the one who tries to really understand witchcraft."[34] Arterton added, "Jeremy [Renner] and I found within the script moments where we showed the vulnerable side of them. Often in action movies, people are scared to put that in. I think it was important."[35] She said that she "loved every minute" of the production and did not want it to end, also crediting it for helping her overcome her fear of getting hurt.[36]
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