I haven't family-movie blogged in awhile, but over the break I did take three law professor daughters (only one mine) to see Penelope.  My overall reaction was that the movie was pretty cute, and my fellow movie-goers agreed. 

Penelope is the latest in a pretty short line of feminist fairy tales that put a twist on the prince charming saves damsel in distress plot device.  I liked all three Shrek endings:  In the first movie, Fiona's "true form" is revealed to be her ogre form, in the second, Fiona chooses to return to her ogre form rather than become conventionally beautiful with Shrek, and in the third, Fiona leads several fairy tale princesses in an effort to rescue themselves and stop the evil Prince Charming.  Recently, in Enchanted, the damsel in distress ends up rescuing her true love.  In Penelope, Christina Ricci is a 25-year-old "blue blood" woman who bears a family curse of a pig's snout; this curse will only be reversed when someone of "of her own kind" loves her.  Her mother, the wonderful Catherine O'Hara, engages in a plan to find a suitable aristocratic love interest, but there are no takers.

So, how can the ending of Penelope compete with the other feminist fairy tales?  Are there only so many feminist fairy tale endings?  I won't spoil it for you, but I will say that in some ways the ending is more satisfying than the Shrek endings, although not in other ways.  All in all, I was glad my daughter saw it.

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