STORYTELLING

Official Tangled Trailer

Walt Disney's, Tangled, is a children's fantasy movie. Bryon Howard and Nathan Greno are the directors of the movie and it came out November 24, 2010. Although it being almost seven years old, it still has the qualities of a good beginning according to K. M. Weiland in our textbook.

Tangled is about a princess who lives in a tower and has never been out of that tower her entire life. Until her prince, Flinn Ryder comes along and takes her on the adventure of her lifetime. With enemies chasing them the entire journey, Rapunzel finally gets to see the stars she's been seeing from the top of her tower every year on her birthday.

According to K. M. Weiland, a good beginning has seven traits; they don't open before the beginning, they open with characters, they open with conflict, they open with movement, they establish the setting, they orient readers with an establishing shot, and they set the tone (Weiland pp. 338-339). Tangled pretty much has all of these qualities.

It starts out with some background information, but nothing too overwhelming. It opens with the main characters, Flinn Ryder and Rapunzel, and also shows some of the enemies. While there are more important characters in the movie, you won't see them until you watch it. There's conflict from the beginning when Flinn is being chased by the guards. There's conflict throughout the entire movie but it also opens with conflict, which is a trait of a good beginning. The movie opens with movement in many ways; when Flinn is being chased, when Rapunzel hits Flinn with a frying pan, when they both are on the journey and running away from the guards. There are countless examples of movement in Tangled. The setting isn't clearly established but we can tell that it's in a small town with a king, queen, and princess. Lastly it sets a tone. We know there is going to be a lot of fighting and suspenseful parts. But there is also some not so suspenseful parts.

While there are many movies out there with the right traits to a good beginning, Tangled is just one of them. Once we are hooked at the beginning of a movie, we are hooked the whole way through. That's why it's important to have a good beginning in a movie, TV show, or even a book.


Work Cited

Weiland K. M. "The Hook." Eds. Laurence Behrens, Leonard J. Rose. Writing and Reading Across the Curriculum, 13th ed., Pearson, Boston. 2016. pp 338-339.