Task 2 - Propp - Brief 4

Vladimir Propp’s grew up in Germany and later in life he wrote Russian folk tales. He extended the Russian formalist approach around the narrative structure. By Propp breaking down these Russian folk tales into their smallest narrative units, or narratemes he was then able to arrive at a typology of narrative structures; some of which include

Absentation, Interdiction, Violation of Interdiction and so on…

Propps Ideas - He believed that in every film there was:

• The Hero - Seeks something
• The Villain - Opposes the hero
• The donor - Helps the hero by providing a 'magic' object
• The dispatcher - Sends the hero on it's way
• The false hero - Falsely assuming the role of the hero
• The helper - Gives support to the hero
• The princess - The reward for the hero, but also needs protection from the villain
• The father

Comparing these characters to 'Some like it Hot':

Sugar - The Princess: As she is the beautiful woman that is wooed by both men in the film.

Joe - The father, The hero: He wants to protect her from harms way and also saves/falls in love with her and they end up together.

Jerry - The Helper: Although both of them love Sugar Joe get's the girl in the end, but helps throughout the film as they try to disguise themselves so they don't get caught by the mobsters.

'Gangsters' (That they are running from) - The Villain: Because they want to kill Joe, and Jerry as they witnessed the gangsters killing someone.