I was delighted to receive, as a Christmas present from a friend, a copy of The Singing Ringing Tree which I remember watching as a very little girl – maybe around 5 or even younger.
The blurb on the DVD describes it as a fairy tale that “haunted a generation” and it must have made an impression on me because although I was only very little when I watched it I still have vivid memories of it. Watching it as an adult I can see why. For a start it’s in technicolour with glorious and strange scenery which reminds me of watching the Wizard of Oz, though of course the settings are on a smaller scale. The soundtrack is very evocative, especially in the scary bits. The acting is good for that sort of thing – the sort of theatrical, unsubtle acting which works well on stage and the costumes are good, for example, when the prince gets turned into a bear they were clever enough not to have a bear mask but to have hairs glued onto his face so you could still see the pathos in his features (as my friend put it he doesn’t look like Bungle out of Rainbow which would have been really rubbish).
I chose to watch it with the English voice over, just as I watched it as a little kid. This is a narrator telling the story Jackanory style in line with the visuals. I don’t know in how many countries this was shown, but I can see how it could have wide appeal as the visuals and acting are compelling enough, and with a narrator telling the story in their own language it would work for children anywhere. There is one thing I misremember … instead of hearing the actors’ voices in the background (it was a German production and the actors speak in German) I remember a constant burbling in the background of what sounded like another narration in Czech or something? … this of course added to the overall weirdness … perhaps this is a false memory but the friend who gave it to me says that he remembers the same.
The wicked dwarf is very scary indeed and I am surprised that it didn’t scare me as a little kid. When he’s thwarting the prince and princess you can hear his cackling laughter as his face pops up out of a cloud, or out of the side of a tree, or out of the ground like an evil teletubby.
