The Nutcracker: An Index and my Top Five

Between 2011 and this year, I have written blogs about thirty works based on E.T.A. Hoffmann's The Nutcracker and the Mouse King. There are more, of course. Little audio adaptations, stage productions that aren't ballets, little animated video versions thanks to internet video being widespread, and countless more adaptations of the ballet. But given that there are so many, it was important to just say, "this is enough for now."

Perhaps some day, if the mood strikes me, I'll write about more of them. I avoided going to the ballet as many of them have similar if not identical structures, the differences being in the exact choreography and costume and set designs. I made an exception for the Stowell/Sendak adaptation of the ballet as it tried to hew closer to the original Hoffmann story. As such, if I do write about the ballet adaptations, I don't expect to repeat my thoughts.

I feel my more recent writings are better than my 2011 efforts, not just that I've improved my writing style, but I tried to do more research about the versions I was looking into. As such, I discovered more versions and discovered many interesting things about the people involved with the properties.

So, here is a list of the Nutcracker blogs from this year and 2011, arranged in order of their release.

• The Nutcracker and the Mouse King, the story that started it all, my original 2011 blog, and my 2018 blog: Cracking the Shell of E.T.A. Hoffmann's Classic
• Histoire d'un casse-noisette, the French adaptation by Alexandre Dumas
• Carl Reinecke's Nutcracker and the Mouse King suite
• The Nutcracker Ballet, the famous adaptation scored by Tchaikovsky, my original 2011 blog and my more researched 2018 blog.
• Warren Chappell's 1958 Nutcracker picture book
• Dziadek do orzechów (1967), the Polish film adaptation
• Щелкунчик (1973), a Russian animated adaptation
• Caedmon Audio's presentation of Janet Schulman's 1977 adaptation of the story
• The Nutcracker and the Mouse King, Bura and Hardwick's 1978 stop-motion adaptation 
• Nutcracker Fantasy, Sanrio's 1979 stop-motion adaptation
• The Nutcracker, the Kent Stowell and Maurice Sendak 1983 production and its 1986 film
• The Nutcracker, F Production's 1985 puppet adaptation
• The Care Bears Nutcracker Suite, the 1988 Christmas special
• The Nutcracker Prince, the 1990 theatrical animated film
• The Nutcracker, an episode of Funky Fables
• Lamb Chop's Nutcracker Suite, Shari Lewis' 1993 audio adaptation
• The Nutcracker, a 1994 animated adaptation from Storyteller's Classics
• The Nutcracker, a 1995 anime adaptation from Jetlag Productions
• Le Fiabe più Belle. — Lo Schiaccianoci, another 1995 anime adaptation from Toei
• The Nuttiest Nutcracker, a 1999 animated adaptation
• The Nutcracker, a 2000 episode of Hello Kitty's Animation Theatre
• Barbie in the Nutcracker, the 2001 animated film
• Katya and the Nutcracker, a 2001 animated version
• Щелкунчик, a 2004 Russian animated version that was also redubbed in English
• The Secret of the Nutcracker, a 2007 Candadian film inspired by the story
• The Nutcracker in 3D/The Untold Story, the film eventually released in 2010
• The Nutcracker and The Mouse King, an adaptation from BBC Radio
• The Nutcracker Sweet, a 2015 animated adaptation
• Nussknacker und Mausekönig (2015), a German television adaptation
• Hiddensee: A Tale of the Once and Future Nutcracker, a 2017 novel by Gregory Maguire
• The Nutcracker and the Four Realms, Disney's 2018 film inspired by the story

In addition, I wrote a blog about my personal feelings about the Nutcracker in 2011 and I wrote up my top five best and five worst adaptations. This year, here are my new top five Nutcracker adaptations:

5. Dziadek do orzechów, the 1967 version follows Hoffmann faithfully and does so delightfully, but is unable to fully immerse itself in fantasy by cutting the scenes in the Land of Sweets.

4. Щелкунчик (1973), the Russian cartoon manages to stay in the top 5 by still being a dialogue-less adaptation with style, smartly timing itself to Tchaikovsky's music.

3. Nussknacker und Mausekönig, this 2015 German television adaptation enters the top five with a solid adaptation that plays a loosely with the story but sticking to the themes of the original and updating the storytelling

2. Nutcracker Fantasy, moving up to the number 2 position, this stop motion version goes full out for fantasy while wholly reworking the plot, but keeps the heart of the story intact.

1. The Nutcracker Prince, this animated adaptation sticks faithfully to Hoffmann's story while smartly reworking it for cinematic effect. It goes even further by fleshing out the cast with some of Clara's toys come to life, in keeping with the original story's moments of Marie talking to her dolls as if they're people.

Hiddensee: A Tale of the Once and Future Nutcracker

After taking on L. Frank Baum's Oz mythos in The Wicked Years series, Cinderella in Tales of an Ugly Stepsister, Snow White in Mirror, Mirror and Alice in Wonderland in After Alice, author Gregory Maguire turned to Hoffmann's Christmas classic in Hiddensee: A Tale of the Once and Future Nutcracker.

What many of these books have in common is that Maguire will select a character or themes and take his own spin on the tale from another perspective, sometimes telling the life story of the side characters.

In Hiddensee, Maguire selects the character of Godfather Drosselmeier from The Nutcracker. (I've not addressed it before, but with the spelling of Drosselmeyer's name varies in different versions. I typically stick to the one with a y, but the one with an i instead is just as valid.)

Maguire's Dirk is a foundling: an abandoned child. He was taken in by a couple who lived in the woods and raised him. As he learns to cut wood, an accident happens, leading Dirk to have a strange experience. After many years, he goes to learn more about the world. As he learns from a minister, he is given his last name: Drosselmeier.

Dirk meets various people through the years, chiefly Felix Stahlbaum, a man who appreciates him for who he is, even if he doesn't fully understand him, and there is even a homoerotic moment between them.

The story returns to a legend of a golden walnut that contains a key, Drosselmeier eventually making a nutcracker that he claims will open the nut one day. It is, of course, this nutcracker that is eventually given to Claire-Marie (or "Klara") Stahlbaum, an imaginative child who Dirk particularly loves.

The book offers a take on the Nutcracker story wholly its own. While Maguire relishes in the mundane looking for fantasy (he describes hair color like "frozen mud" or "melted marzipan"), he creates in Dirk a man who may yet be the mysterious and nearly sinister figure from Hoffmann's original story, but is yet not particularly a bad man, just one who seeks to find more from life than it willingly offers, and in the end, his lone lasting accomplishment is giving inspiration to a child one Christmas Eve.

I found some of the book particularly lengthy with discussions and thoughts about Dirk's past experiences and philosophy filling pages and pages. Yet it goes for just under 300 pages, rendering this on the shorter end as some novels go.

References to other works appear, with Dirk's adoptive mother telling stories to one of the Brothers Grimm, Hans Christian Andersen is mentioned, and it's even mentioned that Dirk has a copy of Dickens' A Christmas Carol. This makes it impossible for the story to neatly complement Hoffmann's original story, dating from 1816-1818, while Dickens' famous story was first published in 1843, 21 years after Hoffmann's death. This is rather disappointing as Wicked retells many of the events of The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, just from the perspective of the Wicked Witch in a version of Oz different from Baum's, but could arguably be out of the perception of Dorothy.

Another disappointment I had is that Hoffmann's Drosselmeyer is first introduced with his clock repair and his ability to create clockworks. One would think that having a young Dirk become fascinated with clockworks and finding out how they work and mastering them for himself would lend itself well to the storytelling. At over two-thirds of the way into the book, I was wondering if it would come in at all. It finally did, with his mastery of clockwork being briefly mentioned to explain how he made a few toys, especially the clockwork castle from Hoffmann's story that Fritz quickly grows bored with.

Overall, I would only recommend Hiddensee to those familiar with Maguire from his other works. It's not as out there as some scenes in Wicked (if you read it, you know what I mean), and provides an interesting story on its own. As a companion to Hoffmann, it falters in a few areas.

Storyteller's Classics presents The Nutcracker

Here is a half hour animated adaptation, but it's not listed on IMDb. The end credits say it was produced by British company Mad Man Movies for Castle Communications, whose sole IMDb credit is a 1996 Christmas themed special titled Silent Night. This carries a copyright date of 1994, and according to a WorldCat listing, it was released on VHS by the Orion company. A YouTube video transfer of a commercial for the Storyteller's Classics series reveals four other titles in the series: Peter and the Wolf, The Toys' Symphony, and animated adaptations of Tchaikovsky's other ballets: Sleeping Beauty and Swan Lake, all narrated by Dudley Moore or Helena Bonham Carter. Moore narrates this one, which is animated well and looks nice, but is not "breathtaking animation" as the commercial says.

This adaptation opens with a party at Marie and Fritz's home (yes, they have their original Hoffmann names). A couple of servants are getting everything ready while mice raid the food. Drosselmeyer arrives and among his gifts is of course the Nutcracker, which Fritz breaks some of the teeth off of. The mice spot the Nutcracker and inform their king.

Marie sleeps with her Nutcracker and the mice invade her room to try to steal it. When she gets up to investigate, they scurry away. The Nutcracker comes to life and Marie shrinks. He explains that he was the prince of Candyland who was going to marry a princess, but her father didn't want them to marry, fighting with the prince. When the king gets a wizard to turn the prince into a nutcracker, he refuses to pay for the service, and is turned into a mouse king.

The mice attack the castle Drosselmeyer brought, Marie and the Nutcracker making a stand, but Marie is captured. The Nutcracker manages to free her and they go to Drosselmeyer's workshop, which leads them to Candyland. (Apparently, riding the carousel does it.) The Sugar Plum Fairy brings them to her castle, where she pays the wizard to break the curse on the Nutcracker to restore him to the form of a prince and Marie becomes a princess, while the Mouse King arrives.

Marie confiscates the Mouse King's crown and disposes of it, rendering the king a regular mouse, and the other mice rebel against him. The prince and Marie kiss, then the scene fades to Marie and the Nutcracker still in bed on Christmas morning, but the living room is still a mess from the battle. So was it a dream?

I was reminded a bit of the 1973 Russian Nutcracker while reviewing this one, in which the Nutcracker also tells a different origin story for himself and uses no dialogue (there is a version narrated by Shirley MacLaine, but I haven't seen it). Still, that one had style, deciding to time the animation with the music, while this one just has the music play in the background. It also alters the plot in an unusual twist, what with Marie being imprisoned and later defeating the Mouse King—revealed to be a transformed person who is never restored—just by removing his crown. I can't exactly say it was bad, but it wasn't that great either.

This version seems to be hard to find. Copies pop up on eBay, and it doesn't appear to have been reissued on DVD. I found it on YouTube, the uploader unsure of its origins and their tape starting after the title and possible opening credits had already passed. The sound had an unfortunate loud tape hiss. They claim to have made the video from a DVD transfer of a VHS recording from a TV broadcast. If you're interested in collecting it, copies may be out there, but I wouldn't recommend spending too much on it.

Katya and the Nutcracker: A Christmas Fantasy

I discovered this version of The Nutcracker shortly after completing my 2011 blog series. It's an animated take on the story that uses no dialogue, only sound effects and Tchaikovsky's score for the ballet. It runs for about 25 minutes. I was wondering if Katya was part of a series, but seems this was done to present a more Russian Nutcracker in honor of the Russian roots of Tchaikovsky and the ballet.

This adaptation is set in 1910 St. Petersburg, evident from Russian architecture and some fashions. Katya lives with her father and three other children and an older woman. This might be a grandmother or an aunt, and the other children might be her siblings or cousins. There's a boy and twin girls. This Christmas, the children are given presents, but while the others get toys, there's nothing for Katya. She is happy, however, when her father gives her a nutcracker. (This one has an odd design with an O-shaped body, the nut is put in the opening and the arm is cranked to break the shell.) However, the boy tries to get his turn at it and breaks the arm off. Katya goes to bed unhappily.

That night, she awakens and as she goes downstairs, she shrinks and finds the toys and the Christmas tree being attacked and looted by mice, their leader wearing a gas mask. The toys come to life and fight back, but the tide turns when Katya's cat arrives on the scene and scares the mice away, the leader taking to a toy airplane, but the Nutcracker and Katya aren't willing to let him go without a fight, and all three ride the plane outside, where after a bit, the lead mouse is set flying into the sky with an explosion by Katya pulling a lever on the plane.

To celebrate, Katya and the Nutcracker fly to a fairyland, where the Nutcracker is given a new arm, and they are entertained by many dancing creatures (including a group of mice). The two then head out to a wondrous winter realm, during which time the Nutcracker is turned into a real boy able to ice skate with Katya. They meet icy centaurs before the scene goes back to Katya's bedroom, revealing it to be just a dream, her father placing a repaired Nutcracker on her bed just before she awakens.

As I was writing this, I realized that although we can see a bit of the classic Nutcracker towards the beginning, after that, the story more resembles Raymond Briggs' classic picture book The Snowman in which a child goes off with a magical creature and has a wondrous experience that appears to be only a dream. And sure, this is present in the original Nutcracker story, but given that an animated version of The Snowman is a Christmas staple in the UK and this is a British based production as well, you can't help but wonder if some subtle inspiration happened. Particularly as both animated specials feature no dialogue.

To be fair, the animation is generally well done, though I can't say I care for a lot of the character designs. The story adaptation is no less faithful than a lot of versions of the ballet, and honestly, I'd suggest that if you're interested, give it a watch.

Hello Kitty's The Nutcracker

 Japanese company Sanrio turned to The Nutcracker in 1979 with Nutcracker Fantasy, which I covered back in 2011. But that one had a tiny blink and miss cameo by their most famous creation, Hello Kitty, and wouldn't you know? There's now a Hello Kitty Nutcracker cartoon. This was part of the series Hello Kitty's Animation Theater, released in 2000. Seemingly, Hello Kitty and her friends would be cast as the characters of a story. Note that the stories ran about fourteen minutes and were very kid-friendly.

In this one, Hello Kitty is Clara and Dear Daniel is Fritz. Clara gets the Nutcracker for Christmas, but when Fritz breaks it, Clara takes it to the shop of Drosselmeyer to have it fixed. While she's there, Drosselmeyer tells her the story of how a king had his sausage party (hey, they said it) ruined by the Mouse Queen eating most of the fat for the sausages. When the king sets traps, the Mouse Queen takes revenge by cursing the Princess. A young Drosselmeyer (who the storyteller teases may be a relation) breaks the nut and the curse, but is cursed and rebuffed by the princess for his pains. Drosselmeyer gives her a necklace that he says may help her.

Clara believes this may be her Nutcracker and that night, she finds herself and her Nutcracker transported to an otherworldly landscape where the Nutcracker fights the Mouse King. When Clara tries to help, she's subdued by the Mouse Queen, who's defeated when she uses magic on Clara, but it's repulsed by the necklace. Using the necklace, the Nutcracker defeats the Mouse King and is restored to his true form and takes Clara for a boat ride to the Land of Sweets, where everything is made of sweets. A suddenly shaky boat turns to Clara being shaken awake at home, just in time to meet Drosselmeyer and his nephew Kristoff.

There's not a lot to this adaptation, which offers a slightly abbreviated Story of the Hard Nut. Like Nutcracker Fantasy, Clara actually encounters the Mouse Queen, who has an expanded role. Having recently seen the Funky Fables version, I couldn't help but note that Clara suddenly being pulled into a different landscape to fight the Mouse King happens in both versions. But like Funky Fables, this one is a very inoffensive Nutcracker. Not bad, but not exactly a major one.

Funky Fables: The Nutcracker

Funky Fables was a series by Saban Entertainment that presented some very comically designed anime adaptations of classic fairy tales, from Cinderella and Snow White to The Wizard of Oz and, of course, The Nutcracker. The designs were complemented by whimsical music and comical narration and dialogue.

 In this Nutcracker, Clara and Fritz are anxiously awaiting their Christmas presents, Fritz constantly getting the holiday wrong, and saying he wants a "chicken." (He means a hobby horse.) Well, when all is ready, Fritz gets his "chicken" and Clara gets the Nutcracker, presented to her by Drosselmeyer, who has his eyepatch, a beard and a big hat. She's unimpressed at first until Fritz asks how he's a soldier with no sword. She suggests that maybe he's a nonviolent pacifist.

That night, Clara has been staying up late with the Nutcracker, becoming very fond of him. When she finally goes to bed, she has the Nutcracker tucked in next to her. At midnight, it comes to life as the King of the Mice and a couple of his mice soldiers jump out of her clock, then spotting the Nutcracker next to Clara, they hop into her bed, waking her up. Suddenly she's pulled up into the air and a mysterious door appears behind her and she's pulled through.

Clara spots the Nutcracker fighting a couple mice, then the Mouse King appears behind her. As he grabs her, the Nutcracker leaps to fight him directly. The Mouse King tosses him off, breaking his arm, but Clara manages to escape by biting the King. She then helps the Nutcracker to a cannon and soldier, which they fire at the charging Mouse King, but it doesn't stop him. A magic nut appears in Clara's hand, and on the Nutcracker's suggestion, she throws it at the king, seemingly making him shatter like glass and transporting her back to her bedroom.

The next morning, Clara hears Drosselmeyer calling her upstairs, so she follows and he tells her that the Nutcracker is a prince of "the dream world," transformed by the King of Mice. He suddenly is downstairs leaving and as he leaves, he suggests Clara look at the grandfather clock in the attic, where she finds a sword on the back of the pendulum. She falls asleep shining it up, and her mother finds her and takes her back to bed.

Clara is almost pulled through the mysterious door once again, but fights back and manages to get to the attic, but can't find the sword as the Mouse King has it and grabs her. He uses energy emanating from the sword to torture the Nutcracker, but Clara manages to divert it back to him, making him drop her and the sword, and restoring him to his true form with seven heads. ("He's so full of evil schemes that one head isn't enough to keep track of all of them," the Nutcracker explains.)

The attic fills with mice, but Clara and the Nutcracker manage to get to a beam above them and use the magic of the sword to turn the Mouse King's minions into flowers. Clara swings down and hurls herself at the King, knocking him back, letting the Nutcracker get in the finishing blow with the sword. Giving the Nutcracker the King's crown, he resumes his true form as Prince Bongo of Dream World, which they visit, described as a "flight of fancy to the furthest reaches of the imagination." They go to the castle and join a ball, where they meet Clara's favorite storybook characters.

Waking up the next day, Clara looks out the window and spots Drosselmeyer outside and goes outside to meet his grandson Bongo, who takes her to his kingdom. In a bit of humor, the narrator explains that this happened a long time ago, the kingdom is now an amusement park, the castle is a hotel, but you can visit the penthouse where Clara and Bongo lived happily ever after, "just go to the front desk and ask for... the Nutcracker Suite."

This one's really loose and doesn't really get a lot of the themes of the original story across, but it does maintain Clara's status as a heroine. Funky Fables isn't a series you'd expect a serious adaptation from, so I'll give it a pass. It's not a great adaptation, but it's not an offensive one, either.

F Productions Presents The Nutcracker

I could recall my father checking out a video tape from the library containing some adaptation of The Nutcracker performed by puppets. I could remember very little, except that the puppet depicting Clara didn't look very inviting with large, slanted eyes that made her look annoyed. I recall some announcer introducing "The Waltz of the Flowers," and that was it, really. Thinking harder, I can remember that the Nutcracker seen was just a prop and didn't even come to life.

Well, as I decided to search "Nutcracker" on streaming services to find more adaptations, I came across it on Amazon Prime. There was the Clara puppet, having re-emerged from my childhood memories. So, I decided it was time to look it over again.

Frankly, it's not really worth the half hour it takes to play.

It opens with a puppet of an old man wearing a black robe, and this puppet has a stationary face, while the hands are clearly human hands, and it gives you a quick introduction to the ballet, telling you the music was by Tchaikovsky, the original choreography by Petipa (not that we see it here) and when the original ballet debuted. He further tells us what a nutcracker is and how it works, using the prop Nutcracker. He tells us we won't see the entire ballet, just an abridgement of Act II.

Act II, which famously has no substantial plot. It's the celebration of the Nutcracker's victory, which we don't even get to see here.

The ballet starts with an abridgement of the overture, played by two puppet crickets on a piano. The opening credits said the music was adapted for two keyboards, and that's what you hear here. No grand orchestration.

It shows us Clara walking through the woods to the candy castle, then joining the King and Queen of Sweets. The King introduces each of the dances, which only last a few minutes, filling out the 28 minute run time until the finale, The Waltz of the Flowers. A variety of puppets move in time to the music, and as far as that's concerned, it's well-done and probably good enough to keep young children occupied with the screen.

Overall, this version of The Nutcracker has no story, doesn't present a great version of Tchaikovsky's score and is overall unimpressive. It might have been great back in 1985 for a parent wanting to expose their child to some classic music and the ballet, but in short time, there were animated versions and filmed versions of the ballet, not to mention audio recordings of the music readily available, making for better options.

So, pass on this one.

Bura and Hardwick present the Nutcracker and the Mouse King

Bob Bura and John Hardwick were a major name in stop motion animation for kids in the UK, animating several programs for young children, such as Camberton Green, Trumpton, Chigley and You and Me as well as producing segments for the series Music Time. One of their shorts for the series was indeed based on The Nutcracker and the Mouse King. (Another was Coppelia, an adaptation of a ballet based on two other Hoffmann tales.)

I've found a few conflicting dates on this adaptation, but when I found it won a BAFTA in 1979, it seems it should have been first aired around Christmas 1978.

The short runs for just under 20 minutes and features very smooth stop animation, thanks to the animators having refined the method for stop-motion. My searching for information turned up that they commissioned a special camera and would turn out perfect stop-motion photography. They would also design their puppets and props with little clues for how to move it for the next frame.

Anyway, the story begins with Clara and Fritz's family's Christmas party, all the scenes being set to Tchaikovsky's score. Fritz is again depicted as a younger brother and a nice shot shows him sliding down a bannister. Drosselmeyer is the last to arrive to the party with a mechanical castle and a swan, but the narrator says Clara likes the Nutcracker (which was seen on the tree) most of all.

It seemed a little odd to me how the entire party seems to focus on Clara joyfully cracking nuts and then babying the Nutcracker. To break it up, Fritz begins playing with toy instruments loudly and to stop it, Drosselmeyer reads the Nutcracker's story, that a king and queen had a lovely daughter, but had also set several mouse traps, which upset the Mouse Queen and her seven-headed son. In retaliation, the Mouse Queen curses the baby princess, saying it can be only broken if the silver nut is broken by a young man. The King and Queen promise the Kingdom of Sweets to whoever can break it, and a young prince answers the call and comes through, but steps on the Mouse Queen, who turns him into a Nutcracker, who can only be restored if he defeats the Mouse King and wins the love of a young woman.

The guests go to dinner, Fritz taking the Nutcracker from the crib Clara put him in and putting him on top of the castle. That night, Clara goes downstairs and sees the Nutcracker lead the toys against the mice, climaxing with him fighting the Mouse King on the castle and pushing him into a moat where he drowns.

Then the Nutcracker is turned into a prince and the castle grows to a large size, where the swan takes the Prince and Clara across the moat to the castle where sweets (actual candy) dances. The film ends with a swirling of faces before fading to Clara in bed, with narration asking if it was real or if Clara was just dreaming.

Overall, the story is simplified and is aimed more at introducing children to the stories that go along with classical music. And really, the fact that we get the story of how the Nutcracker came to be shows that the adaptation went for a combination of the ballet and the original Hoffmann story. (Or perhaps Dumas' rendition.) While it does lack depth, it effectively handles the Mouse King, making that part a little scary for youngsters who'll enjoy coming back to it later, or even looking to other versions of the story.

So, while it was BAFTA winning and overall definitely isn't bad, this is more of a "My First Nutcracker" rather than a great full-fledged adaptation. And that's perfectly fine.

The Nutcracker Sweet

I almost wanted to root for Aronnax Animation's The Nutcracker Sweet. It was produced in Peru, as many South American countries are getting into the animation industry, and it was the company's second film. It has a few good names in the cast: Alicia Silverstone, Drake Bell and Ed Asner. And it's clearly based on the original story over the ballet, albeit Dumas' rewriting of it.

The story follows Marie and Fritz Silberhaus (as I said, Dumas) over the day before Christmas Eve. They clash as siblings often do, with Fritz being the younger one. Their Godfather Drosselmeyer arrives and presents them with a present to share: a nutcracker. The nutcracker does get damaged, but it is easily repaired.

During these scenes, an owl in the clock pops out and tells the story of the Nutcracker, with some alterations. The most altered bit is that the Mouse Queen created the Mouse King with a magic spell that required her to steal baby Pirlipat's crown, which had the side effect of making the princess ugly.  The promised reward for breaking her curse is "becoming a prince," and Drosselmeyer's nephew is made the kingdom of the Land of Sweets.

That night, Marie witnesses the battle between the mice and the toys and ends it by throwing her slipper at the Mouse King. The next day, she awakens is visited by her godfather. That night, she and Nutcracker go to the Land of Sweets, called the Kingdom of Marzipan, where the Christmas Forest somehow turns Marie into a toy soldier. They meet Nutcracker's sister, Princess Marmalade.

Fritz is tricked by the mice to taking them to the Land of Sweets, where they become robotic toy mice and they turn on him and lay siege on Nutcracker's castle. Giant tree and gelatin people are involved somehow, and the battle climaxes with the Mouse King chasing Nutcracker up a tower. The Mouse King falls off, but the Nutcracker tries to save him at first before the Mouse King finally meets his end by falling to the ground.

Fritz and Marie are returned home (and back in human form) for Christmas, when Drosselmeyer's nephew shows up and tells them they can visit his kingdom anytime they want.

The story adaptation goes off the rails trying to go epic scale with storytelling that really doesn't warrant it. There's slowed down scenes that really shouldn't be slowed down. The animation is quaint, but not remarkable. It's not what you'd expect from Pixar or Illumination or Blue Sky. I'm pretty sure Fritz and Marie and the Mice getting turned into toys were because those forms were easier to animate and it reduced the budget. The voice cast does fairly well, though.

The depth to the story has all been scrubbed and sanitized and "sweetened" away, eliminating anything grotesque or anything that might rankle parents. To me, this was the biggest weakness as the slightly disturbing stories and fairy tales given to kids makes them think. Removing objectionable content might make the story more fun, but it makes it ultimately forgettable.

If you're really interested, give this Nutcracker a spin. If not, give it a pass.

Carl Reinecke and the Nutcracker

This time, we're not doing a review. This is because I only became aware of this derivative work based on The Nutcracker very recently. Instead, consider this more of me pointing out a curiosity.

German composer, conductor and pianist Carl Reinecke was quite the influential artist of his time, his most famous work being the opera Undine. He also did the piano arrangement for the classic Christmas carol "Silent Night." Yet looking through his works turns up eight pieces for two to play on a piano together in a collection titled Nussknacker und Mausekönig. This does not appear to be one of his major works, and I can't tell if it was simply a number of pieces of music based on Hoffmann's story or if it was written as an actual opera. The pieces date as early as 1855, when some of the sheet music was published. This means that it predated Tchaikovsky's famous score for the ballet by a few decades and then some.

The eight pieces are:

• Overture
• Weihnachtsabend (Christmas Eve)
• Pate Drosselmeyer's Automaten (Godfather Drosselmeyer's Machine)
• Schlagt den Generalmarsch getreuer Vasalle Tambour (Beat the General March, Loyal vassal Tambour - The Battle scene, also known as Die Schlacht, the Battle)
• Pate Drosselmeyer's Uhrmacherliedchen (Godfather Drosselmeyer's Clock Song)
• Schäferballet im Puppenreich (The Shepherd Ballet in Doll Land)
• Barkarole (Baracolle, likely to correspond with the song sung by the little men who take Marie and Nutcracker in a boat)
• Hochzeitsmarsch  (Wedding March)

It seems the pieces are popular for recitals in Germany, and around the music a narrator would tell parts of a shortened version of the story. Even so, recordings of all eight pieces are rather rare, particularly with Tchaikovsky's ballet score eventually sending Reinecke's compositions into the realms of obscurity as far as international consciousness was concerned.

Thanks to the music being over 100 years old, the sheet music and English versions of suggested dialogue for reading with them are available online. Note that the sheet music is laid out for two players at one piano. Anyone attempting to create a MIDI would need to enter both pages of notes at the same time.

Here is what I have been able to turn up in trying to enjoy Reinecke's Nutcracker in a post-Tchaikovsky world:

• A YouTube playlist of a German children's performance
• Sheet music from IMSLP
• A book containing the story retold in rhyme as well as sheet music
• An edition of Hoffmann's story along with readings to go along with Reinecke's music.
• A video of a piano roll, created by Reinecke himself

 There is also a CD featuring the music available from Germany. Since writing the above sections of this entry, I have obtained a copy of this disc and am going to review it here.

This CD is, as far as I am aware, the only complete recording of Reinecke's Nutcracker score. However, it is designed for children, and also contains a retelling of the story, completely in German. Mostly, Reinecke's melodies are allowed to play without narration over them, but a few times they aren't, with "Drosselmeyer's Clock Song" especially having narration over it.

I don't know German, so I couldn't follow the story adaptation, but given that I heard the name "Pirlipat," I assume it faithfully follows Hoffmann's original story. Stephen Weiss tells the story in an appropriate tone, a little low and hushed as if he's telling a wondrous story to a group of enthralled children, which in fact he is!

As the sole complete recording of Reinecke's melodies, I recommend this to Nutcracker fans. If you're wanting to hear a more pure version of "Drosselmeyer's Clock Song," there is a version performed on strings on digital platforms, as well as a similar recording of "Christmas Eve." I would have preferred to have the narration tracks around the music tracks rather than it being mixed in, but I'll take this over nothing.

Dziadek do orzechów (1967)

I had heard that there was a Nutcracker film in Poland, but I never got around to checking it out. ... Until now.

Dziadek do orzechów was released in 1967 and uses stop motion and other camera tricks when special effects are needed.

Like yesterday's German offering, I don't understand Polish, and this time, I had no summary, just what was going on onscreen and familiarity with the source material to go on. So, while I was able to follow the story, I can't comment on the dialogue. Which is a pity, because with some caveats, it looks like this one really tried to follow Hoffmann's story faithfully.

Before the credits start (it was one of those that had the credits before the movie starts), the movie is introduced by none other than E.T.A. Hoffmann, or at least actor Wienczyslaw Glinski portraying him with a voiceover and posing for various photographs, which move around on a wall. In the opening, you also hear some of the score, which uses no music from the ballet.

The film opens in Drosselmeyer's workshop, with a few stop-motion effects making him look magical. One of the few outdoor scenes shows him walking to the Stahlbaum home, then levitating to the second story window. He's also played by Wienczyslaw Glinski. And no, he doesn't have an eyepatch.

Then the classic story starts proper as Marie and Friz wait to see the Christmas tree and have their presents. When they do, there's a choir of children singing. The story flows much the same as in the book, except there are guests present. It seems Louise may be present, but without subtitles or being able to understand the language, I'm not sure who she was. Drosselmeyer brings a mechanical castle, Marie gets the Nutcracker, Fritz damages it, and it's put in a doll bed, with Marie even apologizing to one of her dolls for making use of it.

When the Mouse King arrives, we see he only has two heads. As he, the mice and the toys are animated via stop-motion, I'll forgive the lack of the other five heads as I assume it was easier to handle.

A little moment from Hoffmann I don't believe I've seen in any other adaptations is present as when the Nutcracker gets up to fight, Marie's doll begs him to not fight, and even to take her token, but he tells her he is already carrying one for another as his bandage is a ribbon Marie gave him.

The battle scene is nicely done for what it is. It's not the most thrilling of stop-motion battle scenes, but it tells the story and uses a nice arrange of soldiers and mice.

When Marie is laid up in bed, Drosselmeyer enters magically through a wall and even at one point appears inside a bird cage. The Story of the Hard Nut is told in one go with Marie's mother and Fritz present. The story is told extremely faithfully to Hoffmann's text, even including a bit where one of the court is bitten by the baby Princess Pirlipat. There's just one thing: the entire cast of characters are played by children. The affair of the sausages seems to have one alteration, the Mouse Queen steals most of the sausages rather than eating up the fat. There is also a humorous bit in which a courtier steps on a mouse trap. In a twist, it seems the Mouse Queen survives the story but threatens that her son will get revenge as the two-headed Mouse King is seen leaving Pirlipat's crib after she's cursed.

Nearly keeping instep with Hoffmann's text, even the scene in which young Drosselmeyer and the astrologer give up is set inside in a room with trees printed on the wallpaper and potted plants around them. The scene where they meet Drosselmeyer's cousin, however, is supposed to be set outside, but still looks like a set on a stage. In a nice touch, the first scene with the nephew shows him cracking nuts with his teeth with a sister handing him nuts and another one taking the kernels. Later, when he breaks Pirlipat's curse, he slips backwards when the Mouse King kicks half of the Krakatuk nut's shell under his feet, and when he falls, it's a jump cut and he's gone and a stop-motion animated Nutcracker is in his place.

Marie is threatened by the Mouse King on three consecutive nights and has to give in to his demands so she can protect the Nutcracker, but she tells Fritz, who makes the suggestion that the family borrow the baker's cat, and this is displayed by a scene in which he and a woman visit the bakery. It was a bit odd to have a scene in a wildly different location.

Marie has conversations with the Mouse King that go on for quite a bit, but the filmmakers employ a few tricks with the Mouse King puppet, such as having him clinging to a curtain or even yawning.

Finally, Marie asks Fritz for a sword so the Nutcracker can fight the Mouse King, and Fritz agrees. While the Nutcracker does conquer the Mouse King and give Marie the crowns, if they visit his land, it is done entirely offscreen.

The family isn't picking up on Marie's stories, and she finally does confess her love for the Nutcracker. The restoration happens with the Nutcracker on the shelf, suddenly he is replaced by a very small nephew, then the next shot shows him at normal size stepping out from the cabinet doors. According to IMDb, the nephew is named "Amadeusz," which works as well as anything.

Amadeusz proposes to Marie, and they use the Mouse King's crowns as engagement rings. Then, they step through a wardrobe (shades of Narnia!) into a weird scene. It's a magical landscape, and they are semi-transparent, with a number of exposures overlaid. During this shot, Marie's blue dress is transfigured into a more elaborate white one. They leave, and then of all things, Marie's mother steps into the wardrobe, looks around in the strange landscape, then steps back out. The production wraps up with some final narration by Drosselmeyer in his workshop.

Overall, it's a lush, interesting production that does a number of unusual choices while largely sticking to Hoffmann's story. I just wish they could've actually done some scenes in the Land of Sweets and it would've nudged it just a bit closer to perfection. Still, if you're interested, I'd recommend checking it out. Especially if anyone can point me towards an English subtitled version.

Nussknacker und Mausekönig (2015)

 I happened to stumble across a German television production of The Nutcracker and the Mouse King. It was produced in 2015 for the German series 6 auf einen Streich (6 in one Blow, meant to bring to mind The Brave Little Tailor), which adapted fairy tales for television, each episode running for just under an hour.

I was a little excited at the discovery as it was in German, the original language of The Nutcracker, and it was low budget, meaning that if it veered away from the text, it wouldn't be to show off grand spectacle. In addition, it is the first film version of the story to originate from Germany. (There may have been filmed productions of the ballet.) This version first aired on Christmas Day, 2015 and was nominated for a Grimme Award.

I need to explain that I do not know German aside from a few words. While I could follow the story and later read a summary translated by Google Translate, it's impossible for me to explain everything exactly as it was depicted. All I had was what was going on onscreen, the tone of the characters's voices and facial expressions, and familiarity with the source material.

The episode opens with Fritz and Marie walking home, spying in at Drosselmeyer's shop on the way. Fritz is a young boy, while Marie is much older, unlike their ages in the original story. Louise is not present here.

They get hit by a snowball by some local boys and Marie throws a snowball towards them, seemingly missing, but she actually was aiming for a branch above them, covering them with snow. Fritz and Marie go home, where their mother scolds them. Perhaps they're late getting home. Mother also seems to be upset when the children notice a mouse in the house (which, to be fair, it is early 19th century Germany, so you don't want mice). I'm going to venture that she is very much focused on the children taking responsibility and being "grown up," especially Marie.

The family sings "O Tannenbaum" as they come to the Christmas tree, and Marie is shown receiving a sugar doll and a dress. Fritz gets a sword to play with. Godfather Drosselmeyer arrives and unveils a toy theater with dancing sugar dolls. It appears that the conversation about altering the mechanism occurs. Drosselmeyer talks about his nephew who's been missing since "the war," but he hopes he'll come home soon.

Marie finds the Nutcracker under the tree and her father demonstrates how to crack nuts with it. Fritz breaks it when he tries to crack a toy cannonball and drops it on the floor, breaking off the lever and an arm. After tying the missing pieces into place, Marie places the Nutcracker into a doll's bed while Fritz seemingly brags about how brave he is while swinging his new sword at a mirror.

That night, Marie goes back downstairs and sees Drosselmeyer's face appear on the clock. Then, a strange young man in a crown and carrying a staff begins to question her about the Nutcracker and then threaten her. After he gets physically abusive, the Nutcracker comes to life as a full-sized man who is yet bandaged, but manages to fight with just his left arm. They fight (we briefly see many mice on the floor and Fritz's toy soldiers do a quick stop-motion move), and Marie throws her shoe at the Mouse King before passing out.

The next morning, the butler finds her on the floor and her mother helps revive her and finds her with a fever. She's allowed to rest, and later Drosselmeyer arrives and using animated shadows he projects on a wall with a device, he tells the story of how Queen Mouserinks and her family ate up the fat for the king's sausages and how mouse traps were made to kill her family, and in revenge, she cursed Princess Pirlipat. He tells how the Krakatuk nut and the young man who could break it were found. Marie's father believes the story is over when he hears that Pirlipat ate the nut, but Drosselmeyer continues to explain how the young man was cursed. Marie realizes that this must be the story of her own Nutcracker and the young man was the last of Mouserink's sons (the summary I read called him "Grobian Mauserinks"), just taking a human form.

That night, the Mouse King enters Marie's bedroom and demands the Nutcracker. She refuses and in retaliation, he bites her sugar doll into pieces. She's found passed out on the floor the next day and revived by her father, who tells her that Drosselmeyer took the Nutcracker to repair it.

The following night, the Mouse King again threatens Marie, and as she is not giving into his demands, he begins tearing up a beloved book her mother gave her. Fritz is actually awakened by this, but by the time he arrives on scene, the Mouse King is gone and he's not ready to believe his sister.

The repaired Nutcracker is brought back the next day, and Marie tells Drosselmeyer about her issues with the Mouse King, but he doesn't readily buy it, though it's always possible he knows more than he lets on.

That night when the Mouse King arrives, the Nutcracker is ready to face him, but he no longer has a sword, however, Fritz is awakened and running in and seeing the situation, brings the Nutcracker his own sword, which allows him to defeat the Mouse King by destroying his crown, turning him permanently into a normal mouse.

With the Mouse King defeated, the Nutcracker can remain in human form and he and Marie disappear into the toy theater, where the figures are alive, including a sugar fairy who's served as regent while the prince has been away. Marie and the Nutcracker dance.

The next morning, Fritz is found passed out on the floor, but otherwise fine. Marie is safe in bed, and gets up, seems to have a quiet bemusement, wearing her new dress. Drosselmeyer arrives and introduces his returned nephew Frederich, who is of course the Nutcracker. He and Marie talk, and a bit of seemingly magic sparkles are seen in a Christmas ornament they're looking at. (According to the summary, which was roughly translated, she asks him if he plans on staying long. He says he doesn't know yet.)

This version of the story is very low budget and it shows in eliminating the battle between the toys and the mice, and having the Mouse King as a man in a costume, and not even an elaborate one. That said, the story changes are well-executed and although the production isn't able to match the grandeur Hoffmann describes in many scenes, it's forgivable.

I actually liked this take on the Mouse King, with Joel Basman being wonderfully hammy and over the top. As a much older Marie, Mala Emde was very effective and Leonard Seyd made the best Fritz I've ever seen. Sven Gielnik was wonderful as the Nutcracker/Frederich and very attractive. I couldn't help but think of a bit from Hoffmann's telling of Pirlipat's story when she notices him and hopes that he will be the one to break the curse and win her hand. I couldn't blame her in that case.

Sadly, I wasn't impressed with Anatole Taubman as Drosselmeyer, who doesn't have the classic eyepatch and didn't exude the same mysterious manner the character is known for. He did have some good moments, particularly the Story of the Hard Nut scene in which his magic lantern shows animated shadows on the wall. Another is while he's repairing the Nutcracker in his shop and notices the time and looks afraid, as if he knows that Marie is facing the Mouse King.

Overall, I'm very glad Germany produced their own Nutcracker film, despite the changes and low budget. The result might not be the perfect adaptation of the Hoffmann story, but I'm ready to put it pretty high up there.

Maurice Sendak and the Nutcracker

Maurice Sendak and Kent Stowell

In 1979, one Kent Stowell, choreographer for the Pacific Northwest Ballet, contacted illustrator Maurice Sendak about collaborating on a new ballet production of The Nutcracker. Sendak was not interested at first, until Stowell asked him to read the original story by Hoffmann. Sendak was struck by how different the Hoffmann tale and the standard ballet version of the story were. Desiring to help create a new version of the ballet that honored Hoffmann, Tchaikovsky "and ourselves," he worked with Ken on what the new ballet needed, as well as designing sets and costumes to bring the story to life with a visual signature wholly Sendak.

The ballet opened in December 1983 to great acclaim, and the Sendak-Stowell edition of The Nutcracker ran through 2014, before the Pacific Northwest Ballet switched to George Balanchine's version.

Still, there is quite a bit from that version of the ballet out there that exists.

My favorite thing about it is that Sendak's work spurred Ralph Manheim's translation of the original Hoffmann story, reworking many of his design work pictures into illustrations, and offering many new illustrations as well.

The book opens with an introduction by Sendak talking about how he came on board the project, what he disliked about the ballet and what he appreciated about the Hoffmann story, and how he and Stowell adapted the book for ballet. He also briefly mentions that he could only find the original story in Dover's The Tales of Hoffmann, and later talks specifically about illustrating the book, that pictures appear in the book that were not used onstage. He also addresses the translation, quoting the editor of the Dover book in that most English translations of Hoffmann aren't done skillfully and lose a lot of Hoffmann's unique voice, but he believes Manheim finally got it right.

In this way, the book acts as a perfect souvenir for the ballet: it contains some words about the adaptation and production, a faithful translation of the original source material, and illustrations that were originally set and costume designs, or are in the same style. It was published in 1984, and copies were likely for sale in the lobby of the Pacific Northwest Ballet.

There was an audiobook of this translation released. Sadly, it's not available through Audible and the audio cassette and CD copies are out of print, but it was read with great gusto by Christopher Plummer and was accompanied with music from Tchaikovsky's score.

The biggest remainder of this edition of the ballet was a film adaptation, essentially filming it, but using some movie magic. Released in 1986, it was titled Nutcracker: The Motion Picture. There were some alterations done to make the ballet more cinematic, notably the ending being altered as cutting between different locations is possible in film, but hard to convey onstage. The film also had a soundtrack album released, containing the complete score.

Part of the ballet's staging is using the story of Pirlipat as a metaphor for Clara's growing up (despite the love given to Hoffmann, it was decided to go with the name Petipa had given her), using an opening the movie didn't use in which Pirlipat chooses to dance with the Nutcracker or the Mouse King. Clara in the film appears to be about fifteen.

The movie opens in Droselmeyer's workshop, showing many shots of the dolls and clocks, Tchaikovsky's score kicking in as he begins to design then build an elaborate clockwork castle. As the opening theme is concluded, Drosselmeyer has fallen asleep after completing his task. The castle comes to life and shows us Clara asleep in bed.

This version re-frames most of the story as Clara's dream, starting with her dreaming about fighting with Fritz, who invites a mouse who bites her. She appears to turn into a mouse herself, but it cuts to the family's Christmas party, and it seems that was just a nightmare.

At the party, Drosselmeyer displays his castle, where a couple of figures dance. The ballet features a sequence with masquerade dancers as Clara discovers the Nutcracker. The interesting thing here is that the music is from Tchaikovsky's The Queen of Spades rather than The Nutcracker. The masquerade dancers are supposed to represent Pirlipat, the Mouse King and the Nutcracker, but the camera doesn't focus on them, instead having many glances between Clara and Drosselmeyer, who watches her anxiously, which is supposed to suggest an introverted, anti-social nature for the old man, but comes off as creepy.

The rest of the first Act is similar in story to most other versions of the ballet, complete with the growing Christmas tree. I have heard that the Mouse King's tail goes across the stage while he's onstage, but am unsure as to how he was depicted. The film shows him as a giant monstrous mouse, most of his heads being behind him. He appears to grow larger until Clara throws her slipper at him, forcing him to turn into a normal-sized mouse, the Nutcracker chasing him through the giant coat he was wearing, Clara following, coming out the other side replaced with an adult dancer and finding the Nutcracker now transformed into a handsome prince. As they journey together in this fairyland, snowflakes dance.

The second act depicts a more accurate version of the multi-cultured Candy Town of Hoffmann's story, with the same actor who plays Drosselmeyer as a Pasha. In the stage version, Clara declines to return home and at the end, the Pasha is revealed to be Drosselmeyer and Clara is highly disturbed when she removes his eyepatch. In the film, the prince and Clara dance and the Pasha lifts them high into the air, and then suddenly breaks his magic, having them free fall to the ground, transforming back into a Nutcracker and a child before Clara awakens from her nightmare, the final pieces of score being a curtain call in Drosselmeyer's clockwork castle.

To reflect the many cultures described in Hoffmann's story, the people who dance in Act 2 are depicted as people from Chinese, Indian, Arabian and other Eastern cultures instead of foods. One beloved alteration was instead of having a dancer represent coffee in the Arabian dance, a dancer dressed as a caged peacock was brought out of a cage to perform. During the Chinese dance, a dancing tiger in a costume dances, but its paws are tied to the other dancers: it's being controlled.

The Sendak-Stowell edition of The Nutcracker tries to draw on nightmares more than dreams, with anxiety building throughout. They play on Drosselmeyer's character and his relationship with Clara as a starting point. Critics have noted that Drosselmeyer seems antagonistic to her throughout, probably playing on how in the original story, she blames him for the battle as he muffled the clock so the chimes wouldn't scare away the mice. Yet Hoffmann is able to finish the story with a more or less happy ending while this production ends it with nasty surprises.

Given how many editions of The Nutcracker ballet tend to go for a sweet fluffy production, I can only assume a mind like Sendak would think of taking it in the opposite direction and create a more disturbing version. It attempts to bring a core to the storytelling of the piece as opposed to other productions in which the plot is wrapped up in the first act and the second act is entirely the celebration. And while this attempt to bring a more cohesive story to the ballet is welcome, I'm not entirely sure if Hoffmann would have wanted it to be so disturbing.

The Nutcracker and the Four Realms

Once upon a time, a very long time ago now, about 2005, Walt Disney Pictures released a movie titled The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. A co-production with Walden Media, the movie did very well, prompting a sequel to hopefully lead to a complete series of Narnia adaptation films. The sequel made money, but not enough to keep Disney happy, and they allowed 20th Century Fox to release the third (and turned out, final) movie. However, Disney wanted to make more successful movies in the fantasy film genre, their next major one being Alice in Wonderland in 2010, directed by Tim Burton.

Alice was massively successful, grossing over a billion dollars. Yet some critics of the film noted its plot similarities to the first Narnia movie. This led to a number of other films in the same genre, some even based on the same source material as classic Disney films, or clearly inspired by those movies: Maleficent, Oz the Great and Powerful, Cinderella, Beauty and the Beast, The Jungle Book, Pete's Dragon, and coming soon, Dumbo, Aladdin, The Lion King and Mulan. Oz the Great and Powerful was also cited as having many similar plot points to Alice.

News of a new Nutcracker film began around the same time that I was posting my 2011 Nutcracker blogs, bouncing from studio to studio. Eventually, Disney announced their film would be titled The Nutcracker and the Four Realms, automatically eliciting some curiosity. Hoffmann's story contains two distinct worlds, were these considered two of the realms? As the first trailer dropped in December of 2017, red alerts began to go off in my mind. Why did the trailer not show the Nutcracker? Where was the Mouse King?

So, Disney released the first trailer for The Nutcracker and the Four Realms, their made-to-order holiday hit for next year.

Only impressive thing is the use of Tchaikovsky's score.

The trailer shows nothing recognizable as E.T.A. Hoffman's The Nutcracker and the Mouse King. I'm not sure how, but as a kid, I was drawn to that story like a moth to flame, and returning to it years later discovered an enchanting tale about a girl who chooses to believe in her dreams, with a mystery as to whether what she experiences are true or not left dangling until the last page.

And after 2000, every movie adaptation turns it into a "Save the kingdom" story instead. Just like The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, just like Tim Burton's Alice in Wonderland, just like Oz the Great and Powerful. Instead of keeping to the original story, they fit it to something else. It's been done already.

Not helping, where's the actual nutcracker of the story? Where's a shot of Marie (or Clara) holding it? I'd rather watch the ballet again, because at least it's easy to understand why that one has to condense the plot so much.

That was my response to the trailer that I posted on my Facebook. Was I just in my early criticism?

Yes.

The film clearly reuses the same plot skeleton as Alice and Oz, just this time, it's even harder to spot the connections to the original story. One wonders if the writers and other people who created the story even read Hoffmann's original story. The end credits at least say it was "suggested" by Hoffmann's story and the ballet, which is credited to Marius Petipa.

The Stahlbaum family of London (it is identified by name, and Big Ben is seen in the beginning) is having their first Christmas without the late matriarch Marie. Young Clara and her younger brother Fritz enjoy a close friendship. with older sister Louise trying to step into the void created by her mother's passing. Their father, struggling without his late wife, gives the children presents their mother asked him to distribute. Clara receives a decorative silver egg that is locked shut.

The family then goes to godfather Drosselmeyer's Christmas Eve party, where Clara accuses her father of being selfish. Drosselmeyer distributes gifts to the guests, which he distributes by strings tied to a tree that lead off to the gift. Clara's leads through several halls and eventually into a dark passageway that leads her into a snowy wood. It leads to a little golden key suspended in a tree that a mouse steals.

Chasing the mouse, Clara enlists the assistance of a soldier (she identifies it as a nutcracker, although it's unclear how she would've known) named Captain Philip Hoffman as they trace the Mouse into the "Fourth Realm," where they are attacked by the "Mouse King," a swarm of thousands of mice that take a vaguely humanoid shape. Hoffman rescues Clara and as they leave the Fourth Realm, the giant clockwork operated by Mother Ginger calls to Clara and says she has the key.

The pair go to the castle at the center of the Four Realms in the Christmas Tree Forest. (Wait, did they just base the design of this world on the Land of Oz?) Here, Clara meets the Regents of the other three Realms: Hawthorne of the Realm of Flowers, Shiver of the Realm of Snowflakes, and Sugar Plum of the Realm of Sweets. They explain that Clara's mother created their world and that Mother Ginger was the fourth Regent, until something happened that disgraced the Realm of Amusements. Sugar Plum reveals that she has a plan to create an army to defend the other realms, she just needs the key for the Engine, which brought the people of the realms to life. It appears that the key needed for the Egg is the same, so Clara, Philip and a variety of soldiers go to the Fourth Realm to retrieve it.

After a run-in with Mother Ginger, Clara manages to obtain the key, but is frustrated to discover that the egg is a music box. Sugar Plum then uses the key to activate the Engine so she can bring tin soldiers subservient to her to life. She then throws Clara, Philip, Hawthorne and Shiver into prison, making it clear that Sugar Plum was lying about Mother Ginger all along. Clara manages to break out and sends Philip to Mother Ginger to warn her while she breaks into the Engine Room. Philip and the Mice join forces to face off against Sugar Plum's army while Clara manages to make the Engine turn Sugar Plum back into a porcelain doll.

With peace restored to the four realms and Mother Ginger taking her place as a regent again, Clara heads home. She apologizes to her father, coming to understand he's having trouble dealing with his grief. They enjoy a dance with each other as the film ends.

The film's plot isn't very unique, and doesn't seem to build on the original story further. It clearly fits the mold of movies like Alice and Oz in that a person has issues in the regular world, then winds up in a fantasy world where their adventure sees them deal with that, which often includes them gaining confidence in themselves so they can step up to some challenge. (Clara discovers the egg also contains a mirror, and this combined with a note saying "All that you need is inside" assures her that she can set the Realms to order again.) Duplicitous characters, loyal companions and creatures who aren't what they seem at first come into play, often with some special item needing to be retrieved (the vorpal sword, Glinda's wand, or a key). At the end, our main character is a better person for the adventure.

It might be fine if any of these were used to convey any of the themes put forward in Hoffmann's story, but any fail to materialize. Sugar Plum's treachery might be akin to Princess Pirlipat reneging on her promise or the idea that appearances don't necessarily reflect true natures, but given how more similar it is to trends in recent Disney films (Prince Hans in Frozen springs to mind), I find it unlikely. This movie finds a way to use both the names "Marie" and "Clara" by making Marie the name of Clara's mother. The lead mouse is named "Mouserinks." Clara's older sister appears and the family's last name from the Hoffmann story is used. (Dumas changed it to "Silberhaus.")

I am baffled how Disney's version eschewed classic imagery of the story for something so markedly different. Where is Clara holding the Nutcracker? The closest we get is a flashback of her putting an ornament shaped like one on the Christmas tree or her acknowledging Fritz's present, which happens to be one. And the classic Mouse King (one head or seven) is nowhere to be seen. There's little recognizable as the Nutcracker story left, replaced with Disney's generic fantasy tropes.

There's a few other odd things that jumped out to me early in the film. Louise receives a dress that belonged to her late mother, and the shot of her father seeing her in it is supposed to convey him being reminded of his wife and missing her, but perhaps it lingers too long and suggests something unwholesome going on. Later, he demands a dance with her, which out of context can just be seen as confirmation of the unwholesome concept. When Clara receives the egg, Fritz asks her about it. Perhaps I blinked or missed a shot, but it seemed they were on opposite sides of the room, and Fritz appeared to be looking towards the nearest wall while talking to Clara about her gift. It turns out, she was sitting in front of him.

It was also disappointing that Disney retained the Stahlbaum family's and Drosselmeyer's German names, but relocated the story to London. If any studio could make a distinctly German Nutcracker happen, you would think it'd be Disney. Frozen took inspiration from countries near Germany.

While the movie fails to live up to the imagination and themes of the original Hoffmann story, there are good points. The music by James Newton Howard manages to adapt Tchaivosky's score for the ballet impressively. Being a Disney production, the production values are very good. The only special effect that seemed off in my rarely CG-critical opinion was Sugar Plum flying. The cast does their part to make what they hoped would be a good movie, and I liked Morgan Freeman as Drosselmeyer, but given the character's role in the original story, he is severely underutilized here.

I won't be surprised if some kids mark this version as a favorite as they won't think to compare it to Disney's other live action fantasy output and fondly remember going to see the movie with their family. To be fair, despite it being formulaic, it was generally enjoyable. So it'll find some afterlife, despite how it fared at the box office and with critics.