Once Upon a Time… in a Kingdom of Horrifyingly Beautiful People
If you’ve ever wished that Game of Thrones had more ogres, fewer clothes, and a giant flea that gets more character development than most Netflix protagonists, Tale of Tales is your fever dream come true. Matteo Garrone’s 2015 fantasy-horror anthology is a lush, grotesque, and gloriously weird adaptation of Giambattista Basile’s Pentamerone—a collection of fairy tales so twisted the Brothers Grimm probably read it and said, “Whoa, tone it down.”
This is no Disney bedtime story. It’s more like bedtime after three bottles of Chianti and a nervous breakdown. And it’s brilliant.
The Three-Course Feast of Madness
Garrone serves up three stories, each exploring desire, obsession, and the terrible things people do when they mistake craving for love. It’s like The Canterbury Tales, but with more skinning, ogre murder, and medieval awkwardness.
1. The Enchanted Doe — “How to Ruin Motherhood in One Easy Ritual”
Salma Hayek plays a queen so desperate for a child that she takes parenting advice from a necromancer who looks like he crawled out of a Tool music video. He tells her to eat the heart of a sea dragon cooked by a virgin—because sure, that’s how babies work. Her husband (John C. Reilly, looking perpetually confused by his career choices) slays the beast but dies immediately, leaving her with a meal that would make Hannibal Lecter say, “Bit much, isn’t it?”
The result? She gives birth to a pale, white-haired son, Elias—meanwhile, the virgin cook also becomes pregnant with an identical boy, Jonah. The two lads grow up as best friends, which drives the queen absolutely insane because nothing ruins royal brunch like your son hanging out with his peasant twin.
The rest of the tale is a mother-son psychodrama wrapped in monsters, magic, and Oedipal undertones that Freud would have charged extra for. By the end, the queen’s obsession literally turns her into a monster—because this movie isn’t big on subtlety.
2. The Flayed Old Lady — “Extreme Makeover: Medieval Edition”
Vincent Cassel, playing yet another royal sex pest (his résumé must read “Professional Letch”), becomes obsessed with a voice he hears singing outside his castle. Unfortunately for him, that voice belongs to Dora, a woman whose face could stop time—and probably traffic. She and her equally elderly sister Imma live together in a state of codependent delusion.
When Dora tricks the king into sleeping with her in total darkness, he discovers the truth in daylight and hurls her out the window. Fortunately, she’s rescued by a witch who breastfeeds her back to life. (Yes, that’s exactly what happens. Garrone’s world does not care for your boundaries.)
Dora reawakens young and beautiful—because magic lactation works wonders—and immediately snags the king. But power and beauty have expiration dates, and soon her aging sister demands the same transformation. Dora, now a royal snob, sarcastically tells her that the secret to youth is getting flayed alive. Imma takes her seriously. The result? A literal bloodbath and a moral lesson about vanity so dark it makes Snow White look like a toothpaste ad.
3. The Flea — “When Pets Go Wrong”
In the kingdom of Highhills, Toby Jones plays a king whose hobbies include ignoring his daughter Violet (Bebe Cave) and raising insects the size of Buicks. His favorite pet—a flea—grows so enormous it deserves its own zip code. When it dies, the king decides to hold a contest to find a husband for Violet: whoever can identify the creature’s skin wins her hand.
Because nothing says paternal love like turning your child into a prize.
Enter the ogre—huge, hairy, and correct in his answer. Violet marries him out of duty, which is understandable since daddy’s version of The Bachelor doesn’t allow for a “none of the above” option. Cue a nightmare of captivity, gore, and escape that makes Beauty and the Beast feel like The Great British Bake Off.
By the time Violet returns home—bloodied but triumphant, dragging the ogre’s severed head—the film’s message is clear: the real monsters are usually men in crowns.
Themes: Desire, Delusion, and Dragon Heart Cuisine
What ties these stories together isn’t just their medieval insanity—it’s the universal disaster known as human desire. The queen’s maternal obsession, the sisters’ lust for youth, the king’s paternal negligence—they all stem from wanting something so badly it curdles into madness.
Matteo Garrone said he wanted to explore “plastic surgery, motherhood, and adolescence.” Mission accomplished—though here, cosmetic enhancement involves actual flaying, and coming-of-age means outsmarting ogres.
It’s both grotesque and profoundly human. Each character wants something relatable—youth, love, legacy—and each achieves it in the most catastrophically stupid way possible. It’s like watching an ancient episode of Black Mirror directed by Fellini on mescaline.
The Aesthetics: Beauty So Gorgeous It’s Uncomfortable
Visually, Tale of Tales is a feast so rich you can feel your retinas gaining weight. Garrone’s camera loves decadence—the gleam of armor, the rot beneath a banquet table, the shimmer of fairy-tale horror lurking behind royal curtains.
Filmed across real Italian castles and landscapes that look stolen from oil paintings, every frame drips with texture. The contrast between lavish beauty and grotesque content is intoxicating. Blood on marble, lace over decay—it’s all part of the director’s grand joke: that fairy tales were always more horrifying than wholesome.
Even the creatures—sea dragon, ogre, magic flea—are rendered with a mix of wonder and unease, like museum exhibits that might suddenly start breathing.
The Performances: Regal Madness All Around
Salma Hayek devouring a sea dragon’s heart with the ferocity of a Michelin-starred demon queen is an image that deserves to hang in the Louvre. She’s magnetic—a woman who’d burn down heaven if it meant better maternity prospects.
Vincent Cassel delivers his signature blend of sleaze and charisma, proving yet again that no one plays “horny monarch with poor impulse control” quite like him. Toby Jones, meanwhile, steals his segment by treating a giant flea like a beloved house cat—his understated devotion to this absurdity makes it oddly tragic.
John C. Reilly, appearing briefly before being eaten by plot mechanics, adds a touch of tragic warmth that somehow makes you wish for a prequel about his poor life choices.
The supporting cast, from Shirley Henderson’s heartbreakingly tragic Imma to Bebe Cave’s fierce Violet, bring a balance of pathos and pitch-black humor. No one here is purely victim or villain—they’re all beautifully broken, and that’s what makes them unforgettable.
Garrone’s Fairy Tale Philosophy
Garrone doesn’t sanitize the fairy tale; he restores it to its original venom. Before Disney turned them into bedtime comfort food, fairy tales were moral horror stories for adults—bloody, lusty, and unapologetically weird.
Tale of Tales revives that primal energy with operatic grandeur. It’s a reminder that “once upon a time” usually ended with someone dead, flayed, or cursed. But within that brutality lies real beauty—a reflection of humanity’s endless, self-destructive hunger for more.
And yet, despite its darkness, there’s humor. Garrone treats tragedy with a wink, letting absurdity mingle with awe. You laugh at the horror, cringe at the beauty, and realize that’s the point: fairy tales were never about comfort—they were about facing the nightmare in the mirror.
The Happily Ever After (Sort Of)
By the film’s end, Violet is crowned queen, Salma Hayek’s dragon-hearted line is extinct, and Dora flees as her youth fades—an ending as bittersweet as an overripe fruit.
But that’s the genius of Tale of Tales: it doesn’t tie up neatly. It lingers, seductive and unsettling, whispering that maybe all our desires—power, beauty, love—are just different shades of the same curse.
Verdict: 4.5 out of 5 stars.
A masterpiece of decadent horror, gorgeous insanity, and fairy-tale nihilism. Come for the dragons and ogres, stay for the existential crisis. And maybe skip dinner—you’ll never look at seafood the same way again.
