On Trolls, Mustard, and Grimm

My mom and I headed to Mt. Horeb this afternoon. For those not in the know, Mt. Horeb is a small town of about 5,000 people and is known for trolls and The Mustard Museum. Here's selection of trolls from Main Street, a.k.a. - The Trollway.







I've read about why the town's relationship with trolls but can't for the life of me remember the story. Harumph. Anyway, we headed to The Mustard Museum.



They a shitload of mustard on display. Prepared mustard:







As well as dried mustard:



There was also a collection of antique mustard pots that some gentleman donated to the museum:



Apparently mustard in a tube is big across The Pond:



After giving the mustard displays a once over, we headed to the shop. I got me some Chocolate Fudge Mustard, Ass Kickin' Hot Snack Mix, a little hoolie of bourbon mustard for Miss Rosie, and a couple tubes of German mustard - one for myself and one for The Dulcinea. There was a bottle of spray-on BBQ sauce which I found humorous as well as a sign saying "Danger: Men Cooking".

Although I've lived here for 15 years and Mt. Horeb is about 10 miles from town, I've only ever been through there and have never actually been to The Mustard Museum until today. Afterwards we ate some breakfast at a local diner which featured Ancora coffee, a Madison roaster, as well as Chocolate Shoppe ice cream, another Madison business. I had me the Hungry Norwegian Breakfast which consisted of pancakes, eggs, bacon, sausage, hash browns, and toast. Needless to say, I made a complete pig of myself. It was a neat diner which had retained much of its 1940s look and appeal. With bellies full, we headed back to my house whereupon I changed shirts and called The Dulcinea. Her movie date for the afternoon had bailed so she was free. Hence I invited her to go see The Brothers Grimm with us and she took me up on the offer. Since they had met last night, it would be a mellow encounter.

The Brothers Grimm was very good. By this I mean that it was a very fun and funny flick but lacked much Gilliam weirdness. I would probably be raving about it had it been directed by anyone else but, when I see a Gilliam film, I expect it to be really odd and Grimm wasn't. But, by all means, if you haven't seen it, do so. The cinematography was excellent and it had a wonderfully creepy atmosphere. I thought Matt Damon & Heath Ledger did very well and Jonathan Pryce is always a treat onscreen. Plus Lena Headey is a hottie! It was fun seeing all the references to various fairy tales as well, such as Little Red Riding Hood and Hansel & Gretel. I expected the motif about childhood to have been stronger but this was eschewed in favor of more action, I suppose. Gilliam has made films with this theme before: Time Bandits and The Adventures of Baron Munchausen. I expected more about childhood because it's about the bloody Brothers Grimm! The film opens with a scene from their childhood and there are flashbacks later on from Angelika's youth. And the film centers around uncovering the disappearances of young girls from a town. Plus the villain relates to youth as well. Childhood was everywhere in the film but I couldn't discern a well-developed statement about it as the aforementioned films have. Perhaps this isn't surprising as Gilliam wrote these two screenplays but gets no writing credit on Grimm. Well, his Tideland comes out soon which concerns childhood and he had a hand in the screenplay. Again, do go see it!