Stardust (film)/YMMV

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.


  • Alas, Poor Villain: Lamia. Played straight in the book, as in quite a few other Gaiman's books. Played with in The Movie (imagine the scene in the castle of the witches, after Lamia's sisters die, and how the film would have ended if she truly were regretting it)
  • Broken Aesop: You don't have to just be a shop boy, you can go out and have adventures and be a boy momentarily working in a shop! Don't worry if you're not born special! Except Tristan Is the son of a magical princess.
  • Complete Monster: Lamia and Septimus: they both want to cut a young girl's heart out to obtain immortaility and in their quest they're quite happy to murder and/or torture anyone who stands in their way.
  • Crowning Music of Awesome: Shooting Star and The Star Shines are probably fantasy distilled into music form.
  • Evil Is Sexy - The oldest of the Lilim in her young form, though she doesn't actually seduce anyone.
    • Septimus should probably also be mentioned. ...Septimus should definitely also be mentioned.
  • Fridge Brilliance - Lamia spends magical effort smashing up her house to drive Tristan and Yvaine towards her instead of simply killing or holding them from a distance. That isn't only For the Evulz, but because Lamia wants to keep Yvaine in flight-or-fight mode so she won't have time to think. If she calms down a bit there's a chance she'll realise she's hopelessly trapped and her lover is about to die horribly - which might break her heart again, or at least reduce its power. Lamia wants to keep her terrified until the last possible moment.
  • Fridge Logic - A possible example, Lamia as the movie proceeds, slowly but surely ages further and further back to her initial state in the movie whenever she casts magic...the issue is that this happens or more specifically, the viewer is shown this happens, when she does what are otherwise small feats of magic. At one point she polymorphs two goats into humans, one into a women and then she creates an entire inn at a crossroads. After creating the inn, at least, one would think she would be decrepit but its not even highlighted, she doesn't seem to age in that moment.
    • The horse Bernard uses when traveling with Septimus' soldiers is the one the seer had, explaining why Septimus seemingly had an extra horse.
  • Les Yay: Una and Yvaine don't have many scenes together, but when they do, they positively drip with it.
    • And Bernard, the boy-turned-goat-turned-hot-chick, who is very happy to be helping Yvaine undress.
    • And Lamia and Yvaine pretty early on. The massage scene, anyone?
  • Magnificent Bastard - Evil Prince Septimus. Or at the very least, he tries to be one.
  • Visual Effects of Awesome - The epicness when Lamia kills Septimus by throwing his voodoo doll into a pond and thus making Septimus FLOAT IN MID-AIR has to be seen to be truly appreciated.
    • Not as dramatic, but almost as impressive, is the scene where Yvaine tries to maul the witch Sal only to bounce off her like a magnet. Except with sparks. How the hell did they do that?
      • She has a rope/tether connected to her back which supports her weight and allows her to lean forward. The rope goes straight back behind her; if you look very carefully, you can see the background swim/blur slightly where they edited out the rope. As far as her hands bouncing off the shield, she might have just been miming that, and obviously they CG'd in the effects.

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