And behind door number 22... a guide to some music of the more traditional kind
Catherine Munn and Jacob Martin list their Top 5 programmes to watch over the festive period.
And behind door number nine... some dazzling musical delights
The complete arts guide, for week 9
10. Grandmother Willow (Pocahontas)
The Native American princess' spiritual guide was a talking willow tree with a face like Angela Lansbury, who often showered her with petals, told her of impeding danger and gave out the odd haiku of knowledge.
9. Robin Hood's many trees (Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves)
When he was expelled from Nottingham for consorting with the likes of Morgan Freeman, Robin made his way into Sherwood and whittled a surprisingly elaborate tree city for his merry men, complemented by running water and a distillery.
8. That Big Tree in Avatar
On the forest-moon of End. . . Pandora, the Native America. . . um, I mean aliens, lived in a huge tree, which was later destroyed by corporate mercenaries in their ruthless quest to advance intergalactic global warming. The bastards.
7. Rafiki's Tree (The Lion King)
Home to the savannah's most colourful character, a half-demented baboon who loves to dance and hit things, and is for some reason the king-maker of the animal kingdom. This lovely tree is also full of crude finger-paintings.
6. The Tree of the Dead (Sleepy Hollow)
The gateway to hell is located in a tree in upstate New York, and can be manipulated by scheming gold-diggers to call forth murderous headless horsemen. They always get their comeuppance, though.
5. The Ewok Tree Village (Return of the Jedi)
These disgustingly cutesy-fruitsy teddy bear aliens lived in gigantic trees on some planet which was pivotal to the downfall of the Empire. After a giant battle in which many were slain, they retreated to the trees for an extended tea party.
4. The Tree in Antichrist
A demonic tree which Willem Dafoe had sex with, apparently.
3. Yggdrasil (or, 'The universe according to Thor)
Apparently, modern astrophysics is perfectly congruent with Dark Age fairy stories about the universe being some sort of tree. While sceptical at first, this has been proven beyond doubt by the movie Thor.
2. Treebeard (The Lord of the Rings)
While technically not a tree, he looks a hell of a lot like one. Grumpy old Treebeard was pivotal in rescuing the Hobbits and defeating Saruman's forces in the war of the ring. Which is pretty good for a tree.
1. Forrest Gump's Tree
Forrest and Jenny had a favourite tree they used to sit in all day long. When Jenny died, she was buried underneath the tree. When Forrest missed her, the tree would shower him with blossoms. That's a damn good tree.
This is James' finest hour.
The final Top 10 from our departing 'Arts Features Coordinator'. *Sobs*. I wish the tree in my garden would give me haikus of wisdom.
The tree you have used for the photo is the tree of life from Darren Aronofsky's 'The Fountain' which definitely deserves to be on this list, if not at the top!! This article is inspired.
I still maintain the tree from 'The Evil Dead' should be on there
I love you all. More pertinently, I also love trees (but not, I should add, as much as Willem Dafoe).
haha this is amazing
Could have the "Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil". Since it was supposedly pivotal to the original sin and consequent damnation of the entire human race. Might upset some people to have it called ficional though
Or for SNES fans; the talking trees on Legend of Zelda that also sometimes attacked you with bombs for no good reason.
Ooh, and The Magic Faraway Tree from the Enid Blyton books. There were pixies, and a saucepan-man, and talking animals, and someone who apparently didn't mind being called Moonface and a different land at the top of the tree each week... My childhood (if you could still call it that) would not have been the same without it.
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