Kurt Vonnegut was quite witty and funny when explaining how stories can be put into shapes.  I agree that people love to see stories about people who get into trouble and find a solution to it.  Or a situation of boy meets girl, they have a falling out, and they fall in love again.  Everyone can relate to a situation like that and it fills our basic needs as human beings to solve problems.

I decided to describe the shape of the plot of Enchanted, because of 2 reasons: 1. The songs from it have been stuck in my head for days now and 2. The princess plot it portrays isn’t the typical plot of “princess is unhappy, princess meets prince, they live happily ever after.”  There are a lot of twists and it has a modern take to it.

The shape of this story starts with the Giselle (the princess) extremely happy in her cartoon fairy world, and she becomes even happier in life when she meets Prince Edward and they agree to marry.  The prince’s evil stepmother, Queen Narissa, tricks Giselle and traps her in our real-life modern world in New York City.  Distraught, Giselle wanders the city until she meets Robert and his daughter Morgan, who help her get back on her feet.  She learns what love really is and what relationships should be like (instead of getting married after a day of knowing each other).  Prince Edward comes to NYC to find Giselle, and when he does, they are both ecstatic.  However, Giselle soon realizes that she may not in fact, love Edward, but Robert instead.  They go to a ball for their last night before returning to their cartoon magic world (Andalasia), where Queen Narissa arrives and destroys the evening.  In the end, Robert and Giselle realize they’re meant to be, and live happily ever after, and Prince Edward winds up with Nancy, who was Robert’s girlfriend throughout the film.

When searching for videos as an example of digital storytelling, I immediately remembered this video that was popular a few years ago: Marcel the Shell with Shoes On by Dean Fleischer-Camp.  I think this is a great example of a digital story, because it’s filmed using a camera and posted on the internet to share with millions of other people.  The film has a plot, albeit simple, but a plot nonetheless, which shares the story of a tiny shell and how he adapts to his surroundings.