What would you give to have a friend?
Poison for the Fairies (Veneno para las hadas) is a 1984 supernatural horror film by Mexican director Carlos Enrique Taboada.Veronica is Conveniently an Orphan, living in genteel poverty with her reclusive, invalid grandmother and her superstitious nanny. Rejected and mocked by the girls at her school for her strangeness, and scolded by her teachers for her habit of telling lies, Veronica lives for the frightening bedtime stories her nanny provides, tales in which wicked, powerful witches use magic to control and destroy anyone who stands in their way.
At school, Veronica meets New Transfer Student Flavia, a timid, naive girl who's been Spoiled Sweet by her wealthy, doting parents. Flavia's privileged life fills Veronica with envy, and she becomes determined to win Flavia's friendship in order to share in her luxury.
Taking advantage of a series of coincidences, Veronica soon convinces Flavia that she is an ancient, powerful witch disguised as a little girl, and that if Flavia doesn't give her everything she asks for, she will use her powers to punish her. Flavia, terrified, gives in to Veronica's every demand. But when Veronica finally asks too much, Flavia must summon her remaining courage to free herself from her friend.
This film provides examples of the following tropes:
- Adults Are Useless: As educated and experienced as they are, Flavia's parents are unaware that Veronica is basically blackmailing their daughter, nor do they seem connect Flavia's recent unusual behavior and fearfulness to her new friend. Even when they have misgivings, they dismiss them by reasoning that they can't pick Flavia's friends for her. Meanwhile, Veronica's grandmother is too old and sick to provide any parenting or discipline, and her nanny's superstitions and stories fuel Veronica's behavior.
- Alas, Poor Villain: As unsympathetic as Veronica is through the entirety of the film, her pitiful cries for her friend to save her are gut-wrenching.
- Big Fancy House: In spite of being impoverished, Veronica and her grandmother live in a sprawling, two-story hacienda filled with expensive rugs and marble fireplaces. Meanwhile, Flavia's family, who is stated to be extremely wealthy, owns two such houses, one of them large enough to have its own private lake and to require a groundskeeper.
- Blood Magic: Veronica convinces Flavia to cast a curse on her piano teacher using a drop of her own blood.
- Blunt "No": How Veronica responds when asked if she misses her deceased parents.
- Can't Live with Them, Can't Live Without Them: Veronica dominates and terrifies Flavia, forcing her to hand over her prized possessions and to go against her better judgement (such as threatening Flavia with witchcraft until she agrees to skip school with her). In spite of this, Veronica is Flavia's only friend and she's as afraid of losing her friendship as she is of her magical powers.
- Chuunibyou: It's a little ambiguous if Veronica truly believes she's a witch or if she pretends she does in order to have agency, but the girls' dynamic reads very much like a chuunibyou relationship.
- Contrived Coincidence: Veronica is able to use several of these to her advantage in order to cement her hold over Flavia.
- Cool Car: Flavia's parents pick her up from school in a Rolls Royce, which shows Veronica just how rich Flavia is.
- Creepy Child: Veronica's classmates regard her as this, but have no clue how deep it really goes.
- Creepy Cemetery: Two. One is an ancient catacomb on the site of a former nunnery, where the girls go to conduct a blood ritual. The other is the abandoned graveyard on the grounds of Flavia's summer home, where the girls gather ingredients for Veronica's poison for the fairies.
- Evil Is Petty: At the end of the day, Veronica is just a little girl, and the things she demands of Flavia amount to trinkets: a fancy pencil, a doll, a trip to the countryside. Meanwhile, Flavia literally believes that the Devil will appear and take her to Hell if she doesn't give Veronica what she wants.
- Extreme Doormat: Flavia becomes this as Veronica's hold over her increases.
- The Faceless: The film goes out of its way to avoid showing the faces of any adult. There are two horrifying exceptions: Veronica's grandmother is used in a Jump Scare, and Flavia's music teacher's face is only visible once she's dead.
- It Began with a Twist of Fate: Veronica is able to convince Flavia of her powers after Veronica happens to overhear that Flavia's least-favorite teacher is taking an emergency leave of absence for the rest of the school year. Veronica presents this knowledge as if she caused the teacher to vanish as a favor to Flavia.
- Jump Scare: Veronica tricks Flavia into her grandmother's bedroom, where Flavia is brought to hysterics by the grandmother's withered, palsied appearance.
- Kids Are Cruel: The other girls at school make fun of and avoid Veronica, who in turn utterly dominates Flavia for her own gain.
- Kill It with Fire: The only way to destroy a witch is to burn her. Guess what happens to Veronica.
- Lack of Imagination: It's heavily implied that Flavia, raised by strict rational atheists, succumbs to Veronica because her imagination isn't developed enough to understand that this is all an elaborate game of pretend.
- Light Feminine Dark Feminine: Subverted. Golden-haired, fair-skinned Veronica is sadistic and manipulative, while dark-haired, olive-skinned Flavia is sweet, innocent, and frightened.
- Maybe Magic, Maybe Mundane: Deconstructed. Flavia's magical powers are a combination of manipulation and coincidence, but her ability to exploit those things does give her real power over Flavia, which, for Flavia, is indistinguishable from actual magic.
- The Münchausen: Veronica is known for inventing impossible, self-aggrandizing stories to make herself seem more important. No one ever believes her...until Flavia comes along.
- Ominous Owl: Veronica convinces Flavia that the stuffed owl in her study is her Familiar, which comes to life at night and does her bidding. Later, when Flavia is tempted to disobey Veronica, an owl outside her bedroom window frightens her enough to give up her plans.
- Overdrawn at the Blood Bank: The movie opens with a scene in which a slashed throat produces enough High-Pressure Blood to pour all the way down a flight of stairs. Subverted when the film reveals that this is a story Veronica's listening to and that she (a child who probably has never seen an injury worse than a skinned knee) is simply imagining such a wound would produce gallons of ridiculously bright-red blood.
- Really 700 Years Old: Veronica convinces Flavia that she is an ancient witch disguised as a schoolgirl.
- Reluctant Gift: By threatening Flavia with magic, Veronica is able to force her into giving her her most prized possessions. Her requests are initially pretty petty, but she uses them to determine just how far she can push Flavia. The final straw comes when Veronica demands Flavia hand over her beloved puppy.
- Satan: Veronica believes that the devil is the source of all witches' power and convinces Flavia to pray to him so that she no longer has to go to her hated piano lessons. When the prayer seems to work, Flavia becomes terrified that the devil will come for her if she tells anyone about the spell.
- Skipping School: Veronica convinces Flavia to skip school with her to visit a nearby catacomb.
- Smoking Is Not Cool: Flavia's strict piano teacher is a smoker. When she dies later in the film, Flavia's parents mention that the teacher continued smoking even after being diagnosed with a health condition, which contributed to her sudden early death.
- Spoiled Sweet: Flavia's parents give her everything she wants and are very protective of her. Initially Flavia gives in to Veronica's demands because she understands Veronica doesn't have as many nice things as she does.
- Stern Teacher: Most teachers at school are stern with Veronica due to her behavior. Flavia, meanwhile, is afraid of her stern, perfectionistic piano teacher.
- Title Drop: "Poison for the fairies" comes from a bedtime story told by Veronica's nanny. In it, fairies are the natural enemy of witches, and the witches create a poison to destroy them. Later, Veronica enlists Flavia to help her create a "poison for the fairies" in order to secure her own power.
