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Guest Writer Wednesday: Disney: The Little Mermaid

This piece by Ana Mardoll is cross-posted with permission from her site Ana Mardoll’s Ramblings.

Disney. The word is so synonymous in my mind with “animated feature films” that it’s like using “Kleenex” for “tissue.” When children come to my house, as they sometimes do, they’re invariably drawn to my huge selection of “Disney movies,” only about 70% of which are actually affiliated with Disney in any way shape or form. I enjoy most of them, or I wouldn’t own them. They each have their own problems, but a good many of them have something truly positive that I treasure. And what better way to start a deconstruction of animated feature films with the one I knew first and loved best: The Little Mermaid?

The Little Mermaid is possibly one of the most contentious movies I’ve ever loved. It was created in 1989, and has been specially beloved by many children in general and by myself in particular since then. I must have watched the movie eighty squintillion times as a child; it was one of the few videos I loved enough to manage to convince my parents to buy, and I watched it until the video literally broke from use. By that point, Disney had locked the reel in their “appreciate for value” vault and when they relaunched the movie in theaters in 1997, I was there to see it on the big screen. I have never been able to watch the movie without sobbing straight through from opening titles to end credits.

I sometimes feel like everyone I meet online has seen this movie at least once. Almost all of them have an opinion on the movie. Most of the opinions are strongly polarized: either Ariel is a free-thinking young woman who bravely rejects racism to forge her own destiny and create a lasting peace between two cultures or she’s an idealized anti-feminist icon, complete with Barbie-doll figure and shell bikini, completely willing to throw away her family, her culture, and her own voice for the sake of a man she’s never even met.

Those who fall between these two views tend to stay out of the flame wars. I don’t blame them.

I like The Little Mermaid. I like a lot of things that are problematic, and I don’t think there’s anything necessarily wrong with liking problematic things as long as a certain awareness is maintained that Problems Abound Therein. Art is complicated like that. But I like The Little Mermaid and I think it’s compatible with valuable feminist messages. Certainly, it was my first introduction into a feminist narrative and I have always considered the problematic romance storyline to be camouflage for the real story. But we’ll see whether or not you agree.

Please note that everything I say from here on in is just my opinion.

For me, The Little Mermaid is the story of an Otherkin girl living in a world that is hostile to Otherkin. Ariel is a human born into a merperson’s body, and in a culture that routinely lambasts humans for the very same things that the underwater world does: eat fish. (Seriously. That shark at the beginning who chases Ariel and Flounder is clearly trying to eat them. These are not Happy Vegetarian Fishes.)

For me, The Little Mermaid is the story of a feminist girl living in a world that is hostile to feminist ideals. Ariel is a headstrong young woman who wants knowledge and growth and her own voice, but these things are being systematically denied to her. The only form of learning her father permits is that of patriarchy-approved women’s pursuits: she may study music, but not other cultures.

For me, The Little Mermaid is the story of a culture-conscious girl living in a world that mandates insularity. Ariel wants to learn about cultures and peoples and practices and histories different from her own, but she lives in a world that holds even third-hand study of such things to be utterly forbidden because the power structure believes that the populace is safer if they are steeped in fear and ignorance. (Fearful merpeople won’t try to make contact with the humans, and thus fear maintains their secrecy.)

And now I’ll walk through the film and explain why I feel these things.

The opening titles air over singing humans as they work on the local prince’s pleasure ship / wedding ship / fishing ship. Well, there are three ships in the movie, and they all look pretty much the same to me, so I’m going to assume that Prince Eric has a fleet of all-purpose boats and this is one of them. But the sailors are singing while they collect fish in their nets and Eric (and the audience!) is learning, and here are a couple of problematic things up-front.

One, everyone in this universe is white. (We’re going to be seeing this one a lot in the Disney deconstructions.) Two, this is not a working class universe. Oh, the fishermen are fishing, but this is really the only work you’re going to see in this movie outside of a quick shot of laundry-washing and some cooking. I think Eric’s kingdom is supposed to be one of those picturesque smaller ones where the royalty aren’t far removed from the common folk and don’t mind getting their hands dirty, but it’s kind of a muddled message and it only gets worse when we get to Triton’s kingdom. Let’s just place a big sign over the deconstruction that these are Privileged White People with the inherent issues that inevitably follow.

We pan down under the sea to the King Triton’s Schmancy Music Hall and Combination Throne Room just in time to see Ariel completely fail to show up for a music gig that was intended largely to glorify her father while his daughters display themselves to the populace and use their vocal talents to praise his name. I can’t imagine why a young woman might think she had better uses of her time than to be a public ornament to her father, nor why she might refuse to come to rehearsals (as Sebastian tells us). And when her father realizes that Ariel has failed to show up for the concert, his eyes literally turn red with rage. Yowza.

And here is an important point: Ariel’s dad is abusive. Oh, I think he doesn’t try to be, and I even think he doesn’t want to be, but he is. And I really do think it’s a function of The Patriarchy Hurts Men, Too. You see this clearly in the scenes with Triton and Sebastian: both men shore up each other’s will to be harsher than they otherwise individually would be inclined to be, and they do this because they think it’s expected of them. When Triton is alone and when no one is looking, his face softens, his expression is sad, and he sighs and weeps for the decaying relationship he has with his daughter. It’s when others are looking — notably, Sebastian, the only other adult male in Triton’s scenes — that Triton is at his most abusively fierce.

I don’t think this is a coincidence. Triton isn’t monstrous and Sebastian doesn’t callously bring out the worst in him; they both reinforce each other’s commitment to harmful patriarchy ideals, because they’ve been raised to believe the patriarchy expects them to. Neither is it a coincidence that Triton’s final act of redemption comes after he and Sebastian have revisited a previous conversation and they’ve admitted that they were both wrong and that their actions were harmful. But now I’m jumping ahead.

By giving Triton this characterization, Ariel is immediately given a rich and sympathetic background before she even swims onto the stage. She’s living in a deeply patriarchal and oppressive community where her status as “princess” is largely ornamental and wholly subject to the whims and wishes of her father. While she probably had moments of tenderness between her and her father, particularly when she was younger and could be indulged as a child instead of punished for being a woman, their relationship is strained by his insistence on publicly conforming to aggressive and abusive parenting models whenever anyone is looking. These shifts in emotional tone probably confuse and frustrate Ariel: why is her father so kind at times and yet so harsh at other times? She’s coped with the on-and-off abuse by literally withdrawing. By forgetting rehearsals and the concert and pulling back into her cavern of collections, she’s not passively asserting herself or deliberately catering to the patriarchy; she’s trying to carve out a safe space, mentally and physically.

We are introduced to Ariel who, at great personal risk to her safety — both from the sharks who seek to eat her and from her father who could severely punish her — she is scavenging human items from old shipwrecks. And this… is amazing! Our protagonist is an explorer. What’s more, she’s a scientist, going to a direct source (albeit a bad source, since the seagull is actually ignorant of human affairs, but Ariel has no way of knowing that) to be educated on the items she finds. She wants to understand the humans, and to study the things they do and the items they create. She has a whole secret museum dedicated to all the things she’s collected over the years.

Words fail me in describing how incredible I find this. In another movie, or in a book, there would be more time spent on just how incredibly subversive Ariel is being and has been, for literally years and years. This isn’t a trivial hobby or a girlish obsession; she’s the only person in her culture who is both willing and privileged enough (due to the fact that Triton might not blast his own daughter into tiny bits for breaking his laws) to almost single-handedly set up an entire cultural museum of study on a race of people right outside the kingdom’s doorstep. The sheer bravery and gumption and intellectual devotion necessary for Ariel to have done what she’s done is amazing: she’s essentially created her very own Human Studies department right under the king’s nose because studying other cultures is important, dammit.

I dare you to bring me a Disney heroine who has demonstrated similar levels of bravery, intellect, scientific pursuit, and proactive awesomeness within the first 15 minutes of her own movie.

Then we cut over to Ursula, and… I have mixed feelings about Ursula. On the one hand, she’s a fat woman and a villain in a movie that has problematic body portrayals. Ariel’s sisters are almost uniform in body type, expect for Adella who kind of sort of maybe looks a little bit bigger than her sisters, in the Lane Bryant model sort of way (i.e., same breast and hip proportions, just slightly bigger all over) and who was promptly slimmed down for the sequel because Disney got the memo that fat people are not sexeh because DEATHFATS. The only other fat women in this movie are the castle servants, who are fat in the non-threatening happy-servant kind of way, and the fat woman in the Ursula song who “this one [is] longing to be thinner.” And — rage! — the fat merwoman’s tail extends up and over her breasts like Ursula’s does, but the thin incarnation of the fat woman has the bare-stomach shell-bra combo that Ariel sports. Because nude fat stomachs are obscene and ugly, but thin fat stomachs are normalized and pretty! Grr, Disney.

But! Ursula is sexy. Her breasts! Her butt! The way she moves! Her voice! I don’t honestly remember really… noticing this as a child, but it’s there and it’s largely treated as… normal. Ursula isn’t evil because she’s sexy, nor does she seem really to be evil because she’s fat. She’s just evil and fat and sexy, all in the same package, and I guess that’s kind of cool? I’m not sure. But then when I noticed that in this viewing, I realized that this movie is actually VERY filled with women’s bodies. Can we say that about any other Disney movie?

I don’t just mean the bikinis and the tummies; the women’s bodies here move. Ursula struts realistically around her cave and gods but those breasts and butt are there and they move. And — skipping forward a bit to Ariel’s “I Want” song — Ariel shakes her hips when she sings about “strolling along” the street; she undulates her whole body sensually when she imagines being “warm on the sand.” There are bodies in this movie! And… while they are sexy bodies, I don’t feel like I’m being clubbed with Male Gaze. I like it. I like how it seems to normalize women’s bodies as real, as things that come in different sizes, as things that can be uncovered and sexy and yet not objectified into T&A without a head or a personality needed. I’m just sorry that we have to leave the 1980s in this regard.

Coming back to the movie, Triton yells at Ariel for missing rehearsal. He cuts her off multiple times in this scene, and calls humans “barbarians” which is a nice bit of othering to throw onto the pile of objections to Triton’s character. He then tosses a tone argument at Ariel, which effectively cuts off not only what she was going to say but also punishes her for reacting realistically and legitimately to his bullying. Then Triton tells her that as long as she lives under “my ocean,” she’ll obey “my rules,” which is totally not controlling or an abusive conflation of kingly privilege and parental privilege. And then Triton and Sebastian decide that Ariel, who is a young woman budding into her sexual awakening, needs “constant supervision.” Patriarchy for the win.

And then we have Ariel’s “I Want” song and it still gives me shivers. The opening lines — “If only I could make him understand. I just don’t see things the way he does. I don’t see how a world that makes such wonderful things could be bad.” — reinforce that Ariel is not only longing to be human already, but she’s also inherently more open-minded than her close-minded and prejudice liege-father. Her fantasies of being human conflate with her fantasies of living in a feminist-friendly society where she can speak her mind freely and grow intellectually: “Betcha on land, they understand; bet they don’t reprimand their daughters. Bright young women, sick of swimmin’, ready to stand. And ready to know what the people know; asking my questions and get some answers.”

MORE WOMEN! The picture of fire and the wind up toy that shows dancing both have women in them. The parallel is obvious in that Ariel wants to be these women, but I’m still blown away looking at how many women are in this film in places where I frankly think nowadays they’d be edited out. Maybe it helps that this movie wasn’t made or marketed with the All Important Male Demographic in mind, I don’t know.

Sebastian tumbles out and informs Ariel of what she already knows: her father would be furious if he found out about the museum. Which makes so much sense, really, that his racial hatred of humans extends so far that he would deny his subjects the ability to even study them, if only to come up with more effective ways of avoiding the humans, because studying leads to understanding and understanding leads to compassion and compassion doesn’t mesh well with racial hatred. And, yes, I know they’ve woobied him up with two decades’ worth of backstories and personal tragedy, but I think that waters down the message that sometimes even people we love can be racist assholes.

We zip up to the surface for Ariel to see Prince Eric and for some character establishing shots. And I have to say that Eric is probably my favorite Disney prince. He’s hanging out with his working class and while that could be seen as slumming, he doesn’t seem to mind getting rope burn on his hands and he knows how to steer the boat, so he’s at least not adverse to learning. And he goes back to a fiery burning ship to save his dog.

Ariel saves his life.

They didn’t have to do it this way. They could have had Ariel and Eric catch a glimpse of one another and fall in love that way. Ariel could have been singing in a quiet grotto and Eric could have been drawn to the sound and seen her for a split moment before she disappeared. It would have been pretty and feminine and sweet. But they didn’t do that. They had her proactively search the burning wreckage of a ship, and drag an unconscious man to safety on the shore. And that tells me two things. One, in 1989, being saved from death by a woman didn’t emasculate you forever in the eyes of the (probably) male screenwriters. Two, in 1989, saving a handsome man from drowning was considered an acceptable female fantasy with all the strength, verve, and determination that accompanies that.

Haha, no, there’s totally not a backlash against feminism today in 2012. IT’S ALL YOUR IMAGINATION.

Sebastian tries to convince Ariel that life under the sea is better than life as a human. He has a jazzy musical number and Ariel gives him quirky yeah-I’m-not-buying-it looks before it becomes clear that she’s not really needed for this song routine and goes off with Flounder. And here is a big ol’ world-building mess because apparently the fish neither work nor eat, and they all live off of plankton delivered to their doorstep every morning by magic. Or so Sebastian seems to think from his position of Privilege? I dunno. This is why deconstructing movies with talking animals is hard.

Triton calls Sebastian into his throne room and interrogates Sebastian while cheerily pointing his weaponized triton at the little crab. Haha, that is not scary at all! Sebastian breaks down and tells Triton about Ariel’s museum, and Triton shows up and brutally destroys it all while she weeps and begs him to stop. And this scene? Wrecks me every time. The bit with Triton building himself into a rage — “One less human to worry about! … I don’t have to know them — they’re all the same. Spineless, savage, harpooning fish-eaters, incapable of any feeling…” — is both horrifying and priceless because it really gets through how xenophobic and racist Triton truly is. He doesn’t care that he’s frightening his daughter; the rage has built in him to a point where terrorizing her makes more sense to him than actually talking to her or doing anything other than abusing his position as both king and father.

And this scene is so utterly valuable. Because now Ariel will go to the sea witch and trade her entire life away (and her voice) to go chase after a man she’s never met. Remember that anti-feminist message referenced way back up there at the beginning? But that’s not what she’s doing, not really. As much as Ariel laments in a moment that “If I become human, I’ll never be with my father or sisters again,” her father has driven her away. Ariel isn’t safe under the sea, not emotionally or psychologically. Her life’s obsession with studying and understanding and educating herself on human culture will never be accepted — and if she persists in trying to do so clandestinely, it will only be a matter of time before someone discovers her secret, betrays her to the king, and all her work is destroyed. She knows that fate is inevitable, because it’s just happened not ten minutes ago.

Ariel can either go home and be a good mermaid and play with her hair and go to voice rehearsal and marry a merman who will never share her interests or understand her and she can live and die frustrated and unfulfilled. Or she can take a chance and become everything she’s ever wanted: a human. And she can become that human by finding true love — “Not just any kiss,” Ursula cautions. “The kiss of True Love.” — with the first human she’s ever met, a man who attracts her with his courage and bravery and adventurous spirit. It’s a gamble, and possibly not a good one, but it must seem like the one hope for happiness left available to her.

Human! Ariel washes up on Prince Eric’s beach and is taken for a traumatized survivor of a shipwreck, which seems plausible enough. And while I’m not 100% sure I like Grim pressing Eric to woo the traumatized survivor of a shipwreck rather than, say, provide for her education and psychological care and place her in the best possible position to choose how she wants to live the rest of her life, I do love that Eric is shown as being highly reluctant to treat Ariel with anything less than courtesy and respect. A privileged man who doesn’t react to a pretty half-naked woman washing up on his beach like Christmas has come early? Yes, please.

There’s a scene with a French chef that is so heavy on the cultural stereotypes that I don’t even know what to say. I was going to say that this was one of the only animated feature film songs that features a foreign language, but then I remembered the Charo song in Thumbelina, which is also heavy on cultural stereotypes. *sigh*

Then Eric and Ariel go on a tour of “his kingdom,” which seems to basically be this one decent-sized town, and Ariel is in complete Manic Pixie Dream Girl mode, but for once this makes sense because everything she sees is literally new and exciting and amazing and a dream come true. And then he lets her drive the carriage and she loves it and clears an oddly-placed death-defying jump and once the panic passes, Eric settles back like this is the good life and Ariel is clearly having a ball. I think that’s sweet, frankly.

And then there’s a lot of singing and near-kissing and Ursula showing up to ruin things and Ariel being towed out to the ship which is not nearly as awesome as her swimming out there under her own power, and I get that it makes sense that swimming-with-legs would be something she’s not mastered, but still it feels like the Feminism Power has run out, and then Ariel and Eric reunite just in time for it to be TOO LATE and Ariel is a merperson and Eric does not care even a little bit because Eric is not a racist asshole like Triton. And then Eric saves Ariel’s life with a harpoon while Triton watches, and this is hilarious given Triton’s earlier rant about humans-who-wield-harpoons.

After the exciting showdown scene, Eric recovers slowly on the shore while Ariel watches from her rock. Triton and Sebastian watch from further out, with Triton realizing that she really does love him and that this hasn’t all been About Him and her special butterfly rebellion. Gee, ya think? Sebastian tells him “children got to be free to lead their own lives” and Triton references as earlier conversation where Sebastian said the opposite. And this is the moment where everything is unspoken, but for me it seems like they’re saying yeah, this whole Patriarchy thing is garbage and we were wrong. And then Triton gives Ariel her legs back, she marries Eric, and there’s a new era of peace for both kingdoms, and it is awesome.

And… yeah. It ends in a 16 year old marrying a guy she’s known all of three days. (Assuming we don’t go with the standard handwave that between cuts there could have been years and years of dating that we didn’t see. Because movies don’t work like that.) And, devoid of context, that is Very Problematic. Hell, even with context, it’s not something that gives me warm fuzzies. I do not like the Mandatory Marriage at the ends of these movies, or the implication that it’s not a Happy Ending without one. And I like the Mandatory Marriage even less when it happens to two teenagers (or one teenager and one guy in his early twenties) who’ve known each other only over the course of a few adrenaline-packed and hormone-driven days. I don’t feel like this is a healthy formula. So there’s that.

But it’s also one of the few movies I can think of where an Otherkin protagonist gets the form she’s always felt was really hers. And it’s a movie where a brave young woman defied the racist and xenophobic laws of her homeland in order to create a greater understanding between two cultures and almost single-handedly engineer a peace between both kingdoms. And she did all this while she was sixteen, as a young woman in an abusive family where she was only valued for her ornamental status. She held on to her inner essential self and managed to forge her own path without ever once beating herself up for the abusive things that others did to her. Throughout the movie, the entire narrative seems to scream that being strong-while-female is not a bad thing: it’s okay to defy your racist asshole dad, it’s okay to save the life of the handsome guy who won’t then turn around and act all emasculated and shun you, it’s okay to own your “acceptably feminine” talents in ways that make you happy, social expectations be damned. And for a movie that is now over twenty years old, that seems kind of awesome.

Ana’s Happy Feminism Fuzzies Scorecard

– Otherkin narrative where protagonist proactively gains the form she wants

– Feminist narrative where protagonist longs to be taken seriously as a cultural researcher

– Intellectual narrative where protagonist values museums and cultural study

– Racial/Cultural narrative where protagonist demonstrates that Racism Is Bad

– Body Positive (with caveats) narrative where women characters abound of different body sizes

– Patriarchy Hurts Men narrative where good men are abusive because of patriarchal expectations

Ana’s Sad Epic Fail Scorecard

– Narrative that is entirely cast with white people and has a Angry French Chef stereotype

– Narrative that contains muddled class portrayal and is largely about privileged people

– Narrative that contains no openly QUILTBAG characters

– Narrative that ends with a teen marriage between two almost-strangers

Final Thoughts: The Little Mermaid is — like most Disney movies — rife with issues of class, race, hetereonormity, and body portrayal. But in my opinion it’s ironically one of the least problematic movies in the set (“ironic” because the current cultural narrative is that we’re now BETTER at those things than we were in the 1980s), and if you’re a white heterosexual class-privileged girl living in an oppressive patriarchy — as I was when I came to the movie — it may just resonate with you. Maybe.

As a final link, here is a picture of Disney Princesses dressed as the villains in their movies. I like the Ariel/Ursula swap so very much.

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Ana Mardoll is an avid reader and writer. She loves cats, fairy tales, and intense navel gazing. She blogs on a near daily basis from an undisclosed location in the wild, untamed, and astonishingly dusty Texas wilderness. Her photo-realistic avatars are a gift from best friend and invaluable writing buddy, J.D. Montague.

To read more of Ana’s writings, including her snarktastic literary deconstructions, visit her website at www.AnaMardoll.com.

Guest Writer Wednesday: Going Broke Chasing Boys: Why Disney Ditched Princesses and Spent $300 Million on ‘John Carter’

This is a guest post from Scott Mendelson. Originally published at Mendelson’s Memos.

If you’ve seen the trailer for the upcoming John Carter, you know that not only does it not look like it cost $300 million, but it so painfully feels like a Mad Libs male-driven fantasy blockbuster that it borders on parody. It’s no secret that Disney thinks it has a boy problem. One of the reasons it bought Marvel two years ago was to build up a slate of boy-friendly franchises. And the last two years have seen an almost embarrassing attempt to fashion boy-friendly franchises (Prince of Persia, Tron: Legacy, The Sorcerer’s Apprentice, I Am Number Four, Fright Night, and Real Steel), only half of which were even as successful as their alleged flop The Princess and the Frog (which obviously grossed ‘just’ $267 million on a $105 million budget because it starred a character with a vagina). We can only ponder the reasons why Disney decided to outright state that they were never going to make another fairy-tale princess cartoon again, even after Tangled became their most successful non-Pixar toon since The Lion King, but I’m pretty sure Disney won’t be making such statements about boy-centric fantasy franchises anytime soon.

Now we have John Carter, which allegedly cost $300 million (if not more). It’s being released in March, where only one film (to be fair, Disney’s Alice In Wonderland) has ever even grossed $300 million. Hell, in all of January-through April, there have been just five $200 million grossers (The Passion of the Christ, Alice In Wonderland, How to Train Your Dragon, 300, and Fast Five). So you have yet another film that basically has to shatter all records regarding its release date in order to merely break even. But that’s okay, thinks Disney, because John Carter is a manly science fiction spectacle so it is surely worth risking the bank. Disney is so desperate to not only chase the young male demos that is willing to risk alienating the young female demos that has netted it billions of dollars over the many decades. What they fail to realize is that the success of the Pirates of the Caribbean franchise (especially the first three films) was rooted in telling a story that crossed gender lines. All-told, the original trilogy actually revolved around Keira Knightley’s character, and her journey from daughter of privilege to outlaw pirate. I Am Number Four is a perfect example of this clear misunderstanding. Disney and Dreamworks decided to cash in on Twilight by making a variation told from the point of view of the super-powered teen boy, a story which turned the ‘Bella’ character into just another stock love interest to be sidelined for the third act.

If you look at Disney’s future slate, with the arguable exception of Pixar’s Brave (the first Pixar film to feature a girl, a warrior princess no less), they have almost no female-driven movies between now and 2014. Oh wait, I’m sorry…they ARE releasing Beauty and the Beast and The Little Mermaid in 3D over the next two years. My mistake. I may complain about the frenzy of upcoming live-action fairy tale adaptations, but at least those are big-budget movies centering around a female protagonist. It would seem that Disney, as a corporation, genuinely places less value on the female audience than the male audience. Money is money, and sweaty bills from girls should be just as green as bills from boys. Yet Disney apparently so disdains its core audience (young girls) that it not only has stopped chasing them (in the knowledge that they will buy princess merchandise anyway) but has risked untold millions on the most generic possible new franchise, with no star power and little to distinguish itself from a hundred other such films, purely because ‘it’s a boy movie’. In a way, Disney has become just like the Democratic Party, risking alienation of their base because they know that the young girls (and their parents) won’t really ever jump ship.

Scott Mendelson is, by hobby, a freelance film critic/pundit who specializes in box office analysis. He blogs primarily at Mendelson’s Memos while syndicating at The Huffington Post and Valley Scene Magazine. He lives in Woodland Hills, CA with his wife and two young kids where he works in a field totally unrelated to his BA in Film Theory/Criticism from Wright State University.

Top 10 of 2011: You Say Princess Like It’s a Bad Thing

#9 in 2011, by guest writer Myrna Waldron, ran as part of our Animated Children’s Films series. While most of reviews in the series criticized unbalanced and stereotypical gender roles in media for kids, Waldron flipped the formula and looked at the positive and admirable values displayed by the much-maligned Disney princesses.

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“The sarcasm is practically melting off the screen!”

If you’re an internet and animation addict like I am, you’ve probably come across several sets of images, like the one above, that point out the sexist flaws present in Disney films. While I wholeheartedly believe in critical analysis of popular culture, I think images like these are unfair, and further marginalize the characters by accentuating the negative. Most of the Disney Princesses, especially the ones from the Disney Renaissance, are admirable and strong female characters. It is to Disney’s credit that from the beginning they have made many female fronted films; compare Dreamworks and Pixar, who have only one female-fronted movie so far (Monsters vs. Aliens and the upcoming Brave, respectively). It is my job, then, to remind us of the positive traits of the Disney Princesses while still taking a feminist perspective.

But first, a few caveats. For the sake of my sanity, I will only be examining the original films that the characters first appeared in. No sequels, no supplemental film merchandising, no consideration of the Disney Princess merchandising line. Second, there is a lot of truth in the feminist criticisms targeted at the Disney Princesses. I credit most of these truths, however, to the contextual historical origins of the stories. The Grimm Brothers, Charles Perrault and Hans Christian Anderson predate modern feminism, as do the films made before the 1960s. Lastly, I will be concentrating on the 6 most common targets: Snow White, Cinderella, Aurora, Ariel, Belle and Jasmine. With all that clarified, let’s begin.

“I wish I could get animals to help me do my chores.”

I knew it would be a difficult and thankless task to write a feminist defense of the pre-1960s Disney Princesses. But part of my personal definition of feminism is to celebrate and empathize with all kinds of women, especially if they are portrayed in a positive light. In that sense, Snow White is perhaps the sweetest and kindest of the Disney Princesses. Like many of the other Princesses, she is a victim of circumstance. Physically and emotionally, she can’t be more than 12 to 14. To be orphaned and subsequently demeaned at such a young age would be hard for anyone to deal with, but as we see in the beginning of the film, Snow White makes the best out of a bad situation. To remain cheerful and hopeful in a situation like hers is a strength of character I think many of us wish we could have.

Her song, “I’m Wishing”, reflects her emotional depth of character. It is not specifically a handsome boyfriend she longs for, she is longing for someone to love. That’s quite understandable considering she has lost everyone who loved her. “I’m Wishing” is a prayer for affection; “I’m hoping and I’m dreaming of the nice things he’ll say.” Her subsequent infatuation with the prince who meets her is another aspect of her personality. Since she is barely out of childhood, she still has a childlike trust and strong affection for anyone who treats her with kindness; we see this again later in her relationship with the Dwarfs, and her unfortunate trust in the disguised Queen.

What, then, of her famous domestic talents? Note that once she’s left the castle, she doesn’t do chores because she is expected to or forced to do them. When she stumbles upon the dwarfs’ cottage, she wonders if the messiness is because the inhabitants are orphaned children like herself. She sees herself in this situation; a motherless child forced to fend for herself. Her inherent sweetness and kindness shines through here. She volunteers to clean up the cottage because she does not want to deny anyone else that which she has been denied. This, I think, is a good feminist message. Women have been, and are, often denied rights and marginalized, but it is our conviction that someday this will end, and that if we can prevent it, or do anything else to help someone in a similar situation, we will gladly do so. And, like Snow White, when confronted with a difficult job, we will “Whistle While You Work” to give us strength to get through it.

Click here to read the full post.

Animated Children’s Films: Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs: The History and the Legacy of Disney’s Original Fairy Tale

This is a guest review by Stevie Leigh Cattigan.

‘Hell, Doc … we just make a picture and then you professors come along and tell us what we do.’ – Walt Disney, Time Magazine (1937)

With the release of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs as their first feature length film in 1937, The Walt Disney Company began negotiations for the complete buy-out of the fairy tale genre. Their venture paid off with profits in excess of $66 million. They capitalised upon this success adapting no fewer than seven more fairy tales to the big screen, and built an entire theme park empire around the idea of their enchanted kingdom whilst making a bomb through the marketing of princesses to little girls. Unsurprisingly, given the seventy year monopoly on fairy tales afforded Disney, many forget the original source tales for these works. Straparola, Basile, Perrault and Madame de Beaumont go unmentioned while Disney still hog the spotlight.

As for the Brothers Grimm, whose tale ‘Schneewittchen’ provided the source for Disney’s adaptation, they fare slightly better in popular culture. In many ways Disney are the natural successors to the Grimms, sharing many of the same conservative values and imparting similar messages about good girls and heroic boys to their audiences. But there are also several differences between the two versions, especially concerning the role of the prince. As is the case in many of the Grimms’ tales, the prince is barely even a character, he just shows up at the end in order to whisk the princess away to his castle. In Disney’s version however, the prince has a more prominent role. As discussed by Sandra Gilbert and Susan Gubar in their seminal work The Madwoman in the Attic, women’s stories are often framed through male discourse and they are, ‘(enclosed) in his texts, glyphs, graphics’. Disney’s prince is the beginning and the end of Snow White’s story; he literally frames her narrative. Then there are of course the dwarfs, so much more prominent in the Disney version than the Grimms’ that they are included in the title. Snow White’s character is so massively one dimensional and underdeveloped that she needs seven little men as a supporting cast (and the Evil Queen) in order to make the film even remotely interesting.

But of course, Snow White is not supposed to be an interesting character. She is a template; a parable for how girls should behave. In the Grimms’ version she is just seven years old. I’m presuming she is older in the Disney version, but the point is irrelevant really. No matter her age she is supposed to be childish, innocent, naïve, unknowing. But most importantly she must be domesticated. In the Grimms’ version the dwarfs tell Snow White, ‘If you will keep house for us, cook, make the beds, wash, sew, knit and keep everything neat and tidy, then you can stay with us, and we’ll give you everything you need’, to which Snow White replies, ‘Yes, with pleasure’. In the Disney version she offers to ‘keep home’ if the dwarfs let her stay with them. She also shows that cleaning is darn good fun, and I imagine it really would be if you had a troop of woodland creatures doing most of the work for you. Disney’s Snow White is good and obedient, she does what she’s told and she says her prayers before bedtime. Her only act of disobedience occurs when she ignores the strong warning given to her by the dwarfs: ‘beware of strangers!’ She is tempted by the old hag’s red apple, and we all know by now that there are always disastrous consequences when it comes to disobedient women and apples. Unable to bring themselves to bury her in the ground, the dwarfs creepily decide to display her dead body in an ornately decorated glass coffin, so they can always enjoy her beauty. In the Grimms’ tale the prince, who has searched high and low for a dead chick in a glass coffin, says to the dwarfs, ‘Let me have the coffin. I will give you whatever you want for it… Make me a present of it, for I can’t live without seeing Snow White. I will honour and cherish her as if she were my beloved.’ Note how she is simply referred to as an ‘it’ here; she is a mere possession for the prince. In the Disney version Snow White is then awoken by ‘love’s true kiss’, another deviation from the Grimms’ tale and presumably an element borrowed from Sleeping Beauty. Perhaps it appealed to Walt’s romantic side – his creepy, bordering-on-necrophilia romantic side. As a reward for her unrelenting submissiveness Snow White gets to spend the rest of her life in a giant castle with a man she barely knows who calls her ‘it’. Believe it or not the evil Queen’s fate is far grizzlier.

Despite the pervasiveness of the ‘evil step-mother’ as a stock character in popular culture, it is actually the biological parents who play the villains in many fairy tales. Often the Grimms would alter certain tales they had collected, substituting birth mothers for step-mothers, so as not to shock their readers and tarnish the image of the motherhood. In Snow White, her good biological mother dies in childbirth at the beginning of the tale, paving the way for a truly monstrous step-mother. In Disney’s version they go even further by eradicating Snow White’s birth mother from the narrative all together, leaving us with just the good, pure and passive Snow White contrasted with the evil, jealous and powerful Queen. The whole virgin/whore dichotomy thing, which Western culture still cannot get enough of, is prominent in the original tale but is amped to the max by Disney. In versions of the tale pre-dating the Grimms, most notably Giambattista Basile’s ‘The Young Slave’, much is made of the Queen’s jealousy of Snow White’s suitors. Once fairy tales became more exclusively aimed towards children sexual themes began to be repressed, and although The Grimms and Disney still focus on Snow White’s step-mother’s jealousy in their tales, the psycho-sexual undertones are far more subtle. Competition for male approval could be seen to be the most prominent theme of the story. Whether it be for the affection of young suitors, or for the attention of the absent father (In the Grimms’ tale Snow White is not an orphan, but her father is only mentioned once in the text. Child psychoanalyst Bruno Bettelheim suggested that the rivalry between Snow White and the Queen was oedipal.) Or, as Gilbert and Gubar suggest, for the approval of the patriarchal voice of judgment in the mirror ‘that rules the Queen’s – and every woman’s – self evaluation.’ The Queen’s obsession with beauty merely reflects patriarchal society’s own obsession with it. This is still relevant today, and it is still an issue which pits women against each other. Again, Gilbert and Gubar highlight this, ‘female bonding is extraordinarily difficult in patriarchy: women almost inevitably turn against women because the voice in the looking glass sets them against each other.’ Of course, for the Queen there is no happy ending, and she meets a sticky end in both tales. In the Grimms’ far more horrific version she is forced to dance in red hot iron shoes until she drops dead. In the Disney version the violence is more sanitised, with her death taking place off-screen. However, her treatment is still harsh and she is pursued by the dwarfs onto a cliff where she falls to her death, destined to be pecked at by wild vultures.

2001 welcomed an alternative to the Disney fairy tale with the release of Shrek, an animated comedy which made fun of the old classics. To date there have been three more Shrek films, as well as other similar animated features such as Hoodwinked and Happily N’Ever After. Even Disney jumped on the bandwagon with the release of their live action feature Enchanted, which tells the story of a fairytale princess transported to modern day New York. In these films fairy tale tropes are lampooned and mocked for being old fashioned and out of touch. In one scene in Shrek the Third the princesses find themselves trapped in prison. Their solution to this problem is to ‘assume the positions’, which means sit around and wait to be rescued. And there is of course the scene where Snow White, accompanied as always by her posse of cute creatures, enchants two guards with her beautiful singing voice, only to then take them surprise by unleashing her song birds as weapons, all to the tune of Led Zeppelin. In Disney’s Enchanted they mock their own little Snow White with a city version of the ‘Whistle While You Work’ scene. This time it is a host of vermin, clusters of cockroaches and swarms of flies that help her with chores. Despite these films making fun of old fairy tale clichés, and trying to create a more modern outlook, they tend to reinforce the same values. They still end happily ever after with a wedding, and they continue to focus on hetero-normative plot points.

After gaining little success with The Princess and the Frog and Tangled, Disney announced in 2009 that they would no longer make fairy tale adaptations. Which I’m guessing they are starting to regret right around now as it seems fairy tales are once again en vogue. There are two new TV shows, Once Upon a Time and Grimm, which deal with the genre, and a whole host of new movie adaptations on the horizon. These include the Shrek spin-off Puss in Boots, and not one but two new Snow White adaptations. The first, Snow White and the Huntsman, seems far grittier with Snow White in armour and a supposedly more active role. Despite this, not one line of dialogue does she get to speak in the trailer. The other adaptation, Mirror, Mirror takes its cue much more from Disney and seems more whimsical and light-hearted. Yet in this trailer Snow White actually gets to speak, and fairytale clichés are made fun of with the prince needing to be rescued instead. However, both trailers still fixate on the monster/angel dichotomy of the two female characters, with no one seeming to understand that this is the most outdated idea of all in the tale. These trailers have prompted much debate over both films’ lack of racial diversity. Considering the wealth of different variations of fairy tales available, from a multitude of different cultural backgrounds, it is completely ridiculous that the only versions we still pay any attention to are those that have been manipulated by upper-class, white guys from the 18th and 19th centuries to suit their own religious and social morals. It would be so easy to put a real spin on the tired old tales, using a more diverse cast and less passive women, because these tales already exist. They are there in the form of traditional folk tales that collectors and publishers chose to ignore, and in the form of post-modern fairy tales, where authors have written out the elitism, racism and misogyny in order to create more exciting tales. Fairy tales are meant to be adapted, manipulated, toyed with and allowed to evolve and to grow. They have travelled from the workrooms of peasants to the literary salons of Paris. They have settled in the nurseries of children and have been adapted to the big screen. They are not meant to be left to stagnate, tracing the same old stories in the same old style. It’s time for change.

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Stevie Leigh Cattigan lives in Glasgow, Scotland and has just graduated with a degree in English and Comparative Literature. Tired of ranting at anyone who would listen about the lack of decent female characters in films, she decided to start at blog about just that called Calm Down Dear (which currently no one reads so take a look if you can!)

Texts used:
Sandra M. Gilbert and Susan Gubar, ‘Snow White and Her Wicked Stepmother’ and The Brothers Grimm, ‘Snow White’ both contained in The Classic Fairy Tales, ed. by Maria Tatar (New York; London: W.W. Norton, 1999).

Animated Children’s Films: Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs

This is a guest review by Rebecca Cohen.

At first blush, a feminist reading of Disney’s 1937 classic Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs seems almost too obvious to bother with. Nearing its 75th birthday, the film naturally reflects the antiquated gender politics of its era. So we should expect nothing less than a passive female protagonist, completely helpless until she is rescued and married. It makes as much sense to criticize these outdated ideals as it does to abuse your 75-year-old grandmother when she wonders if you’ll ever be happy without a husband and children. Sometimes you just have to move on, right?

Well, yes and no. Snow White is still of interest to feminist media critics for several reasons, not the least of which is the continued prominence of the main character in contemporary popular culture. In fact, Snow White’s image is almost as iconic as that of the Mouse himself in identifying the Disney brand. She is commonly featured in the hugely popular Disney Princess line of products aimed at young girls. There is no question that little girls today are still feeling the influence of Walt’s 1937 vision of feminine purity.

And the film has exercised a less overt influence as well. As the first feature-length animated feature to come out of the Disney studio, Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs established a formula for the Disney “princess movie,” as well as template for Disney storytelling which persisted for decades, and from which in many ways the studio is still trying to break free.

At the core of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs are deeply conservative, specifically American values. Although “Snow White” is a German tale, and the setting of the movie is a vaguely medieval, vaguely European fantasy world, the heroine herself is decidedly American. The Wicked Queen isn’t exactly English, but her pronunciation is nevertheless distinctly aristocratic (Mid-Atlantic, perhaps?). Yet the sweet little princess sounds fresh out of Iowa – if a voice can possibly sound corn-fed, hers does.

At every turn, Snow White embodies old-fashioned, small town American ideals. She helps a baby bird not just back to its nest, but back to its “momma and poppa” (because every creature should properly be part of a traditional nuclear family, of course). When she arrives at the dwarfs’ cottage in the woods, her first instinct is to clean up. She assumes, in keeping with traditional gender roles, that the children who live there must not have a mother. That’s the only possible way to explain how their house could be so dirty. Not only does she clean up the place, she enlists the help of the woodland fauna. Indeed, Snow White domesticates everyone and everything around her, spreading the conservative ideals of cleanliness, hard work, and unquestioning acceptance of the status quo even to the animals. She civilizes the dwarfs as well, refusing to feed them until they’ve washed up.

Snow White quickly takes on all the tasks of a wife/mother, cooking and cleaning, staying home and baking pies (as all-American as you can get!), while the little men go off to work during the day. She transforms their cottage in the woods into an idealized suburban American household.

Although Snow White is happy to civilize and suburbanize the dwarfs, it’s clear that she longs for a stable heterosexual union with one man. Yet she remains perpetually passive and never takes steps to achieve that. She expresses what she wants through the song “Some Day My Prince Will Come,” but of course even that is phrased passively; he will come to her, someday. She’ll just have to wait. Although, as princess, she has a rightful claim to the throne, she betrays no shred of ambition in that direction. In fact, the only active step she ever takes in trying to bring about her own happy ending is to make a wish upon the Witch’s “wishing apple.” And look where that gets her!

Standing in contrast to Snow herself is her nemesis, the formidable Wicked Queen. The Queen embodies all the problems supposedly inherent when women occupy positions of power. She is vain and jealous, prioritizing insecurity about her looks above all other concerns. Surely she has a kingdom to run? Yet we never see her do anything except plot to kill her stepdaughter. The Queen’s imposing beauty is directly contrasted to Snow White’s childish innocence. The Queen is commanding, sophisticated, worldly – in short, dangerous.

The Queen is even something of an intellectual. When she disguises herself as a crone, she does so in a laboratory-like dungeon replete with test tubes, flasks and burners, not to mention shelves lined with books. She’s certainly the only character in the film ever seen reading a book. And her final attempt to kill the dwarfs involves use of a lever device, with which she tries to dislodge a boulder and crush them. But her resourcefulness and application of basic physics are to no avail. It’s no coincidence that her cleverness is foiled by a lightning bolt, a stroke of random luck. This anti-intellectualism is of a piece with the conservative American values suffused throughout the film.

Although Snow White’s passivity is evident, it’s notable that the only really effectual character, the Prince, is barely a character at all. He appears in two scenes and has maybe three speaking lines. In truth, he barely participates in the story, except to sweep in at the very end and wake the princess, after all the story action has already transpired. The movie isn’t at all about him or his ability to affect events. The dwarfs play a more prominent role and are constantly active, but they are essentially children – well meaning but utterly ineffective. It’s neither their agency nor their competence that wins the day. Rather it’s their essential goodness and perhaps more important, simplicity.

In the end, neither Snow White nor the Dwarfs ever question the feudalistic system that could allow an evil and dangerously shallow monarch to wield so much power over their lives. They simply live their lives by traditional values, and providence rids them of the unnaturally empowered female, replacing her with a wholesome heterosexual couple. This outcome is where Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs is at its most fundamentally conservative. Through kindness, humility and the observance of traditional gender roles, our heroes ultimately triumph over evil, without ever having to question the system that let evil get the upper hand in the first place.

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Rebecca Cohen is the creator of the webcomic “The Adventures of Gyno-Star,” the world’s first (and possibly only) explicitly feminist superhero comic.

Animated Children’s Films: Despite an Intelligent Heroine, Sexism Taints Disney’s ‘Beauty and the Beast’

This guest review by Megan Kearns appears as part of our theme week on Animated Children’s Films.

An intelligent, strong-willed, female protagonist. Who reads books. And seeks adventure. With a heroine like Belle, Disney’s Beauty and the Beast, must be a feminist-minded film. Right?? At first, I thought so too. But appearances can be deceiving…

Hailed by critics as a touching romance and one of the greatest animated films ever made, Beauty and the Beast became the first animated movie to be nominated for a Best Picture Oscar. When I watched it in the theatre years ago, I too fell under its spell, seduced by its lush animation, whimsical tunes and of course Belle.

It felt refreshing to see an intelligent, outspoken, animated heroine who loved to read. Outspoken and loved books? I was outspoken and loved books! I saw myself in Belle. She was a misunderstood misfit, wanting “more than this provincial life” to which she had been born. I too felt like an outcast, yearning for adventure and freedom. We were kindred spirits.

But it wasn’t until years later that I saw the crack in the veneer. As I got older and embraced myself as a feminist, I began to question things more diligently. Once you start to see sexism, you can’t NOT see it. Sadly, it’s everywhere, including children’s films. Actually it’s possibly most prevalent in children’s films, which often reinforce tired and oppressive gender roles and stereotypes.

Yes, Belle is intelligent, courageous, curious, opinionated…all the things I admire in female protagonists. Disney was painfully aware of the criticism against The Little Mermaid’s Ariel giving up her family, her life, hell even her voice all for a stupid prince. Linda Woolverton, Beauty and the Beast’s screenwriter, drew inspiration for Belle from tomboyish, book-loving, outspoken Jo in Little Women. Belle’s feisty independence heralded a new kind of Disney heroine, paving the way for Jasmine, Pocahontas and Mulan. And yes, we often see the world from her vantage point, another plus. Although the film begins and ends with the Beast, who also happens to go through the biggest transformation (literally and figuratively) in the film. Despite her awesomeness, there’s still a huge problem with Belle.

Even though Belle possesses admirable traits, her merit still comes down to her looks. The Beast, Gaston, the villagers and the enchanted servants all exclaim she’s beautiful, gorgeous, pretty and “her looks have no parallel.” Girls and women should be valued for their intellect, skills and kindness. But no one in the movie is raving about Belle’s inner beauty. Not only is Belle stunning, which of course all Disney “princesses” must be, and white and thin (god we need some diversity in films). It’s her name. Her fucking name is “BELLE,” which in French means “beautiful!” Despite her intelligence and bibliophile ways, even her fucking name revolves around her looks. Once again, women are subjugated and reduced to their appearances. Disney says sure, it’s okay to be smart, bookish, even a weird outcast…as long as you’re pretty. Ugh.

In fact, the whole goddamn movie revolves around beauty. Symbols of beauty (mirrors and roses), permeate the film. Ironic since the intended moral of the fairy tale is looking past appearances to seek true inner beauty. But here’s the kicker. Beauty and the Beast would never have been made with a woman as a beast. Again reinforcing that yep, beauty is only skin deep…if you’re a dude. If you’re a woman, you’d best be gorgeous.

The only other female characters in the movie are Mrs. Potts (I heart Angela Lansbury!), the wardrobe (who has no personality) and the French maid feather duster. A grandmotherly type and a sexpot. Of course Disney does their notorious matricide in the form of the protagonist’s mother either dead or non-existent. They demonize stepmothers and solely focus on both daughters’ and sons’ relationships with their fathers. Seriously, Disney, what the hell have you got against mothers?? And yep, I’m aware Mrs. Potts is Chips’s mother. Doesn’t count. Not only is she not Belle’s mother, she’s a fucking teapot for most of the film. Belle has no female friends, no mother, no sister, no female role model. The importance of female camaraderie and sisterly bonding remain absent from the film.

Unlike many female characters in animated films (or annoying rom-coms for that matter), Belle isn’t looking to be rescued or waiting around for her prince. Two reasons that make Belle a feminist in Woolverton’s eyes. Belle rejects the sexist chauvinist Gaston and his numerous marriage proposals, finding him “boorish” and “brainless.” She wants more out of life than shining that jerk’s boots and popping out his babies. But Belle rebuffs one dysfunctional suitor for another.

A cursed spoiled prince, the Beast imprisons Belle’s father, Maurice, for trespassing. When Belle comes to his rescue, she sacrifices her cherished freedom, for his release. As a “guest” prisoner in the castle, the Beast demands Belle attend dinner with him and forbids her from the West Wing. He screams and throws things at her, his selfish temper raging out of control. Oh, I forgot…the Beast is a romanticized tortured soul. So it’s okay if he’s an abrasive douchebag!

Sure, the sympathetic Beast eventually becomes nicer, giving Belle access to his library and letting birds treat him like a bird feeder. And I do like that Belle and the Beast become friends first before falling in love, which rarely happens in fairy tales. Except for one teeny tiny thing. He’s her captor. Falling in love with the guy who imprisons you, holds you hostage, tells you when to eat, where to go and doesn’t let you see your family?! That’s not love. That’s Stockholm Syndrome, sweetie.

Poisonous messages about love and relationships plague Beauty and the Beast. Don’t worry, ladies…if you suffer and stick by him long enough, your man will change. Just be patient with a guy who’s controlling or abusive. In her lifetime, 1 in 4 women will suffer domestic violence. More and more teenage girls contend with dating violence. Love should not hurt. Ever. But this movie (and sooooo many others) insidiously tells girls that when they grow up, they should stand by their man. Even if he treats you like shit.

I’ll admit Belle as a female character is a step in the right direction. She’s smart, stubborn, kind and ambitious. But Belle gives up her entire life to live forever in a castle with an asshat prince. What about her goals? Her dreams?? Oh that’s right. She becomes a princess! Yet another princess in the pantheon of princesses clogging up girlie-girl media.

Films and books reinforce gender roles and with a lack of female characters, imply that girls and women don’t count. Out of Disney’s 51 theatrically-released animated movies, only 13 feature a female character as a protagonist (16 if you count co-protagonists), most of them princesses. Princesses only care about their clothes and hair. Their looks matter more than their personalities. It seems society would rather teach girls to obsess over their appearance and how to snag a man.

Couldn’t Belle have opened up a bookshop/café or started a book drive or something?? When Belle sang about wanting “more than this provincial life,” I simply refuse to believe twirling around a ballroom in a pretty gown is what she had in mind.

People might think I’m being silly or overreacting about a Disney movie. Fair enough. But I call bullshit. Listen, when we’re young, books, music, movies, TV shows, advertisements and even toys teach us gender roles and identity. Little boys pretend they’re kings or aspire to be president while little girls yearn not to lead like queens, but to be passive princesses. One film probably won’t have much impact. But when the same sexist messages repeat over and over and over and over…well, then it seeps in.

I’m not going to lie. I still watch Beauty and the Beast, singing along to the songs. When I discovered Disney World was building a Beauty and the Beast themed restaurant and attraction, I admit I felt giddy with excitement. But look beyond the gorgeous animation, catchy show tunes and unique heroine.

Sadly, you’ll see yet another fabulous film tainted by sexism, spreading toxic messages that reinforce damaging beauty norms, violence against women, and suffocating gender stereotypes.

Not all that glitters is gold. Unwrapping the beautiful package can sometimes yield an ugly core.

Megan Kearns is a feminist vegan blogger, freelance writer and activist. She blogs at The Opinioness of the World, where she shares her opinions on gender equality, living cruelty-free, Ellen Ripley and delish vegan cupcakes. Her work has also appeared at Arts & Opinion, Fem2pt0, Italianieuropei, Open Letters Monthly, and A Safe World for Women. She earned a B.A. in Anthropology and Sociology and a Graduate Certificate in Women and Politics and Public Policy. Megan lives in Boston with more books than she will probably ever read in her lifetime.

Megan contributed reviews of The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, The Girl Who Played with Fire, The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest, Something Borrowed, !Women Art Revolution, Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, The Kids Are All Right (for our 2011 Best Picture Nominee Review Series), The Reader (for our 2009 Best Picture Nominee Review Series), Mad Men (for our Mad Men Week), Game of Thrones and The Killing (for our Emmy Week 2011), Alien/Aliens (for our Women in Horror Week 2011), and I Came to Testify, Pray the Devil Back to Hell and Peace Unveiled in Women, War & Peace series. She was the first writer featured as a Monthly Guest Contributor.

Animated Children’s Films: The Evolution of the Disney Villainess

The Wicked Queen

This is a guest review by Rebecca Cohen.

I’m not the first to note that the female protagonists of Disney animated features tend not to have mothers. When adult women do appear, they are evil wicked stepmothers, as in Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs and Cinderella, or evil sorceresses, as in Sleeping Beauty and The Little Mermaid. Indeed, it almost seems as if Disney “princess” movies simply don’t have room for two sexually mature women to coexist. The benevolent maternal figures, like Cinderella’s Fairy Godmother and Aurora’s three fairy guardians, Flora, Fauna and Merryweather, are post-menopausal, grandmotherly – certainly not in sexual competition with the heroines. Other than those kindly figures, the only women around are usually powerful adult women who must be destroyed in order for the princess to take her place at her prince’s side.

Yet all these wicked women are not all exactly the same. The role of the Disney princess’ adversary has changed over time in interesting ways.

Let’s start with the Wicked Queen in 1937’s Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. The Queen is in direct sexual competition with her stepdaughter. Her explicit goal is to be “the fairest in the land,” and her aim to destroy the younger woman is entirely in service of that goal. She is willing to risk everything to preserve her status as “fairest.” Her cold, angular beauty is contrasted with Snow White’s child-like, soft appearance. (Personally, I always thought the Queen was far prettier than Snow White.) The Queen is a mature, worldly, strong woman who stands in the way of Snow White’s ascension to marriage and adulthood.

Lady Tremaine

The Disney Studio tried to recreate some of the success of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs with the release of Cinderella in 1950. Cinderella contains many of the prominent elements of Snow White, including an evil stepmother and a protagonist forced to wear rags and perform domestic labor. Notably, the wicked stepmother in Cinderella, Lady Tremaine, is not vain and sexually competitive with her stepdaughter. Instead, Lady Tremaine aspires to wealth and status, and views Cinderella as a threat to that ambition. In a way, this villainess’ objectives have expanded beyond a shallow beauty contest. There is money and position on the line. Although Cinderella herself desires the exact same thing as her stepmother – to escape her present circumstances and live in the castle – the movie couches her ambition as hopeful dreaming, while Lady Tremaine’s desires are conniving and greedy. The wicked stepmother, being past marriageable age, doesn’t enter herself into direct rivalry for the princely prize. Instead she uses her daughters, Cinderella’s stepsisters, as proxies. The stepsisters are flat-chested and bratty, lacking the gentle curves that demonstrate Cinderella’s readiness for marriage. Yes, their appearance and behavior is designed to highlight their “ugliness,” but they also come across as juvenile. They are never real threats to Cinderella’s ascension to sexual maturity. They are only extensions of their scheming mother, who like Snow White’s Wicked Queen, sees the heroine’s inevitable eventual marriage as a personal threat. In the worlds of Snow White and Cinderella, princes are a finite resource and women will naturally compete for them. But only one can prevail.

Maleficent

1959’s Sleeping Beauty breaks from the wicked stepmother mold. In fact, Princess Aurora actually has both a mother and a father, both of whom are on the side of good. But the king is a peripheral character and the queen, while lovely, barely speaks. They are both marginal to the story. The adversary in this case is Maleficent, a powerful sorceress. Maleficent does not view Aurora as a threat to her own ambitions, so much as a tool for revenge against Aurora’s parents. What exactly does Maleficent want? She was not invited to celebration of the princess’ birth, and she takes it as an affront and curses the child. The implication is not that the sorceress is truly that petty, but rather that she wants to instill fear and deference in the monarchs. Maleficent’s role in the kingdom is a little bit vague. She lives on the Forbidden Mountain, in her own castle, commanding her own small army of minions. She is clearly powerful, but she expresses no specific aspiration for more influence. In her own way, she just wants respect. But in the world of Sleeping Beauty, she is a mature adult woman with authority and agency. Naturally she must be destroyed before Aurora can become an adult herself (i.e., marry the prince).

Ursula

The next “princess” movie to come out of the Disney studio was The Little Mermaid in 1989. In The Little Mermaid, it’s not a woman holding the heroine back from adulthood, but rather an overprotective father. It’s hard to imagine a more obvious metaphor for sexual immaturity than being a mermaid. Ariel dreams of having legs, and if it weren’t clear that that means becoming sexually mature, her ambition to be human crystallizes in her desire to marry Prince Eric. The villain in this case is Ursula, “the sea witch.” Like the other villainesses before her, Ursula is a mature woman. She is a very sexual creature, with heavily lidded eyes, big red lips, prominent boobs, and lots of tentacles – down there. Yet she is to be understood as not sexy; she is heavy, and older. Unlike Snow White’s evil queen and Cinderella’s stepmother, Ursula doesn’t see the young princess herself as a threat, but as a tool to another end. But unlike Maleficent, she does have very specific designs on power. Ursula wants to rule the sea in place of King Triton, and Ariel’s campaign to be human (adult) provides a convenient lever for her to achieve this. Ursula is a sorceress, and therefore powerful, but apparently her strength cannot compare to that of King Triton’s mighty trident (ahem). Ursula’s perverse sexuality is of a piece with her perverse power aspirations. How un-subtle that she meets her end being impaled by the prow of a sunken ship piloted by Prince Eric. Once again the only sexually mature woman in sight must be defeated in order for the princess to become available for marriage. And in this case, the ambitious woman who wants more for herself than marriage must give way to the less worldly girl who wants only to land her man.

Ursula was the last Disney villainess I can think of. With Beauty and the Beast in 1991, the studio abandoned the narrative of female competition in favor of an explicit male sexual threat – although it’s still notable that the only other woman in Belle’s world is a teapot. Since then, and probably in response to a fair amount of criticism, the studio has increasingly struggled to incorporate more progressive ideas about gender into their animated features, with varying levels of success. The image of a powerful adult woman in competition with an innocent girl on the cusp of maturity was an intrinsic element of the princess narrative for over 50 years. It continues to resonate in the imaginations of girls to this day, informing and possibly limiting their perspective on gender roles, relationships between women and the nature of feminine ambition.

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Rebecca Cohen is the creator of the webcomic “The Adventures of Gyno-Star,” the world’s first (and possibly only) explicitly feminist superhero comic.

Animated Children’s Films: The Hunchback of Notre Dame

This is a guest review by Caitlin Moran.

Victor Hugo’s Notre-Dame de Paris is not the sort of book I would even remotely consider turning into a children’s movie, so I give the Disney studios credit for trying. Whoever read that dark, unsentimental tale of attempted rape, torture, lust, revenge, kidnapping and execution, and decided, “Yes, this would make a swell children’s movie” has a greater imagination than I do. Much of the book’s R-rated material has been watered down or removed, but the grim core remains in Hunchback of Notre Dame, making this the darkest film of the 1990s Disney Renaissance.

Hunchback follows the lonely life of the titular hunchback, Quasimodo, who was forcibly taken from his mother and ensconced in Notre Dame by Frollo, a sanctimonious, scheming, positively vile judge (he adds “lecherous” to that litany by the end of the movie) whose sole purpose in life is to wipe the gypsy population of Paris out of existence. Quasi is tender and kind despite his exterior (which, while it is decried as hideous multiple times, is at worst a little disproportional and at best kind of cute), and longs for a life outside the cathedral. He gets his wish, of course, and ends up teaming up with Esmeralda, a gypsy, and Phoebus, a pretty-boy soldier hunk to save the gypsies from Frollo and Notre Dame from destruction.

Like most Disney movies, Hunchback only gives us one female character with anything to do: Esmeralda, the smokin’ hot gypsy dancer who seduces every man who so much as looks at her. (Full disclosure: I had not one but two full Esmeralda costumes as a child, an Esmeralda action figure and an Esmeralda Barbie doll). Esmeralda may be the only hooker-with-a-heart-of-gold to ever appear in a Disney movie. She gives a rousing Medieval pole-dance at the Festival of Fools, but is the only onlooker moved by Quasimodo’s brutal humiliation after he is turned on by the crowd (she also follows up a stirring call for social justice by beating the crap out of Frollo’s soldiers). She dances in the street for money, but gives the most humble, heartfelt prayer for her people out of all the worshipers in Notre Dame, who only pray for money or fame, during the lovely “God Help the Outcast.”

And unlike Ariel in The Little Mermaid, whose tribulations are almost exclusively caused by her own narrow-minded pursuit of a dreamboat she’s never spoken to, Esmeralda is street-smart and clever; her eventual capture is facilitated accidentally by Phoebus and Quasimodo, who both see themselves as her male protector and likewise rush to save her, though she was doing perfectly well on her own, thank you very much.

So did Disney finally break away from the flimsy, strong-but-need-a-man-to-save-me heroines so ensconced in their tradition? Not quite. Because never before has a Disney heroine been so objectified as a symbol of lust. In fact, Disney gives Frollo an entire song, “Hellfire,” to explore how much he wants to bang her, complete with a giant blazing fireplace and hooded harbingers of damnation. I remember sitting in the theater as a seven-year-old with my mom, a Sour Patch Kid frozen halfway to my mouth. At the time my only thought was “They’re saying Hell in a Disney movie! Cool!” but upon rewatching the movie in high school I could only marvel at how much “Hellfire” serves as the most perfect rape apologia in all of animated film. “It’s not my fault,” Frollo sings, “I’m not to blame. It is the gypsy girl, the witch who set this flame.”

Dear God.

This is the fundamental problem with the movie, which purports to leave us with the message that what is on the inside is more important than what’s on the outside, but can’t resist having a sexpot heroine whose fundamental awesomeness (she crowd surfs! she wears a knife in her garter! she vanishes in puffs of smoke!) is overshadowed by fact that she’s a 15th century pin-up who ultimately needs to be saved (twice) by the men in her life.

Esmeralda, girl, you deserved better.

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Caitlin Moran is a recent graduate of Boston College. She lives in New York with her cat and a mini-donut maker. Oh, and a human roommate. She’s pretty cool too.

Animated Children’s Films: Aladdin

This is an anonymous guest review.

This movie is about a princess and a “street rat” who fall in love and must overcome the evil Jafar to get married. This movie is also about generalizing non-Western cultures (mainly Middle Eastern cultures) and perpetuating cartoonish stereotypes of Arabic peoples. As an added bonus, this movie masquerades as a girl power film when in fact, it enforces the traditional gender role of men as active/women as passive.

The first time I saw this children’s movie was over this past summer, when I was the assistant director of a summer production of the musical Disney’s Aladdin. I was the only person involved in the production that had not seen Aladdin when I was a child. Every single one of the children (almost entirely girls, ages 9-12 with one 7 year old) came in with ideas of what the show would look like, because they had all seen the movie and they knew every single song. Because they knew the music, we had more time to work on choreography. For a marketplace scene, I asked the kids to strike a pose to freeze in during dialogue. I was looking for marketplace-y poses: two people talking, maybe gesturing to another person, walking poses, etc. They immediately put their arms up with their palms together so that their arms framed their face and their necks were moved to one side (a pose associated with “Arabia” in pop-culture). They all wanted to do their hair in the “I Dream of Jeannie” hairdo, because it was “so Arabian”. I wondered, where did they get such a stereotypical view of the Middle East? And then I saw the movie and all of those questions were answered.

My director thought that this was a girl power movie. Look! At the end, the Sultan declares that Jasmine can marry whomever she chooses, when she chooses! And she rejects all of those suitors because she’s “not a prize to be won”! Girl power yeah! No. This movie is producing yet another hetero-romantic story where women sit there and men pursue them. She was naïve before Aladdin shows her a “whole new world”—she is the passive learner while he is the active teacher. How does she help with the defeat of Jafar? She kisses him—using her body to be attractive to men—the rest of the time she just kind of stands there while Aladdin fights Jafar. Again, she stands there lookin’ sexy and being passive, he fights actively. Even their body stance around each other assumes a dominant/submissive look—Aladdin’s body is tall and upright, Jasmine is leaning into him or sitting behind him or being held in his arms. He is also physically larger, aside from her hair (her ponytail is thicker than her waist), she is extremely thin and takes up very little space when compared to Aladdin’s broad shoulders and muscular body. And of course, what other characters in this movie are women? Oh that’s right, they are all men. Because women can only be in stories to be the object of men’s affections, not to fill other roles. There are some background women in the dance scenes, but those are the “harem girls” and other sexualized women (because foreign=exotic and sexy!)

Essentially, all of the women are defined by their attractiveness to men. “Ugly” women, then, are used as comic relief. In one of the first scenes, when a woman opens the door and says of Aladdin, “Still I think he’s rather tasty!”, everybody in the audience is supposed to laugh. Aladdin looks at the woman (who is quite large) and jumps in surprise and disgust. Oh, silly fat woman, you can’t have feelings because you’re ugly! We’re supposed to laugh at how ridiculous her thinking Aladdin is “tasty” is—because fat women and ugly women are not supposed to have sexual desires. Only when the sexy women do this is it okay—nobody is laughing at Jasmine’s proclamations of love for Aladdin, because it doesn’t seem ridiculous now. Aladdin is attractive, she is attractive, so they can be in love.

So doing this story where every single role had to be filled by a girl made this an interesting production. Some girls told us they didn’t want to be a male character. Some girls who were cast into men’s roles started acting like men—they lowered their voices and changed their body language to reflect a stereotypical man. Some girls who were cast into men’s roles adopted them to be women’s roles—the girl playing Jafar, for example, had no issue with being a female Jafar. The girl who played Aladdin, the title character, made it clear that she was acting like a man—I, personally, thought that it would have been fine for her to be a female Aladdin (but the lesbian love story was not an idea that they particularly were comfortable with, which is interesting given how comfortable they were with heterosexual love stories).

In fact, I think it would have made the movie better if Aladdin was a girl (and if all the racism was taken out). Suddenly, “A Whole New World” takes on a whole new meaning—but these movies with antiquated gender roles would not have been as widely accepted into culture if the relationship it portrayed was queer.

When watching this movie, it’s hard to not get depressed about the fact that this is what little girls are told to aspire to. Watch something else instead.

This is an anonymous review.

Animated Children’s Films: You Say Princess Like It’s a Bad Thing

This is a guest review by Myrna Waldron.

“The sarcasm is practically melting off the screen!”

If you’re an internet and animation addict like I am, you’ve probably come across several sets of images, like the one above, that point out the sexist flaws present in Disney films. While I wholeheartedly believe in critical analysis of popular culture, I think images like these are unfair, and further marginalize the characters by accentuating the negative. Most of the Disney Princesses, especially the ones from the Disney Renaissance, are admirable and strong female characters. It is to Disney’s credit that from the beginning they have made many female fronted films; compare Dreamworks and Pixar, who have only one female-fronted movie so far (Monsters vs. Aliens and the upcoming Brave respectively). It is my job, then, to remind us of the positive traits of the Disney Princesses while still taking a feminist perspective.

“I wish I could get animals to help me do my chores.”

“So pure-hearted she can touch bubbles without bursting them.”

This then leads into another “Domestic Goddess”, chronologically the next Disney Princess, Cinderella. Like Snow White, Cinderella was orphaned at a young age and subsequently abused by her stepfamily. Many critics of her character dismiss her as weak because she refused to stand up to her stepfamily or to leave their house entirely. To that criticism, I point out that it is often extremely difficult for a victim of abuse to be able to confront their abusers or leave them (and feminists should be unfortunately aware of this). Also, where would she go? Assuming the film takes place in the 19th century at the latest, she would have difficulty finding work on her own (other than working as a governess or more housekeeping!), and Lady Tremaine has done everything in her power to make sure Cinderella can’t meet someone and get married.

I take further issue with the dismissal of Cinderella’s character as weak. Right at the start of the film, she displays a strong will, and a sharp wit. Her sarcastic ranting at the castle’s bells remains my favourite scene in the movie. She also has a strong rebellious streak; I highly doubt her stepfamily would have approved of her releasing the mice from the traps and her giving them little hats and shirts. This strong will and sense of rebellion comes to a point when Cinderella hears that every eligible maiden is to attend a ball held for the returning Prince. Her assertion that she is able to attend the ball as well is an assertion of her rights as a woman. Despite her marginalization and abuse from her family, she is, in this invitation, considered an equal. When her stepfamily tries to ensure she will not have time to make a dress, Cinderella steels herself not to be too disappointed about missing out on the ball, showing further strength of character. It is only when her stepsisters destroy her dress (in a scene disturbingly reminiscent of sexual assault) that she finally falls into despair; it is one abuse too many. I cannot fault her for her reaction at this point, as not only has she endured horrific emotional and physical abuse, she has yet again been denied one of the few things she has asked for. The ball, for Cinderella, represents her marginalized rights. At the ball, there is no class distinction, she has a chance to have fun for once, and she has a chance to meet other people (not just the prince). Her stepfamily can thus be interpreted as a representation of people who deny rights to women, and Cinderella can thus stand in for the oppressed women who fight against misogyny.

“Aurora’s side of the wedding chapel was entirely comprised of animals.”

In the planning stages for this essay, I struggled the most with my defense for Aurora. I have decided that this is because she is not even the star of her own movie, never mind the fact that she’s asleep throughout the entire third act. Sleeping Beauty is really about the three (four if you count Maleficent) fairies. Aurora is ultimately a flat character; all we can say about her is that she’s lovely, she sings, and she’s nice to animals. My argument for Aurora, then, is that she is a victim of social conditioning. Compared to Snow White and Cinderella, she’s had a happier childhood, but has grown up in complete isolation. She has never gone to school, never played with other children, and has literally never met anyone else other than her “aunts” (is it any wonder she falls in love with the first man she ever meets?). On top of that, these aunts are deeply overprotective and paranoid (though with reason).

Aurora has thus grown up only displaying the traits that the fairies’ magicked into her, and they have never allowed her to develop into anything other than their ideal. The fairies idealized Aurora so much that they never think to consider that she has a mind and a will of her own, and assume she would be overjoyed that they kept vital secrets from her for her entire life. In many ways, though it was with the best of intentions, the fairies/aunts have done Aurora a great disservice. Their loyalty and promise to the king seems to supersede their loyalty to someone they have raised like a daughter. Though Maleficent must magically hypnotize Aurora into touching the spindle, I believe it is the fairies’ insistence on obedience above all that partly led to Aurora’s downfall. In Aurora’s case, my feminist defense of her character will be one of empathy for her.

“Disney’s ode to teenage angst.”

We now move 30 years into the future to discuss Ariel. A feminist defense of The Little Mermaid was the original subject of this essay before I decided to expand its focus. She is one of my favourite movie characters, so I reacted with dismay at the criticisms dismissing her as a woman who mutilates her own body to get a man. I point to the “Part of Your World” scene as perhaps the most important scene in the movie when it comes to Ariel’s character. She has always felt like an outcast, and has ALWAYS wanted to be human, and this takes place BEFORE she meets Eric. Her falling in love with Eric is a catalyst for her achieving something she’s always dreamed of, not the sole reason. If she’d had the means and the opportunity to become a human, she would have done so beforehand; “What would I give to live out of these waters.”

A second criticism for Ariel is the idea that the film espouses Ursula’s message that only quiet and submissive women are valued; “It’s she who holds her tongue that gets her man.” First off, this is the VILLAIN that says this. Second, this lyric is actually a good indicator of dramatic irony. Eric obviously wants Ariel to be able to talk (and not just because he’s infatuated with the memory of her voice). You can see from his reactions to her sometimes odd behaviors that he wishes he could find out her thoughts and feelings. This is a feminist reversal of Ursula’s claims; Eric values a woman who is able to speak her mind.

Lastly, I wish to shortly refute the criticisms about the climax of the film. It is true that Ariel was incapacitated by Ursula’s magic, and that it was Eric who ultimately killed Ursula. However, only moments earlier, Ariel physically fought against Ursula, and even forced Ursula into accidentally destroying her pet eels, so she is obviously not weak and submissive here. I also think of the incapacitation as a dark echo of a sentiment Ariel expressed earlier in the “Part of Your World Song”; “Sick of swimming, ready to stand.” As a mermaid, she feels and has been exploited into uselessness, as a human, she’s ready not only to physically stand, but to metaphorically stand up for herself.

“I sing to my books all the time, don’t you?”

Belle is probably the easiest Princess to defend. I will first entirely dismiss the “Stockholm Syndrome” interpretation; Belle does not change psychologically, her defense of the Beast is not irrational, and it is the Beast who changes personality, not Belle. With that out of the way, let’s discuss Belle’s character. First and foremost, and refreshingly for an animated female character, she is a beautiful intellectual. Her love of books marks her as a nonconformist in her village, as her neighbors generally take an anti-intellectual philosophy. One of Belle’s most defining characteristics is her complete refusal to compromise herself to please others (which is yet another point against the Stockholm Syndrome nonsense). She wonders if she is odd, and notices that she has never been able to form a friendship with anyone in the village, but notably never considers giving up her books to fit in better. Her nonconformity is thus inherent, and is not a sign of outright rebellion, but a feminist pride in herself.

Feminist messages in the film are also easily indicated by the differences between Belle’s two suitors, the Beast and Gaston. At first, there is not much difference between the men; neither initially takes Belle’s wishes and desires into account when courting her. Note that Belle is undaunted by the lack of respect shown by the men; she ignores Gaston’s dismissal of her interests and responds to his flirtations with sarcasm, and she stands up to the Beast when he has his temper tantrums. Interestingly, both actions demonstrate different kinds of courage: to rebuff the advances and “advice” of a leader of the village shows further confidence and courage in her nonconformity, and to stand up to and argue with a physical embodiment of fear is symbolically feminist of our efforts to stand up to those that would use fear to subdue us.

Later on, Gaston openly proposes to Belle, and affirms his characterization as a male chauvinist. His plans for his marriage to Belle involve forcing her into subservience; he fantasizes about her massaging his feet and bearing him 6 or 7 “strapping” boys (he evidently doesn’t value female children). Once again, he shows no concern for Belle’s wishes and assumes that this life is what all women dream of. Once Beast’s personality starts to change, he differentiates himself from Gaston. He no longer tries to force her affections (such as the demand that she join him for dinner), and shows that he values her intellectualism and cares about her interests when he gifts her the library. In the third act, there is almost a role reversal in the evolution of Gaston and Beast’s characters. Gaston tries to “trap” Belle into marriage through blackmail, and the Beast officially “frees” Belle (though at this point she is arguably staying in the castle willingly) out of love for her, knowing that she may never return. The suitors’ very different approaches to relationships thus serve as excellent examples for the types of relationships that feminists seek to end/embrace: We reject relationships solely based on the wants and desires of the man with no consideration of the woman’s feelings, and seek relationships of mutual respect and understanding, with careful consideration of the interests, wants and desires of both partners.

“I like making you feel uncomfortable.”

Lastly, I will briefly argue for Jasmine. Her character arc and central conflict lies in her father’s legal requirement that she marry a prince by her next birthday. I will have to step on a few minefields here by pointing out that the sultan’s allowing Jasmine to choose her own husband is already astoundingly feminist for medieval Arabia (we unfortunately don’t see that kind of freedom often even today). It’s not an ideal feminist position, but it is part of the Sultan’s own character arc for him to recognize the sexism of his laws. She states that if she must marry, she wants to marry for love, which is conveniently both a common fairy tale trope and an important feminist stance.

Jasmine is characterized as a woman with an intelligence, courage and wit that surprises the men around her (which is perhaps a subtle jab at Middle Eastern oppression of women). Her escape from the palace shows a feminist emotional fortitude; she will put her happiness first. She catches on to Aladdin’s schemes very quickly, showing that she is just as clever about getting out of bad situations as he is. One particularly controversial scene (the one I have pictured) involves her quick-thinking abilities. In order to distract Jafar, she exploits his attraction to her by pretending that she has magically fallen in love with him. It is partly a scene about using her sexuality as a weapon, but I also believe that her actions are equally as much about utilizing her intelligence and adaptability to any situation.

“How can you tell this is fanart? The Characters show an actual personality.”

Many internet and media-savvy Disney fans are by now well aware of the feminist issues present in many of the films, with particular emphasis on the Disney Princess films. I do not disagree. The films’ plots are heteronormative, show very little racial diversity, encourage unrealistic standards of beauty, and foster unrealistic standards of relationships. And yet, despite these problems, there are many things to celebrate about the Disney Princess films. As I have argued, the characters embody the virtues of kindness, generosity, mental and emotional fortitude, courage, intellectualism and staying true to oneself. Even the Princesses that predate the 1960s have traits that feminists would value or empathize with. My recommendation for parents with concerns about the messages these films present to children is for them to talk to their kids honestly. There is always room for improvement, especially when it comes to feminist representation in film, but it is important to recognize the positive feminist messages that are already present. Explain to your children about both sides, and let them figure it out for themselves. They’ll thank you for it.

—–

Myrna Waldron is a 24-year-old pop culture fanatic with a special passion for animation. She can be reached on Twitter at @SoapboxingGeek, where she muses openly about whatever strikes her fancy.

Animated Children’s Films: Why I’m Excited About Pixar’s ‘Brave’ & Its Kick-Ass Female Protagonist…Even If She Is Another Princess

Disney Pixar’s Brave, in theatres June 2012

This is a cross-post from The Opinionesss of the World.

A few days ago, Disney’s Pixar released its trailer for its newest animated film, Brave. Why is this such a huge deal? Why am I so freaking excited to see it?? Because out of the 12 films Pixar has produced, not one has featured a female protagonist. Not one. Until now.

Pixar’s first fairy tale, Brave follows the story of Princess Merida, voiced by Kelly McDonald (Boardwalk Empire, No Country for Old Men). I know. You’re probably thinking ANOTHER princess?! Young girls are entrenched in sexist princess culture. But trust me, this one’s a bit different.

In the Scottish Highlands, “courageous” and “impetuous” Princess Merida is “a skilled archer” who would rather focus on her archery than her role as a docile, demure princess. She defies her parents and tradition, determined to forge her own path in life. But her actions “unleash chaos and fury in the kingdom.” After she turns to a Witch (Julie Walters) who grants her an “ill-fated wish” (yes, this is still a fairy tale), Merida attempts to undo a curse. Her bravery will be tested as she tries to change her fate.

Merida’s mother, Queen Elinor (Emma Thompson), tells her in the trailer:

“A lady enjoys elegant pursuits.”

But Merida replies:

“I want my freedom.”

You go, girl! (Sorry, couldn’t resist the clichéd 90s catchphrase.)

Too many animated films don’t feature girls and women in leading roles. Originally titled Rapunzel, Disney’s Tangled, the most recent animated film featuring a girl, was renamed a gender-neutral title to be less girl-centric. Its marketing didn’t just focus on Rapunzel but featured “bad-boy” thief Flynn Ryder in order to lure a male audience. Lovely. ‘Cause movies shouldn’t be geared to girls, only to boys. You know, ’cause they’re the only ones who really matter.

Male characters dominate animated films. Shrek, Ice Age, Rango, Kung Fu Panda and the entire pantheon of Pixar’s films (Toy Story, Up, Wall-E, etc.) put male roles front and center. Out of Disney’s 51 animated movies, only 12 feature a lead female character. When you DO find an animated female protagonist, she’s usually a princess. Aren’t there any more roles for girls and women?? The exception to this rule are the Japanese-based Studio Ghibli’s films (My Neighbor Totoro, Kiki’s Delivery Service and Spirited Away) which often feature female leads, sans royal titles and tiaras.

Women rarely direct animated films. Brave is the first Pixar film to feature a woman as director (Brenda Chapman) and all female screenwriters (Brenda Chapman & Irene Mecchi). Although Chapman, who worked on the project for 6 years, was fired (such bullshit) and replaced by Mark Andrews, although she’ll still receive credit as co-director. Yes, women can certainly be perpetrators of sexism, gender stereotypes and tropes. But having more women as writers and directors usually leads to more female protagonists and perspectives.

Inspired by Chapman’s relationship with her daughter, Brave also features two parents, a mother and a father. It’s rare for an animated movie to have a loving mother, considering too many Disney films kill off mothers, demonize stepmothers and solely focus on both daughters’ and sons’ relationships with their fathers.

In her eye-opening book Cinderella Ate My Daughter: Dispatches from the Front Lines of the New Girlie-Girl Culture, Peggy Orenstein writes about Brave’s premise:

“Sounds promising, though I cannot help but feel, after waiting patiently (and sometimes not so patiently) through twelve genre-busting films about male robots, male superheroes, male cowboys, male rats, male cars, male bugs, male fish, and a small male mailman, that it would have been nice if the movie was not about a princess, even a kick-ass one. Honestly, is that too much to ask?”

Nope. It really shouldn’t be too much to ask.

Yes, Brave features another white girl as a princess. We desperately need more racial diversity in animated films (and live-action ones too). I mean it took Disney only 72 years to have its first African-American princess with Tiana in The Princess and the Frog (seriously, Disney?? What the hell’s wrong with you?!) And we sure as hell don’t need another goddamn princess. Princesses are EVERYWHERE. Christ, even the inquisitive Dora the Explorer has been turned into a freaking princess in some merchandising. Princesses don pink dresses, wear tiaras and wave scepters. Their only goal? To look pretty of course. Their looks matter more than their personalities.

Girlie-girl images saturate the media, telling girls to strive for physical perfection. Too many films focus on girls and young women wishing to be rescued and giving up their voice for love (um, can anyone say The Little Mermaid’s Ariel??). It’s refreshing to have a spunky, outspoken protagonist who’d rather pursue her dreams of archery than aspire to matrimony.

Girls should be valued for their intellect, skills and kindness. Not their beauty. Hopefully, Brave will help shatter the rigid princess imagery, paving the way for more empowered female protagonists. Girls (and boys) deserve better role models than bullshit stereotypes.

‘Brave’ will be released in theatres June 2012.

Megan Kearns is a feminist vegan blogger, freelance writer and activist. She blogs at The Opinioness of the World, where she shares her opinions on gender equality, living cruelty-free, Ellen Ripley and delish vegan cupcakes. Her work has also appeared at Arts & Opinion, Fem2pt0, Italianieuropei, Open Letters Monthly, and A Safe World for Women. She earned a B.A. in Anthropology and Sociology and a Graduate Certificate in Women and Politics and Public Policy. Megan lives in Boston with more books than she will probably ever read in her lifetime. She is a Monthly Guest Contributor to Bitch Flicks.

Animated Children’s Films: Cinderella

Cinderella (1950)

I would guess that in its long years of making animated features, Disney has made a mint on the princess formula. There is always a brooding prince, handsome, but distracted by his more worldly pursuits (i.e. war, evil, magic, etc.). There is a beautiful yet tragic young woman who is either on-her-knees humble, completely unaware of her high-class lineage, or else common as dirt. It is this woman’s duty to make trouble—stubbornly, stupidly, and innocently; the prince cleans up her mess, the audience rolling their collective eyes, lovingly amused.

In the case of Cinderella, the silly mistakes of losing a shoe and ignoring an expiring spell bring Prince Charming to Cinderella’s doorstep, ready to find his mate no matter how long it takes. This comes after a long and emotionally torturous journey on the part of Cinderella. In its beginning scenes, we see her struggle with housework under the ridiculous demands of her evil Stepmother and Stepsisters. She washes floors while singing prettily, the bubbles harmonizing her melody. It is revealed to us that she used to be rich and spoiled, but destiny wringed her into this incarnation – selfless, lovely, and dutiful. She is the better for it; look what fate made of those Stepsisters – loud, obnoxious, and ugly.

We see the Stepsisters’ true colors when, having been promised by her Stepmother to attend the Prince’s ball, Cinderella pieces together a gown from her real Mother’s dress and beads and cloth trashed by the Stepsisters and collected by Cinderella’s animals friends. As she cleans and cooks (in her Stepmother’s attempt to make her too late to attend the ball), the mice and birds sew together something passable for her to wear. The Stepsisters, recognizing their discarded materials, rip it apart and flounce off, their bustles comically bouncing after them.

It is shocking to see such a comely, self-possessed woman ripped apart as such. But a fairy godmother replaces the dress with a blue, glittering number, complete with absurd ear-covering headpiece. Cinderella floats into the ball and the rest is history. Beauty trumps power once again.

Watching Cinderella again for the first time since I was a child, it was amazing to me that time and again Disney portrays women as either bitches or victims. Ursula, Maleficent, Snow White’s Queen, the Queen of Hearts and of course Cinderella’s stepmother Lady Tremaine are all evil women, jealous of the beauty and innocence of their younger counterparts. One by one they seek to quell romance, passion, and everything else good from the lives of the eventual princesses by seeking power, wealth, and beauty of their own. Only a man can save these women from their pitiful disputes, damaging though they are. Perhaps the notion of a man wielding this type of power over a young, beautiful woman was a little too akin to rape for Disney’s taste. Either way, the Disney-fication of evil into an older, vindictive woman promotes an attitude that women are either a victim or seeking to be a victim; a mentality that when unleashed in the real world leads to horrific statements like, “She was asking for it.”

Newer Disney movies rely much less on this format; I think of such movies as Mulan, Beauty and the Beast, and Pocahontas whose end result of marriage contradicts a much more liberated adventure. In 1950, however, romance, passion, and entertainment could only be accomplished via marriage. True love was confirmed by a man deigning to step from his elevated social status to marry a woman of common birth. (A scheme that, as it usually turned out, wasn’t necessary because said princess is in fact rich or royal or whatever.) And marriage was enough to fill a plot. Jane Austen’s scheming ladies were a prototype for Disney princess movies. The goal is love, sure, but wealth and security sweeten the deal, too.

The problem I have most with Cinderella, though, is in the sweet density of Cinderella herself. “Have faith in your dreams and someday /Your rainbow will come smiling through/ No matter how your heart is grieving /If you keep on believing/ The dream that you wish will come true,” Cinderella croons as she prepares herself for another day of back-breaking, selfless labor. This kind of ignorant rhetoric endorses a blind acceptance of the status quo. Cinderella does not believe she can affect change in her own life. She will wait with faith and something good is bound to happen. Of course, as Disney shows us, it does; Prince Charming really does come and all is happily ever after. It negates a choice and, above all, this is the importance of the feminist movement – to allow the Cinderellas of the world to say “Fuck you” to all the evil power-mongers and be on their way – Prince or no. If women had just kept on believing, their dreams would definitely not have come true. Action in the form of choice is the truest path to liberation.

It is no coincidence that Cinderella was made in 1950. It was the era of writing the standards for the modern housewife; principles of which were impossible for any woman to attain without depression or at least a nasty drinking habit. This archetypal housewife has become the subject of so many books and movies (see The Hours, Far From Heaven, Revolutionary Road, etc.). The era was the springing board for Second Wave feminism. As nostalgia, it is still fun to watch a movie like Cinderella. Perhaps, if nothing else, we can enjoy these movies as a relic of the era – a document of history and ideas that are, luckily, past.

Olivia Bernal is a public school English teacher from Kansas. She reviews books at The Independent Book Review.