A People Trap Set by a Mouse

Disney is everywhere. It has become a juggernaut of media and commercial culture not only in the United States, but around the world. Kevin Shortsleeve’s essay “The Wonderful World of the Depression: Disney, Despotism, and the 1930s. Or, Why Disney Scares Us” describes the Disney Company as a force to be reckoned with, often referred to as “the evil empire.” Shortsleeve goes as far to say, “Many critics appear frightened of Disney on some level” (1).

“Achieving and maintaining great commercial success via an Orwellian-style management, while selling utopian dreams of agrarian, monarchical kingdoms in its films, has impressed, entertained, and subliminally frightened audiences for nearly seventy years. In an attempt to divert attention away from its totalitarian tendencies, Disney has overcompensated with maudlin and insincere “freedom” and “democracy” attractions. It is this “fractured experience” that specifically haunts us. Orwell and Jefferson do not dance well together” (Shortsleeve 5).

Looking at it this way, it becomes frightening how many people are in love with Disney. It may be that Walt wanted to create a perfect utopia of happiness and fun, a dream come true. However, it also could be that he was a maniacal genius who understood that a company engrained in someone’s childhood memories would invest itself in that person forever and ever….

Frightening, but genius.

And even with this knowledge, I still love Disney with all my heart.

Don’t you?

As White as Snow

When I was in first grade, I decided to go as Snow White for Halloween. Then in second grade, I once again put on that yellow and blue dress and black wig. In third grade I decided to ditch the scratchy wig, but was once again found in Snow White’s princess costume. For whatever reason, I was infatuated. The few times I visited Disney World in my childhood years, the only person I cared to meet was Snow White. It could have been for the color of her dress, as yellow was my favorite color, or for her magical ability to talk to animals, although there were certainly other princesses with the same ability. Ultimately, I cannot figure out why it was not Ariel or Jasmine or Cinderella who caught my attention. Why Snow White?

Now, when I watch the film, the feminist part inside of me wishes I could have loved a stronger, more independent female lead as a child rather than the one resembling any typical 1930s housewife. Although I respect and acknowledge the time period in which the film was made, times have changed, and in no Disney movie nowadays would an audience ever allow a princess to have no aspirations other than to do the cooking and cleaning and marry her prince. 

I wonder if in loving a more rebellious and outspoken princess I would have become so as a child, or if rather the shy, angelic piece of me led to my idolization of a more peaceful character.

Either way, it is interesting for me to now look upon one of my greatest childhood role models with a critical eye.

In Tracey Mollet’s“With a Smile and a Song…”: Walt Disney and the Birth of the American Fairy Tale, Mollet discusses how Snow White was also the role model of a separate age, the age of the Depression. This gives me a new perspective on the character of Snow White, whose ability to dream possibly inspired another generation of people to keep the American Dream alive in their minds. She is “kind, good, and placid and awaits the coming of her prince with patience and virtue” (Mollet 114).  However, I also see a downside to that as it gives the impression that if you wait long enough, your wishes will be granted. I definitely believe that dreams are achieved through hard work and perseverance, and “as noted by a psychiatrist in Studs Terkel’s oral history of the Depression, there was a sense that people accepted the situation and remained quiet (80)” (Mollet 114). By her example, people waited.

I guess Snow White has always been a bit of a controversial topic, even though it is one of the simplest stories. There is always something to critique, something to complain about.

When will Disney catch a break?

Grumpy Kitty

I don't know why I find this so amusing, but I do. 

A Man and A Monster

At the beginning of the Disney animated film, The Hunchback of Notre Dame, Clopin, leader of the gypsies, says one of, if not the, most significant lines in the entire movie when he refers to the story of Quasimodo as “the tale of a man and a monster.”

Initially, the response is to connect Quasimodo to the so-called “monster” because Clopin alludes to him in such a mysterious, quite frightening manner. However, by the end of Hunchback, I realized the multiple ways in which the line can be taken, and none of them star Quasi in place of the “monster.” I actually felt guilty for being so stereotypical and for taking the term “monster” so literally, and furthermore, for connecting it to Quasi’s unsightly appearance. More than guilty, I’m ashamed.

I may as well have joined the crowd throwing tomatoes during the Festival of Fools.

        

            In Martin F. Norden’s book chapter “‘You’re a Surprise from Every Angle’: Disability, Identity, and Otherness in The Hunchback of Notre Dame” he points out that Quasimodo himself is misled into believing he is a monster “when he gazes at the beast-like figurine of himself and says very matter-of-factly ‘I am a monster’ to his stepfather Frollo, who has conditioned him to think of himself in subhuman terms” (Norden 166). However, our hearts disagree and weep for Quasi, urging him to gain confidence and realize the beauty within himself. It pains me to think I could not see this from the very beginning, and that I might in fact be just like all the other judgmental people in the world.

            In one sense, these people are the monster Clopin referred to. This is one interpretation. The “monster” could be stereotypes and judgments and cruelty within our massive world that will, it seems, always exist. This monster tries to tear down Quasimodo, and almost succeeds. The world itself is the antagonist in Hunchback for almost the entire length of the film.

            At the forefront of this mob stands Frollo, another viable interpretation of the monster. To put it quite simple, I want to punch Frollo in the face. He is undoubtedly one of the most terrifying and truly evil Disney villains, and is far from just a man.

            A final understanding of Clopin’s ambiguous line is that Quasi is himself both a man and a monster, as perceived by himself and those around him. While his appearance is disfigured, which can bring people to view him as a beast and a demon, his soul is pure and good. He is just a (hu)man, like everyone else.

            While Norden argues that “the movie appears to critique the view that ‘different’ people should be kept separate and isolated, yet it simultaneously perpetuates it” just because Quasimodo does not end up with Esmeralda in the end, I completely disagree. In watching Hunchback, I realized my own initial prejudice, which made it a much more real and impactful story for me. If anything, the film most miraculously shows the need to be welcoming and accepting of all people. 

           Except maybe Frollo.