Deborah Ross, in her essay "Escape from Wonderland: Disney and the Female Imagination", takes on the task of dissecting three Disney films to find out what impression they are leaving on young female viewers. She has come to the conclusion that part of the problem lies with Walt Disney, and the company he built, who was very controlling over the material that went into the children's films that the company produced; she believes that this controlling attitude mixed with the imagination and creativity that Disney films are supposed to be made of, create very confusing films that send mixed messages to the children watching them, specifically the young girls. Deborah also felt it important to mention that all of these princess films parallel
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The plots of the films that Disney gears toward young girls is not very different. Deborah first breaks down Disney's adaptation of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass. She finds that the film begins with a girl who dreams of escaping to this mysterious world where she doesn't have to face life's responsibilities, but in the end she comes to the conclusion that she was wrong for wanting anything other than her reality. Contrastingly, Deborah points out that Disney's Ariel, in The Little Mermaid, is willing to risk everything in her world under the sea to become a part of the human world. Ariel's main goal is to marry a human man and settle into a normal human life, something that falls into Disney's conservative principles. Finally, Deborah points out that naming the female protagonist "Beauty", in Disney's Beauty and the Beast, insinuates that she is a object to be won. Although, Deborah does view the marriage of Bell and the Beast as the fulfillment of the woman's true desire, and not what society dictates that she should …show more content…
I can remember, as a seven year old, waking up early on Saturday mornings just so I could watch The Little Mermaid for the hundredth time. I knew all the words to all the songs and almost all the words to the dialogue, I had a crush on Prince Eric, and I strongly desired to become a mermaid anytime I went to the swimming pool or beach. My childhood obsession seemed so very innocent until Deborah's essay confronted me with the underlying meaning of this so called children's film and others like it. Until I read Deborah's essay I only saw what was on the surface: a entertaining fairytale with a happy ending. I can remember always putting myself into the place of whoever the princess was in that particular film, and wishing that the prince would one day come to rescue me. Is the way I think about men derived from these ideal princes? Do I not find my own independence as important as my dependence on a man? Are my expectations of a romance and relationship too high for reality? I would like to think that my answers to all the previous questions would be, "No", at this point in my life. This partly has to do with my personal relationship with Jesus Christ; I have learned to find my value and worth in Him and not in other people or societal rules. But, I am also human. Sure, the idea of a handsome man
The plots of the films that Disney gears toward young girls is not very different. Deborah first breaks down Disney's adaptation of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass. She finds that the film begins with a girl who dreams of escaping to this mysterious world where she doesn't have to face life's responsibilities, but in the end she comes to the conclusion that she was wrong for wanting anything other than her reality. Contrastingly, Deborah points out that Disney's Ariel, in The Little Mermaid, is willing to risk everything in her world under the sea to become a part of the human world. Ariel's main goal is to marry a human man and settle into a normal human life, something that falls into Disney's conservative principles. Finally, Deborah points out that naming the female protagonist "Beauty", in Disney's Beauty and the Beast, insinuates that she is a object to be won. Although, Deborah does view the marriage of Bell and the Beast as the fulfillment of the woman's true desire, and not what society dictates that she should …show more content…
I can remember, as a seven year old, waking up early on Saturday mornings just so I could watch The Little Mermaid for the hundredth time. I knew all the words to all the songs and almost all the words to the dialogue, I had a crush on Prince Eric, and I strongly desired to become a mermaid anytime I went to the swimming pool or beach. My childhood obsession seemed so very innocent until Deborah's essay confronted me with the underlying meaning of this so called children's film and others like it. Until I read Deborah's essay I only saw what was on the surface: a entertaining fairytale with a happy ending. I can remember always putting myself into the place of whoever the princess was in that particular film, and wishing that the prince would one day come to rescue me. Is the way I think about men derived from these ideal princes? Do I not find my own independence as important as my dependence on a man? Are my expectations of a romance and relationship too high for reality? I would like to think that my answers to all the previous questions would be, "No", at this point in my life. This partly has to do with my personal relationship with Jesus Christ; I have learned to find my value and worth in Him and not in other people or societal rules. But, I am also human. Sure, the idea of a handsome man