In Defense of Disney Princesses: Belle

This post probably should have been written a month or two (or three or four) ago, but it was not.  Why? you may ask.  Well, it's a long story (about twenty-two years in the making), but, in short, Belle and her story transformed my life.

Has there ever been something tangible you can point to and say, "This changed my life!"?  A song, an album, a movie, a book, a YouTube video?  Maybe even an essay?  Beauty and the Beast opened my eyes to reading when I was only three-years-old.  My parents will confirm that I learned to read because Belle loves to read and when I was little, there was nothing more important than being exactly like Belle (emulating?).  

Before church on Sunday mornings, my mom would let me pick out my clothes.  I pretended my closet spoke to me and picked out my church dress because the wardrobe picked out Belle's clothes.  I dressed up as Belle not only for several Halloweens, but also in my everyday life.  My grandmother made me a yellow Belle dress that I wore almost every day.

I will even post a picture of myself in my yellow Belle dress so that you can see first-hand the enabling my family performed towards me being Belle.

I could write a post about how Belle does not have Stockholm Syndrome, how hers and the Beast's relationship is not a case of beastiality.  I could (and have) argue(d) that their relationship is not abusive.  And maybe someday I will, but today I want to write about how Belle and her story transformed my life.  Belle is one of those characters that I connected with deeply, even though I was only three when Beauty and the Beast came out.  

My parents will tell you that we went every single weekend to see that movie.  Especially once it came to the dollar theater. I can remember that theater even though it has not been there for over ten years.  

It was on Alps Road in Athens, Georgia at the end of a shopping plaza.  The windows were all blacked out and you had to go down a short flight of stairs to get to the theater entrance and the concession stand.  The lobby smelled kind of funny, like stale popcorn.  Overall, it was a pretty sketchy theater. But I remember that nasty old theater with sentiment because it housed my first connection with Belle.  

And ever since Beauty and the Beast has been my favorite movie.  For almost twenty-two years I have never had to think about what my favorite movie is.  

My deep connection with Belle is still there and so strong because my life would be different without that movie, without her story.  I would not have had the urgent desire to learn to read from the age of three if I had not seen that movie. Would I have been reading chapter books on my own by the time I was in first grade?  Would I understand the effects that reading can have on my life and its ability to nurture and foster imagination?

I cannot answer these questions truthfully because I do not know anything about my childhood without Belle.  Something special happens when we realize the depths of our connection with a character, a book, a play, a song, a movie and we are never the same. 

Most of these connections for me are through books. The Poisonwood Bible, Wuthering Heights, Pride and Prejudice, and the Harry Potter series come to mind immediately. But would those connections be so strong without that first connection to Belle?  

I may never truly know the answer to that question, but I do think I know the answer. Have you ever realized a deep connection you have with something or someone similar?  Let me know in the comments!!

In Defense of Disney Princesses: Ariel

Ariel from The Little Mermaid represents a new chapter for the Walt Disney Company.  It jumpstarted the animation studio's Golden Age, returning to the their roots of emotional storytelling that captured people's hearts.  With The Little Mermaid, we see a return to a style emotional storytelling that requires characters to burst into song (Broadway-style) in order to fully convey what they are feeling.

We also see some character development within Ariel.  While I adore Snow White, Cinderella, and Aurora, they did not do much changing internally throughout their respective movies.  Their circumstances happen to them and they must be strong and brave enough to overcome them.  Ariel's circumstances happen because of her.  She chooses to disobey her father and explore the surface and even saves a human, something seen as absolutely reprehensible in her community.  Also unlike the other previous princesses, Ariel is headstrong, feisty, and stubborn (often to a fault).  She refuses to let something like losing her voice, and potentially her life, to keep her from doing what she wants and following her dreams.  

I have heard and read many comments that claim it is disturbing that Ariel has to be mute in order to find love with Eric, but technically he has already fallen in love with the beautiful woman with the angelic voice that saved his life.  If anything Eric is clinging as fiercely to his dreams as Ariel is--he is holding out for the girl that keeps eluding him, “the one.”  I have wondered if the animators were conscious that they were trying to persuade audiences that Eric falling in love with a mute girl that is actually not mute and if that is one of the reasons Ariel seems so animated and lively as a human even though she has no voice.  She takes Ursula’s advice and communicates with the other characters and the audience through her body language and emotive facial expressions.  

Throughout the movie, Ariel demonstrates how she is different from the other princesses.  She is truly gutsy and brave.  She gives up everything in order to become human because she feels that it is the right path for her.  She has total and complete faith in herself and the fact that she becomes human via a deal with Ursula shows that she is relatable, she is a flawed character.  Ariel definitely challenges the notion that Disney Princesses are perfect, proper ladies that do not make mistakes.  What is powerful about her is that even though she makes a few mistakes, Ariel is still easy for us to love and connect with; she shows us all how to be brave and confident and how to trust ourselves--really great attributes for us to admire and find within ourselves.

**The Pocket Princess comics are drawn by Amy Mebberson.  You can find her tumblr here or you can copy and paste this link into your browser: amymebberson.tumblr.com.  

In Defense of Disney Princesses: Aurora

I love Sleeping Beauty so much!  But I will be the first to admit that I did not love it a whole lot until I was a little older.  I got the DVD for Christmas when I was sixteen or seventeen and it had an entire disc of special features and it was when I watched those special features that I began to appreciate the beauty of Sleeping Beauty (wordplay intended).  I did not realize that the music drew so heavily from Tchaikovsky's ballet from 1890.  I also was too young to appreciate the beautiful animation in Sleeping Beauty.  After watching the special features I re-watched the movie in complete awe of the animation.  Every frame in this movie is a work of art.  If you haven't seen it for a while (or ever), I would encourage you to watch it keeping in mind that so much money was spent on this movie's animation that Disney's animation studio has never been able to replicate the budget (taking into account inflation and the growth of the Walt Disney Company) or the artistry that is evident in this movie.  

That being said, this is a blog about Aurora and what makes her special, a role model, someone you should be okay with children (especially daughters) looking up to.  I will start with the obvious, if Walt Disney himself decided that Aurora and her story are so special that there needs to be a bank-breaking budget for her movie, he and the studio must have seen something very very special in her.  

 I will start with what makes Aurora different from her predecessors Snow White and Cinderella.  Snow White and Cinderella both are isolated and from broken, abusive families, whereas Aurora is from a loving family, but is forced into isolation from them because of outside evil forces (enter Maleficent, no worries we will get to her later).  So while we do still see this theme of the main character being separated from her biological family, Aurora's childhood is different in that she is raised in a very loving home by the three good fairies Flora, Fauna, and Merryweather.  This may seem to make her a less "interesting" character, but we should not discount her just yet...

Her isolation is extremely important to remember for this next portion.  When she first encounters Prince Phillip, he has already fallen in love with her.  He does not fall in love with her beauty (though I'm sure he really appreciated it), he falls in love with her heart, signified by him falling in love with her singing, her voice.  We have to remember that this is a fairytale, it is not supposed to be realistic, we have to suspend disbelief and remind ourselves what it means that her beauty is not what the prince first falls in love with.  Aurora's kindness, like Cinderella and Snow White before her, is shown through her kindness to animals.  Because of her isolation, she has no peers, she only has the three fairies that have raised her, so her kindness must be shown to the audience through some other means, especially if we are to believe that Prince Phillip falls in love with her heart before he even sets eyes on her.  

Now we definitely see something special in Aurora, she is definitely a good person, worthy of being called a compassionate future ruler of her parents' kingdom, but is there anything that she teaches us that should be passed down to our children (read, daughters)?  I think so.  Even though she does not seem active, Aurora still decides to send caution to the wind and meet this man who has fallen in love with her because it feels right to her.  She has been taught her entire life to never speak to strangers, yet she speaks to him, she even allows herself to fall in love with him.  Aurora first appears to be a passive young lady that lets things happen to her, but we have to read her within her context.  This movie was made in the 1950s, a time when all women were to be content being housewives and mothers.  Aurora, though, is rebellious in the sense that she does decide not to follow the rules set out for her.  She speaks to a stranger and she is devastated when she discovers that she is actually a princess, destined to marry for family and kingdom politics instead of for love.  She also should not be declared a poor role-model for being a good person.  She is beautiful on the inside and the outside, and the fairies only took care of the outside and the singing voice.  Her inner-beauty, kindness, and compassion are all from her.  There is nothing wrong with being kind, and there is nothing wrong with trying to listen to what people have to say when they care about you.  She listens and obeys the fairies and goes to the castle because they raised her and they are the only people she has ever known.  It's nearly impossible for us to imagine her context because almost nobody is isolated from the world in the way that Aurora is; she has no knowledge outside of her life with the good fairies because of the huge need to protect her from the evil Maleficent.

Speaking of the fairies and Maleficent, this movie is also unique in that it displays many different facets of femininity, cool, right?  We have Aurora, the beautiful, shy, and compassionate teenager, the three good fairies, each complete with their own unique personalities, and Maleficent, the CRAZY-EVIL fairy.  (Full disclosure: Maleficent is my favorite disney villain EVER!!  She is SO EVIL!! I love her like I love Jezebel--> see 1 Kings 16-2 Kings 9!!)  Anyways, the cool thing about showing so many examples of what femininity looks like is that people (read girls) can see themselves somewhere in the story, in at least one, if not more characters and it doesn't have to be the princess.   In Cinderella and Snow White there are lots of male characters, which is awesome, boys need to see different forms of masculinity, but in Sleeping Beauty there are lots of lady characters.  I can remember when I was little, I may not have been obsessed with Aurora, but I ADORED Merryweather.  In fact, upon watching the movie again, my favorite part of the movie is still the same as when I was little, when Merryweather turns that awful raven to stone, super-cool.  

So, in conclusion, this movie and Aurora are totally awesome, if difficult, and it is perfectly fine to wrestle with them like we do with everything else in life.  Now for the most important question/struggle/point of controversy: What color should Aurora's dress have been?!  Pink or Blue?!?!

**The Pocket Princesses are drawn by Amy Mebberson.  You can visit her tumblr here.  Or you can copy and paste this link into your browser: www.amymebberson.tumblr.com.