Disney Princess 201: The Renaissance Trilogy

So you remember that blog I wrote almost a year ago about the classic Disney fairy tales? You don't? Well there's the link, nine words back. If you have trouble counting, here it is again. In fact, here is three more times. Now you have no excuse. Read the damn blog.

Finished? Boy that was a long blog. What the hell was I thinking? Moving on.

The 1980's was the decade of prosperity for just about everyone. Except the Disney company. The parks were doing fine and the Touchstone label was churning out some decent hits, but the animated films were thought of as yesterday's medium. Don Bluth had somehow cracked the market that Disney was losing ground in, giving us successful whiny kid voice actor classics An American Tail and The Land Before Time. And that was pretty much it for animation.

Then Who Framed Roger Rabbit hit the screens in 1988. And that was a big deal. Certainly not a flawless movie, but when Mel Blanc and Mae Questel are acting in the same film as Wayne Allwine and Russi Taylor, you know something special is happening. And with the resurgent interest in classic animation, it was time for Disney's Renaissance to begin.

The Little Milkmaid (1989)

Walt Disney had originally not wanted to make another fairy tale film after Snow White out of concern that the Disney name would become too synonymous with Princess stories [your laugh here]. In a way I don't blame him for trying to avoid getting locked into predictability. And you also have to factor in that the three classic princess films were VERY flawed movies, who wouldn't want to branch into other territory?

Then came Ariel. Unlike princesses of the past, Ariel had some real assertiveness to her. Yes, she made mistakes (she was sixteen) but that's what classic stories are about. We see ourselves reflected in the POV characters making impulsive choices and go on the journey with them as they writhe in the consequences. For someone who lives underwater she's got some real fire in her, and it's a delight to watch it -what's the word? -burn.

This was the film that broke the mold and restructured the Disney template for animated stories that continues to this day; namely by embracing the trends on Broadway to full effect and using those tropes to their best advantage. You have the 'I Want' song, the showstopper, the love song, and the third act where the music tends to get out of the way of the plot.

If you cared enough to read the liner notes for Little Shop of Horrors then you might have recognized the names Alan Menken and Howard Ashman, but this was the film that made their talents inescapable. From the first time you saw the movie in the theater, you knew the soundtrack was destined to become a classic right alongside Mary Poppins. One of the biggest criticisms about musicals is the way the action typically has to come to a screeching halt while the performers yammer on about whatever metaphor they think love feels like. In the case of The Little Mermaid this is not a problem. Each song serves a purpose other than to simply appear on the CD.

"Part of Your World" is probably the slowest paced, but it allows us a chance to spend time with Ariel. We know her better after that song than we did before. Similarly, "Under the Sea" establishes the Atlantica status quo that Ariel is told she should be content with but ultimately cannot be. I don't know how many musicals will include deal-with-the-devil numbers, but every one of them will be overshadowed by Pat Carroll's "Poor Unfortunate Souls". The sorely upstaged love ballad "Kick the Girl" (that's the version that always plays in my head) has a layer of suspense, in that Sebastian nearly ends the movie twenty minutes early. Even the sort-of bonus track "Les Poissons" is a joy in its own right, utilizing a crowning moment of awesome for sampling the Can-can.

The story, as you know, is adapted from the Hans Christian Andersen tale, taken from his "Collected Stories With F U Endings" anthology. There's a rumor that Andersen hated children, (like more people should) but I daresay I've never supported the theory that children need to be blindsided into the realization that the world sucks. Our fiction is supposed to be where things make sense. And the Disney company always understood this. So even though the entire second half of this film is fabrication, it works, damn it.

Now there have been some criticisms spilled into this movie's ocean that are worth sorting through. The first is a complaint is that Prince Eric is a bore. And...yeah, kinda. Disney had a long standing difficulty with making adult lead characters interesting, and The Little Mermaid was only the beginning of the transition. Eric is essentially Fred Jones from pre-revival Scooby-Doo; he has a personality, just not much of one. But give him credit, he's a hell of a lot more charismatic than Channing Tatum.

Another issue people seem obsessed with is talking about phalluses. Snopes has covered this topic pretty well. You were wrong. You had fun being outraged. Now move past it.

But the most legitimate complaint is with Ariel herself, in that she never learns anything from her film (apparently a reaction by the Nostalgia Chick). For that I say two things. One, Ariel isn't obligated to learn anything considering she was right and her father was wrong. Two, I would argue that she actually learns plenty, the movie just doesn't waste time pointing it out. In the end, this is one of my all time favorite Disney films.

Bratty and the Boast (1991)

I know so many people who love this movie, and that's fine. We all have our favorites. But I've also seen message boards, Facebook posts, Youtube videos and so on proclaiming this film the greatest. Thing. Ever. And it quickly gets under my skin. Every time I hear someone refer to this film as 'perfect' I start to feel venom forming in my throat. So let's back it up a bit.

I saw Beauty and the Beast in the theater in 1991 like I was supposed to, and came away feeling "eh, it was okay." It just never pulled me into it. I thought the opening sequence was pretty creative and had a theatricality to it. But from there I just felt like I was having to look through someone else's wedding album; it looked beautiful and had a technical precision, but I didn't see my own memories or find any pictures of me.

To this day people won't shut up about this movie, and I'm left with two questions. What are they seeing that I'm not, and why do they not notice the glaring weaknesses that I do? Well let's start with the things I commonly hear people cite as the standout qualities; the movie is beautiful, Belle saves the Beast, Gaston is the best Disney villain, and it has the greatest soundtrack.

The movie is beautiful, I'll give it that. But it doesn't strike me as beautiful in any special way. The computer generated animation was on display much more so than anything that preceded it, but I don't find it jaw dropping. Maybe it's just a matter of preference, but for me it's not the most important element.

So let's discuss our heroine. Belle is pretty, and she's an intellectual, and she's an outcast, and she's the voice of reason. It's almost like we're going down the checklist to make sure she's as strong a character as possible. But here's the deal, I don't find her relatable. The female characters in Disney's canon who take me somewhere do so through their flaws; Alice, Meg, Anna, Mulan, etc. Belle just never struck me as an actual character, but more as a concept. I don't really know what she wants except something 'more' which is a tad undefined.

The Beast fares both better and worse in terms of clarity. His motivations go from 'Why have you come?' to 'Get out!' at the drop of a hat, finally landing on 'Now you're my prisoner.' Um...what? Does he even have a goal, or is he just doing whatever the plot requires? And no, that's not complexity of character, that's sloppy writing. Belle saving the Beast looks innovative on paper but the execution of it is poor because the film never nails down its characters.

Gaston at least makes his intentions a bit clearer even if the film just kind of decides that he's become a straight up villain without earning it. I feel like he would have been a better silly villain like Captain Hook than the animal they tried to pass him off as at the end. I think the problem was that they removed his teeth throughout the first half of the film, presumably to avoid having to animate sexual assault in a G rated movie. That choice is fine, but you can't have it both ways. During The Mob Song it's as if we've switched scripts out. And why in all of his overconfidence as a hunter does he need support to hunt the Beast if not just to have the en masse confrontation with the furniture?

I don't love the soundtrack, and I barely even like it. The title song is a complete bore to me, and I'm happy to skip Something There entirely. Belle is a spectacle in its visual context, but taken on pure audio  it sounds bigger than it is. And I daresay The Mob Song is a melody that just doesn't stay in my head.

And then we have the showstopper Be Our Guest. After much thought and soul searching I've decided this song actually offends me. For one thing, NOBODY loves to serve that much. You could argue that the furniture was so bored out of their minds that any outlet would turn into a production, but that's not how it comes off. It reads as each of these characters had a childhood dream of being able to cook and clean for someone of higher status than them, which is inherently problematic in a family film. The other thing, the song is literally about nothing. Under the Sea helped its plot by Sebastian portraying the ocean in its coolest light and still failing to convince Ariel to accept it. Be Our Guest just puts the plot on hold so, I don't know, Eisner could have the theme park commercial he demanded.

Here's the ultimate issue. I think there was a really solid film being developed but the script was one draft away from completion and Disney executives rushed it. A lot of the elements of that solid film made it into the final cut, and that's why so many people love the movie so much. But I thinks it's also important to acknowledge that the movie isn't perfect and could have been so much better with a rewrite that addressed character motivation.

Gaston: his goal is to marry Belle. In a TV series, characters get to swap out goals once in a while, but in a movie you get one. Every choice he makes needs to further that one goal. Do all the terrible things he does behind her back and then swoop in as the 'hero' to fix it, and show that Belle is smart enough to see through his bullshit. Beast: he wants to break the curse. Okay, he sees how smart Belle is. Take her into the room with the rose and show her why he is the way he is and the time limit he's on. What exactly is love? What kind of love breaks the curse? Where the hell is this enchantress now? Let's see them work through the challenge together. Belle: pick one. Either she wants more than her provincial town OR she wants to see her lunatic father earn the respect he deserves; the latter is the more useful choice for this particular story because it creates tension of where her focus has to be. Don't try to create a role model for girls, just create a strong character. The girls will decide who they want to be.

Malady

It's funny how Jasmine is the one major princess in Disney's lineup to have originated in a film that was clearly aimed at boys. And here's a thought (since Disney's being so live-action remake happy), give us a version of the story using Jasmine as the protagonist. Call it Princess Jasmine. That would almost make up for the failure that is her character in the animate film. You know the sexy lamp test? If your female lead can be replaced with a sexy lamp without altering the plot then you've neglected your responsibilities as a writer. Well, Aladdin has an actual sexy lamp in it that has more effect on the plot than Jasmine.

So docking the movie an entire letter grade based on that lost cause, what's left for us? There's the good. Alan Menken's soundtrack is his A-game, as there's not one song that doesn't stay in your head forever. There's an inspired casting of Gilbert Gottfried that makes you both like and hate Iago in all the right ways. And there's Jafar, who became an instant top-tiered Disney villain for being precisely as over the top as he needed to be.

The decent. The story works just fine. Occasionally Aladdin's choices are unconvincing. The whole 'Genie I can't free you' was destined to backfire and everybody in the audience was at least two steps ahead of the plot by then (never a place a film wants to be), but it holds together well enough and hits all the beats it's supposed to.

The rocky. Genie's hijacking of the movie. You can't fault Robin Williams for doing exactly what he was brought in to do, nor Eric Goldberg for animating the hell out of it. But I don't think writer/director/producer duo Ron Clements and John Musker were prepared for the impact Genie would have on the overall balance of their film. Aladdin stops mattering once Genie shows up, and despite how much fun the movie is in the end it still feels like a wasted potential.

Compare it to The Sword in the Stone. Here you have Merlin who is arguably as powerful and equally scatterbrained mentoring a young King Arthur. That story isn't about how Arthur becomes king, it's about how he becomes a good king. Aladdin doesn't have any goal beyond banging the hot chick despite the clear poverty rampant in the man-child Sultan's kingdom.

Wouldn't it have been cooler to see how easily power corrupts decent people, where he doesn't realize it at first but each wish Aladdin makes gets him closer to becoming the villain of his own story? Then what if that realization come right as he's about to make his third wish? And instead he wishes for the Genie's freedom in an attempt to avoid that fate. Just some fan fiction thought.

The movie as is is fine. It's fun. It's exciting. But it's honestly nothing more than that. Aladdin is the kind of film you quote a lot but you don't really discuss. Yep. That's pretty much it on Aladdin.

Conclusion

This was, and still is, Disney's big three; ignoring The Rescuers Down Under (a hidden gem). The Little Mermaid remains one of my all time favorite Disney films, and in my opinion the least flawed. I felt like they hit a bulls-eye at a point in their history where they'd been hitting haystacks. Beauty and the Beast was a slightly harder target without a bulls-eye on it that they barely grazed and then went on record claiming they'd hit the bulls-eye. Aladdin was a bulls-eye from about half the distance of The Little Mermaid. And Pocahontas was a target that the rain knocked over.