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In Hollywood, both in the past and in the present, what decides whether or not a film will be made, ultimately, is whether or not it is believed that the film will make money. If a film is to make money, it must appeal to a mass audience. If it is to do this, it must contain ideas, themes, characters, stories, and perceptions to which it can relate. It must, in other words, be relevant to the audience’s world view if it is to be successful. Why does a film like Thelma and Louise (1991), ostensibly a road movie about two redneck women trying to escape to Mexico, strike such a chord – and stir up such controversy – amongst audiences around the world? The simple answer to this is that Thelma and Louise touches upon certain issues – mainly women’s roles, rights and positions in what is still very much a male-dominated society – which are relevant not only to the lives of women of the same basic background as the title characters, but also to women as a whole, nearly all of whom have experienced some form of gender-related harassment and/or discrimination. More recently, the phenomenon of the success of the film Bridget Jones’s Diary (2001), as well as the attendant criticism of the way it depicts thirty-somethings at the turn of the twenty-first century, has enjoyed great success. This far-reaching popularity comes from the fact that, like it or not, Bridget Jones’s Diary mirrors back to a great many women the conflicting roles they are expected to fill, and their confusion as to how to navigate the difficulties and contradictions to be found within the era’s complex and evolving understanding of the ways in which marriage, career, and family are/should be prioritised amongst middle-class Western women.

Likewise, there are within Disney’s films certain ideas, perceptions, themes and stereotypes which are relevant to the daily lives of those who made these films successful, namely the audiences, who paid to see these films in the cinema, bought the related merchandise, went to the theme parks and rented or purchased the videos and DVDs. Had these films not “spoken” in some way to contemporary audiences, or at least if the studio had not believed that these films had this potential, then the films themselves would never have been made. Or, if they had been made regardless (which, owing to the expense of their production, is doubtful), then they would – like the many films which have failed to gain a favourable reception with audiences – have disappeared not long after their release. Likewise, had the films been successful in their day, but the ideas and themes they contain ceased to resonate with the public (or, in extreme cases, jarred hatefully with modern values), they would have become rare, controversial cinematic relics along the lines of films such as D.W. Griffith’s The Birth of a Nation (1915): watched out of scholarly curiosity, at best saluted for their technical innovations, but used – ultimately – as a measure of how far social attitudes and values had progressed since such films’ releases.²⁹ Granted, there is within the continuing popularity of the Disney canon a certain element of parents wanting to share with their children those films they enjoyed during their own childhoods. However, if elements within these films had become so outdated that parents re-evaluated their fondness for these films and changed their minds about sharing them with offspring, or, if the children had found nothing within them to which they could relate, then the films would have faded from popularity, lingering in popular memory only because of their nostalgic value, not because of their importance as cultural icons. But the significance of Disney’s animated films is that, by and large, they did not disappear. While some were more popular than others, and while some have either increased or declined in mainstream popularity since their initial releases, most of Disney’s films are still highly popular, highly successful, and even decades (in some cases) after their initial releases, still highly profitable for their studio. As they continue to find new audiences in each up-coming generation, it seems reasonable to assume that these films have more than simply a nostalgic appeal: they must, in some way, still hold relevance for modern audiences.

Molly Haskell, in the introduction to the classic text From Reverence to Rape, noted that “Most of the popular novels, plays, short stories of the twenties, thirties, forties, and fifties have all but disappeared, but the films based on them have survived to tell us more vividly than any new or old journalism what it was like, or what our dream life was like, and how we saw ourselves in the women of those times”.³⁰ This is especially true of the films of Walt Disney. If people are asked to describe Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, they are very likely to start talking about Sleepy, Dopey, and the rest of the dwarfs. If informed that, in the Grimms’ version of the tale, the dwarfs did not have individual names, many are generally (and genuinely) surprised. Those who consider themselves to be “well-read” may not like to admit it, but, so far as many such traditional stories are concerned, we are usually content to let “Uncle Walt” tell us “his” versions of the stories and trust that they have been told fairly and faithfully.

A factor which is just as important, however, in any evaluation of Disney’s role as cultural mirror is an examination of the individual characterisations within the stories themselves, as well as the types of stories which were selected to be made into films. The early films – the stories for which were chosen (and all of which were given final approval) predominately by Walt himself – are simple in their plot-lines, with easily-defined concepts of good and evil. This preference for more straightforward narratives seems to have been influenced, in large part, by the fact that such narratives seemed easier (both to Walt and to his staff) to adapt into animated feature films.³¹ This was particularly true in the earlier history of animation, when technological and artistic innovations were just beginning to find ways to allow for more complex animation such as would support more complex storylines and plots. It is certainly the case that, mostly, they are tales in which highly archetypal, even stereotypical portrayals of women are likely to be found. Snow White, Cinderella, Aurora/Briar Rose – all are good, simple, kind; they are what Virginia Woolf once dubbed “the angel in the house”.³² Many of the female characters from this period are counterbalanced within each one’s story by some evil, obsessive, and (most likely) sexually-unfulfilled older woman: the evil queen, the wicked step-mother, Maleficent the evil fairy, and Cruella deVil.³³ It should be noted, however, that there are a couple of exceptions in this period. In the later periods of Disney’s films, only Penny (in The Rescuers, 1977) and Ariel (in The Little Mermaid, 1989) are directly threatened by an older, vindictive woman. By the time Atlantis was released in 2001 (twelve years later), the female villain, Helga, was depicted as a young, attractive, alluring woman at her peak, and is a far cry (both in looks and in complexity of motivation) from her villainess predecessors.

As feminist critics have noted, Hollywood has traditionally reinforced the patriarchal, largely Victorian value system which has dominated Western culture throughout the history of cinema. “As the propaganda arm of the American Dream machine”, declared Molly Haskell,

Hollywood promoted a romantic fantasy of marital roles and conjugal euphoria and chronically ignored the facts and fears arising from an awareness of The End – the winding down of love, change, divorce, depression, mutation, death itself. ... The very unwillingness of the narrative to pursue love into marriage (except in the ‘woman’s film’, where the degree of rationalization needed to justify the disappointments of marriage made its own subversive comment) betrayed a certain scepticism. Not only did the unconscious elements obtrude in the films, but they were part of the very nature of the industry itself.³⁴

In 1978, Brandon French noted that, particularly within women’s roles (both in film and television) of the 1950s, there was a substantial degree of subversion of the notion that women were happiest in these traditional roles.³⁵ This subversion, however, in combination with the more traditional representations of women finding fulfilment in marriage, still reflects the mood of their era: it is just that they reflect an era of change, albeit change which was still in its earlier stages of development.

In Disney’s films – in particular, those made during what is referred to in this book as “The Classic Period” (films made during Disney’s lifetime, between 1937 and 1966) – this traditional interpretation of the roles of love and marriage is without question the most prevalent. Heroes and heroines meet, fall in love, go through a separation and hardship (which no doubt serves in some sense as a test of their devotion and pureness of heart), are reunited, marry, and live happily ever after. What exactly that “happily ever after” entails is a mystery, and we as spectators are led to believe that it will be simply a continuation of their love and happiness – of their exact emotions – at the time of their marriage. For many individuals within both child and adult audiences, such a future seems not only bright and lovely but possible. There is nothing in most films (Disney or otherwise) to indicate that love, even when it lasts, can change, or lose its intensity without losing its strength. Some recent writers and pundits have criticised this tendency to focus on the “happily ever after” as one of the roots of marital instability in the late twentieth century. As one such writer, working in the increasingly popular so-called “self-help” genre, would complain, “Because romantic tales usually end at the wedding (whole years eclipsed by the lying words: ‘and they lived happily ever after’) and because there has been scant attention paid to the question of how to live together in the increasingly complex state of marriage or long-term cohabitation, most people are naive about what it entails”.³⁶ However, given that, in the case of Disney films, most of these stories were decades or centuries old by the time they were put on film, and that the narrative structures they rely upon have been the framework for countless stories both past and present, when accounting for the increase in failed marriages and difficult or failed long-term relationships in the late twentieth/early twenty-first century, it seems peculiar to think that so much of the blame can be laid at the feet of fairy tales and the movies.

For some spectators, these depictions of love and marriage – stereotypical and essentially Victorian in sensibility though many of them are – served as a valued and valuable form of escapism.³⁷ This notion becomes particularly heightened when one remembers that the films with which this study is concerned, animated Disney feature films based mostly upon traditional fairy tales, are films which can be seen as doubly escapist due to their source material (fairy stories, with which many within the audience would have been familiar since childhood) and their medium (animation being a format which allows for amazing and otherwise impossible characters and depictions of fantasy and mythology). As Norman Klein notes:

Much has been made of the psychological advantages of function in fairy tales; it presumably enables the listener to externalize deeply felt anxiety. It reifies forgotten moments in a person’s intimate development (stages in childhood; family crises; sexual fears), or the social meanings of taboos in a community (like kin or incest). Function penetrates forgotten fears.³⁸

What is it in these tales the Disney studio tells which carries out this “function” in fairy tales? When strong, sexually-mature women are portrayed as frustrated, maniacal, bloodthirsty demons and witches, what are these portrayals saying about perceptions on the part of the film-makers of women’s sexuality? Most of all, perhaps, how large a role do these portrayals play in perpetuating or, in some cases, challenging certain sub-consciously held attitudes within society? Such questions as these are best answered not only through looking at Disney films as a genre in and of themselves, but also through looking at Disney in relation to the horror genre.

Disney and horror

The horror genre possesses many attributes in common with Disney’s animated films, thanks no doubt to the fact that Disney’s major source of stories has been fairy tales (which share major story elements and themes with classic horror films). Disney films featuring human leading characters, in particular, have many of the major elements of the horror film: the heroine/victim, the monstrous Other, the victorious hero who defeats the monster and re-establishes order.³⁹ It is important to clarify that not all of the films within this study can be classed as horror. Indeed, some of the films have either few or none of the elements of the horror genre. Nonetheless, most of these films do have, to varying degrees, examinations of the notion of “good versus evil”, and often, as is traditional when following the Classic Paradigm narrative structure (as most Hollywood films do), the plot is structured so as to depict an on-going contest of protagonist against antagonist. This is most easily seen in the following table (facing page).

Of all the films in this study, “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow” segment of Ichabod and Mr. Toad, in fact, is one of the straightest treatments of horror to be found amongst Disney’s animated features. The plot of the film demonstrates the classic horror film pattern. In essence, this pattern is comprised of the following elements: showing the normal order of the society in which the story is set; beginning the build-up of tension by the telling the background of the society’s “threat” from within (in this case, the ghost of the headless horseman); the actual direct threat to Ichabod Crane as the Horseman tries to murder him; the allusion at the end of the film that the story has been only temporarily resolved, but that the threat in fact remains, awaiting another time and another victim. Though not all Disney films can be discussed in terms of horror (even if only partially), many do contain elements of horror and fantasy, albeit to a lesser extent than films like not only Ichabod, but also such films as Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. Alice in Wonderland has an evil Other in the form of the Queen of Hearts, but this is only for a section of the film. Mostly, Alice in Wonderland is just a bizarre dream full of nonsense, and is more akin to fantasy than true horror. In Mulan, even though there is in a sense the presence of what could technically be seen as a monstrous Other which threatens the order of Mulan’s society, the outside threat is the Golden Horde, with whom China is at war, and though they are a threat to Mulan while she is a soldier, they are not targeting her personally and so, in this sense, are not a threat in the same way that the wicked witches, evil step-mothers, vindictive pirates, and other malevolent characters are in the other stories. The “Pecos Bill” segment of Melody Time, together with The Fox and the Hound, although they do present antagonism, do not really deal with “good versus evil” in their stories. Mulan, however, represents a rather different case. Indeed, in the pantheon of Disney animated films, Mulan presents the historian and film analyst with a special case in terms of its story and subject matter, and, therefore, will be given special attention in a later chapter.

Horror and Disney deal with notions about what are (and what are not) appropriate gender roles, and it is true that Disney films and horror films tend to deal again and again, at least on an underlying level, with such themes as what is proper/improper behaviour for women, what is/is not the “natural order”, issues of coming of age and sexuality, and other gender-based concepts. Who rescues and who is rescued (not to mention who is rescue-able), what behavioural traits make a character “good” or “bad”, and whether a “bad” character can or cannot be reformed or redeemed are themes which Disney and horror films share, and the parallels between the ways in which these themes are played out within these two types of films are numerous.

As a specific example of a parallel between a Disney film and a horror film, we may compare the stories of Beauty and the Beast (1991) and Phantom of the Opera (1925). Both look at the love/obsession of a “monstrous other” for a beautiful, gifted young woman (Belle is highly intelligent and possesses strong academic leanings, Christine is a talented opera singer and performer). The Beast gives Belle a library so that she may read to her heart’s content for the first time in her life; the Phantom gives Christine the opportunity to take to the stage at the Paris Opera in a leading role, and finds ways to ensure that she has a successful career. Both young women, however, are prevented by their “benefactors” from having lives outside the small worlds of their gifts, and the only sources either Belle or Christine have for anything resembling romantic love are the monsters who are their protectors. Both films are based upon classic stories: Beauty and the Beast being based upon a French folk tale, Phantom of the Opera on Gaston Leroux’s novel by the same name, which is, in turn, based upon the legend of a haunting at the Paris Opera House. Both are tales of beautiful, innocent young women who are – ultimately – held captive by a deformed creature who is characterised by such traits as loneliness, vengefulness, possessiveness, self-loathing, possible madness, frustrated sexual desire, jealousy, and fear.

Such parallels between Disney films and horror films are easily drawn. As Brigid Cherry points out in her study of female horror film fans:

For many of these habitual [horror film] viewers, the taste for horror often began well before adolescence – several reported that their first experience of horror involved being enjoyably frightened by Disney-animated films and other dark children’s films based on fairy tales – and had persisted long after. Horror films share the frequent representation of distortions of natural forms – supernatural monsters with a human face, for instance – with children’s fiction, and these representations were often mentioned by participants [in Cherry’s study of female horror film fans] as a continuing source of fascination, suggesting that these viewers continue to be simultaneously drawn to, and repelled by, similar representations to those that had engaged them in childhood.⁴⁰

Clearly, at least in the minds of some fans of horror, there is a definite link between Disney and horror as genres. Yet an interesting area in which Disney and horror films depart company is the issue of what groups are considered the target audience. Although this conception of the horror film is currently changing, for many years it has been assumed that the primary audience for the majority of horror films has been male.⁴¹ Certainly, Cherry has gathered evidence which demonstrates that, far from being unwilling audiences of horror, there are women who actively enjoy horror, even when they dislike certain aspects of the genre (such as the violent treatment of women in many horror films). The target audience for Disney films is traditionally seen as the child/family audience, despite the high degree of violence and terror which is typical in Disney films. It is interesting that the same parent who would not think twice about forbidding their child from seeing Silence of the Lambs (1991), in which a man kidnaps and murders various women with the intention of making a suit of clothes from their skins, would probably also think nothing about allowing their child to see One-Hundred-and-One Dalmatians, in which a psychotic woman is systematically kidnapping the “children” of various families of Dalmatians with the intention of slaughtering them and making a coat from their skins. The parallels between these two stories, when summarised in this way, are obvious. For the majority of spectators, however, such parallels would not seem as salient. After all, one is about a deranged serial killer and the FBI trainee who is investigating the case aided by the killer’s psychopathic psychiatrist, the other about an erratic, eccentric woman and a bunch of talking puppies. Silence of the Lambs is live-action; One-Hundred-and-One Dalmatians is both an animated film and a Disney movie.

Despite the fact that Disney films are seen by many retailers, reviewers, and film cataloguers as being essentially a separate sub-genre of “family films”, if not a genre in and of themselves, the fact is that Disney films’ subject matter has at times been considered – at least by some film review boards – as possibly too intense and/or frightening for the child audience. For example, when it was released in the UK in 1938, Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs was deemed unsuitable for young children as it might cause them nightmares.⁴² This precaution on the part of the British Board of Film Classification, however, was not universally viewed as appropriate, even within Britain. Numerous British reviews at the time of Snow White’s release attest to a wide range of opinions on the subject, though most seem inclined to think that an “A” certificate for the film was a little overly-cautious. One article which refers to the controversy surrounding the “A” certificate being given to Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs reads, in part, as follows:

Of course, one of the questions I wanted to investigate was this business of the “A” certificate. I have since discussed that with several people, and there are two opinions. Some think the “A” certificate ridiculous; others think it is quite reasonable.

My own impression is, that it was a bit over-cautious, and that I have seen many more things, both in cartoons and otherwise, that I should be more doubtful about for children. On the other hand, I should prefer a child to see the picture with his parents, rather than alone, and can assure both parent and child that they would be in for a very enjoyable time.⁴³

Even as recently as 1995, the British Board of Film Classification decided that the Disney/Pixar film Toy Story (1995) deserved a PG [Parental Guidance] rating because, as Veronica Horwell would later describe it in an article on censorship, the film was deemed to be “... a mite scary”.⁴⁴ In the United States, in contrast, the film received a G [General] rating and was apparently not seen by the Motion Picture Association of America [MPAA] as particularly frightening, even for very young children. Yet despite these occasional opinions and the various ties between Disney films and traditional horror films – Disney films are considered, by and large, to be acceptable viewing for audiences of all ages.

There is a substantial amount of scholarship supporting the notion that spectators can and do view films in an active way which allows them to take from a film those incidents and portrayals which “ring true” to them and ignore those aspects of films which are inaccurate or demeaning.⁴⁵ While these studies deal principally with black female spectators of mainstream Hollywood films and women audiences as spectators of horror films, it nonetheless seems plausible that this theory of active spectatorship can be applied, at least to an extent, to the genre of Disney animated films. I say to an extent because, while much of the audience for any Disney film consists of a fair percentage of adult women and older girls, a substantial proportion of a Disney film’s audience is made up of very young girls. The above studies are of adults; they are of women who have learned over the course of their lives to take the portrayals of race/sex which they see on the movie screen with a grain of salt, and may consequently have become sophisticated at reading films. Young children, however, at the beginning of their movie-watching lives, are only beginning to learn that what they are watching is only “make-believe”. Furthermore, and unlike adults, children are very likely to incorporate the things they see in movies into their play, thereby repeating, analysing, and incorporating into their subconscious the ideas and themes they take away from films. The degree to which they do this is a matter of some debate amongst experts on children, the media, and child psychology.

Studies of children and media

In looking at psychological theories about children’s play, the idea that children use play – pretend play in particular – as a way of practising their present, future, and even potential roles within society is undisputed. H.G. Furth and S. R. Kane, for example, use detailed analysis of a single but extended episode of pretend play on the part of three girls (one four-year-old and two five-year-olds) to demonstrate that such play not only develops social skills (the children’s abilities to share and communicate is discussed at length), but also shows how the girls are able to incorporate various cultural stereotypes, roles, and traditions into their play.⁴⁶

The example given concerns three girls pretending to be getting ready for a royal ball. It should be noted that, as the authors of the study point out, the only constraint imposed on the children was that they had to play in a particular corner of their school room (albeit one which was typically used for certain kinds of play amongst the children).⁴⁷ The play initially began between the two five-year-old girls: the older one, who was five years and eleven months, proposed to the younger girl (aged five years and one month) that they pretend that they are getting ready for a royal ball which is to occur “the next day” (according to the frame of their play.) While the two girls were playing, various social conventions were invoked: a hierarchy was established, with the slightly older girl being recognised by both children as being the one in charge (though whether this superiority was thanks to her age or the fact that the “royal ball” theme was her idea is never really discussed or made clear). Sharing and equal division of the various toys available to the girls was done through taking turns selecting items and relying upon rules of previous possession in order to establish “ownership” of the items being involved in play. The ability of children to use items symbolically was demonstrated by looking at how the girls used a large bedspread, with corners on it that could be used to simulate hoods, as their coats, since each of them could use one corner of the bedspread as her personal coat and share it. Furthermore, the use of this bedspread as a coat by the girls was also employed to show that the children were able to incorporate tradition into their play since it would seem that this bedspread has been used as a coat by a succession of children who have been in this classroom.⁴⁸ Nineteen minutes into the play session, a third child – the four-year-old girl mentioned earlier – entered the room and became involved in the play session. Her arrival demonstrated the other two girls’ knowledge of how to play this particular game of “getting ready for a royal ball”, how to establish and maintain rules of ownership, and how to establish and maintain hierarchy – based on age – within the group. Because there were certain elements of their play which the two older girls had to explain to the younger girl, the fact that the girls were able to combine both reality and the rules of their pretend game demonstrated their ability to construct their make-believe world.⁴⁹ Through their play, the two five-year-olds and the four-year-old showed quite clearly the fact that they were able not only to recognise roles and the rules that apply to those living those roles, such as when they are discussing how they will behave and how other (pretend) individuals will behave toward them when they are queens during their evening at the ball, but are also able to internalise them (even if only for the purposes of their play) and regulate their behaviour according to them.⁵⁰ It is interesting that they chose, as the format for this complicated play session, the framework of a fairy tale (in this case creating a story which in many ways parallels the tale of “Cinderella”). As Furth and Kane point out, however, this choice of framework as a way of practising social interaction is understandable, since social and cultural norms are usually contained within such stories. As Furth and Kane put it, “It was Western tradition, handed down in fairy tales and conveyed in the present culture, not personal affect or attachment that determined these roles. There was no need for the players to define roles before they started”.⁵¹

Using a traditional fairy story as the starting point for the discussion in his book on children’s play, David Cohan demonstrates the fact that even very young children are able to understand ideas as complex as gender roles at a surprisingly early age. He points out how his son (who served as one of the subjects) was, at the age of two years and six months, completely aware of the differences between masculine and feminine, and he and others around him were able to fulfil very definite social roles. This passage, which is Cohan’s account of this particular discussion with his son, is best quoted in full:

At 2:6,⁵² Reuben has also started to play games in which his gender identity is brought into question. From 2:0, he has been very fond of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. At 2:5, we have just been listening to the record. Reuben looks happy. I ask him if he is Cheerful (one of the dwarf)?⁵³ “No”, he smiles. Is he Dopey? “No”, he smiles. Is he Sneezy? “No”, he smiles. Is he Snow White? “No”. Reuben now bursts out laughing. He goes on laughing as he says that Mummy – Alieen [Cohan’s wife] is indeed in a white dress – is Snow White.

At 2:6, Reuben also plays a game with Nicholas [Reuben’s older brother] in which each of them is supposed to have a vagina. They cross their legs – Nicholas especially – and, from time to time, laugh a little. This is another instance where they create a game in which sexual roles are involved.⁵⁴

Children have been shown to be well aware of gender roles at significantly early ages, and can even be shown to be aware of what is inappropriate – as well as appropriate – behaviour within these roles. Examples such as those mentioned above point out that psychological observation of normal⁵⁵ children at play offers substantial backing to the notion that children develop a definite sense of gender-appropriate roles at comparatively young ages.

Furthermore, it is known that children are affected from very early on by the media images with which they are constantly bombarded. The example given above (of Reuben and his being questioned on Snow White) already emphasises the fact that very young children are already exposed to the media.⁵⁶ Of course, there is some disagreement as to how much or how little children actually take in of what they see in movies and on television. What does seem to be agreed upon by psychiatrists and psychologists studying the impact of media upon children, however, is that visual media have an influence on children (and on adults, for that matter) because film appeals to the sense of fantasy, even when the images being portrayed are “realistic” (such as with documentaries).⁵⁷ Thus far, however, the amount of recent academic work focusing upon the child audience is comparatively small, the data for examining how children respond to films is limited or flawed, and most research into the effects of media images on children is in any case primarily concerned with television rather than cinema audiences. While there have been a number of studies in the past which have attempted to explore the effects of various media (mainly cinema) on children (one famous example being the Payne Fund studies of the 1930s), these studies are of no use to modern-day researchers into media’s effects on children as they were often distorted by their eras’ attitudes to and prejudices towards race, ethnicity, and class which would today be seen as both irrelevant and elitist, particularly when it comes to their (to modern eyes) patronising and exaggerated concerns about the effects of the movies on immigrants, the poor, and – ultimately – upon all of those who are not white, male, middle-class (or higher), native-born Americans. As the fields of film history and film/media studies grow, this gap will no doubt be addressed. At present, however, the evidence from which I have been compelled to draw my conclusions has been focused more on specific adult audiences (such as women and various ethnic groups), and references to these groups’ viewing interests as children are only briefly addressed, and usually as memory rather than as subjects of long-term viewing habits (which might include, for instance, observing an individual’s movie-going habits over the course of twenty or thirty years and compiling data as to how an individual views films at various points in their lives).