Pocahontas: The Controversial Princess

(Image from Wikipedia)

            Of all of the Disney Princess Features, Disney drew the most ire in 1995, when they released Pocahontas. The tale of a young Native American princess (technically, her father was chief) trying to prevent a war and deal with the realization that there’s another people in the world has one rather huge difference to previous features: the heroine was loosely based on a historical figure. As such it’s fallen under attack for being historically inaccurate, and sexualizing the real relationship of John Smith and Pocahontas, who would have been a preteen when they met. While this is not the purpose of my blog, to those critics I will say one thing: talking trees. One of the main characters is Grandmother Willow-a magical talking tree. Why does anyone expect an animated Disney feature to be historically accurate? True, they shouldn’t have used a historical name as they did. It would have been better portrayed as an original story, which it was. That said, that’s how it should be treated: as an original story, not a slap in the fact of history.

            Pocahontas is a free spirit who lives in a village where everyone plays their part. Her father, the chief, is widowed, but they believe the spirit of her mother lingers around them. She is the first of the Disney Princesses to have a gal pal, that is to say, her best friend is another human. Well, perhaps not her best friend, but she has a human friend as well as two animal companions. She, like predecessor Ariel, is curious of what else is in the world. While her father strongly encourages her in certain directions, she feels like it would be settling, and she’s not sure that it is her fate to do so. She is more aware then some of her peers, and proves she can be quite stealthy-a seasoned explorer completely passes her without notice.

(Via Disney Wiki)

            The course of her story is mostly admirable: she encounters one of the pale-faced new comers, and the two try to prevent war between their peoples. She risks her life to do this in the end, so her father does not execute him and cause a war. There is a corrupt politician, the Governor Ratcliffe, trying to find gold and disregarding the fact that the Native Americans had none. He tore apart the land ruthlessly and encouraged his men to kill the Native Americans, which he encouraged his men to call “Savages” and to shoot them on sight. In general people are scared of new things, so she had quite a bit to deal with; and on top of that her father wanted her to marry the best warrior in the tribe and settle down.

            The romance Disney thrust upon Pocahontas was not only the cause of historians screaming, but the most forced romance they’ve ever done. Even in early movies while the princes and their ladies didn’t get much bonding, there were never any particular reason they wouldn’t work out. While Pocahontas was curious about the new comer and observed him, when he turned a gun on her she was able to sense the danger and run. While they got over her he also accused her of being a few rather horrible things. He commented absent mindedly, without realizing why she might be offended, that her people didn’t know better, were uncivilized, and savages. She was quite rightly offended and attempted to take off. When he followed her, she lectured him. From that point on, their entire romance seemed rather forced. When he initially tries to kiss her, she scurries off and says they can’t meet again. When he appears in the cornfield, she appears to be irritated. And yet later Pocahontas can’t get him off her mind? I could accept them maybe becoming friends eventually; but I can’t buy the romance the audience is supposed to see.

            However her ‘romance’ did have one important difference to previous Disney Princesses: she did not follow love in the end. She chose her family and people rather then to go to the other land with the man who’d been wounded saving her father, and it’s suggested he might not even make it back to England for proper medical attention. Unexpectedly, Disney did not give this princess a fairy tale ending; instead there was the question of lost love. Now, it could be because they felt they’d already trespassed on history as it was, but let’s pretend it’s an original story. As an original story this presents and important lesson previous Disney Princesses continued to miss: you don’t need to wind up with a man. Pocahontas did have love, but she did not marry him. Circumstances did not allow, and that is key.

            Now that I’ve spoken to death about the pros and cons about the romance presented in Pocahontas, let’s review her as a character. She is brave, intelligent, curious, and loyal but not to the point in any which way that she can’t make her own decisions. She is capable of being offended, and does not simply shrug off insult. For heaven’s sake, she prevented a war at risk to herself. While I’m not encouraging little girls to risk their necks for men they’ve only known a few days, they should want to avoid violence. Even if she does get a lot of flack for not being “historically accurate”, as Disney Princesses’s go, Pocahontas is a pretty cool role model.

Jasmine, Gem of the Palace

(Image via Wikipeda.org)

            In 1992, Disney Produced Aladdin, and audiences fell in love with a cast of new memorable characters. Among their ranks were of course Aladdin, and his love interest, the Princess Jasmine. She was the sixth Disney Princess to appear, even though the movie did not focus on her as the lead protagonist. Nonetheless, she was a breakthrough as a female character: to begin with, she was of Middle Eastern descent, the first non-white princess.

            Like Belle and Ariel, Jasmine’s mother is not in the picture. More like Belle and less like Ariel, she gets along with her father: to an extent. They have very different perspectives on the world; but Jasmine also isn’t afraid to speak to her father about what bothers her in life. She has an interesting affinity with animals, her best friend a tiger and releasing her pet birds to fly away when her own freedom is question. She has grown up in the palace as a princess, has never done anything for herself, and she resents that fact. She lives in a society that doesn’t give women much power, and what she wants more then anything is the freedom to make her own choices.

(Image from disney.wikia.com)

            Her enemy is Jafar, and he’s a dangerous figure. He is her father’s advisor, but he is corrupt, and has the power to hypnotize the sultan. His fatal flaws are that he underestimates people and desires even more power. Unfortunately, he’s also rather good at talking people until doing his bidding, and appears to be a master of disguise. Through the course of the movie he proves to be deceptive, cruel, a bit sadistic, and simply doesn’t care what happens to other people as long as he gets what he wants. That is the opponent Jasmine must help defeat.

            As mentioned, the focus of Aladdin is not Jasmine herself but, well, Aladdin. However, she does act as the catalyst of what occurs. Seeking freedom, she risks everything and runs away from home for a chance of freedom. Unfortunately, as she fears, her lack of knowledge of the world combined with a kind heart gets her in trouble. This is how she meets Aladdin-he saves her from losing her hand in the market, and leads her to a safe place. There they spent time bonding, connecting, and learning they were really kindred spirits, trapped by circumstances. It’s a memorable experience for both of them, and it was that encounter that Jafar would use to persuade Aladdin to go to the cave of Wonders; thus, if Aladdin and Jasmine had never met, the rest of the movie would not have played out as it did.

            Jasmine proves herself to be clever and able to think on her feet. When Aladdin returns in disguise as “Prince Ali” she notices his mannerisms, and gives him several chances to come clean. When he continues to avoid doing so, she brings up something Aladdin would know about, but Ali would not-and so proves to herself they are the same person. Naturally she reacts angrily when she finds out he’s been trying to deceive her, but the fact is they are kindred and understand each other well. Later when Aladdin is attempting to stop Jafar once and for all, she is quick to improvise in order to help him. She also does not appear to be afraid of Jafar, confronting him early in the movie, and daring to cross him at the end.

            The main flaw is that Jasmine’s story is not her own; she is the second fiddle to Aladdin in the course of the movie. This however, is no fault of her own. She is also, unfortunately, a little ignorant of how things work, having no sense of the economy or trading money for goods. Yet she is a quick learner and this helps her survive. She longs for the freedom to make her own choices and find her own loves, and she resents when she is objectified. When danger comes to her land and loves ones, she shows bravery. I’d say she’s a pretty good role model to expose little girls to, even if she has some flaws.

From Fins to Feats: Ariel

(Image via Wikipedia.org, with Thanks)

            The fourth Disney Princess to earn the attention of audiences, Ariel appeared in theaters in the movie The Little Mermaid, released in 1989. It featured a motherless mermaid with around half a dozen older sisters, and a father she couldn’t see eye to eye with. They exist separately from humans, under the sea, and seem to have a good amount of their culture focusing on music and keeping to themselves. They avoid humans who live on the surface, and enemies within the sea such as sharks (natural predators) or the evil Sea Witch, Ursula.

            Ariel herself, like previous princesses, is earnest and kind hearted. She’s loyal to her friends, risking her own life to save Flounder from a shark, and encouraging Sebastian to flee to her plate so he is not eaten. She is honestly remorseful when she realizes she missed the concert at the beginning of the movie, though her father focuses on her flaws. She is also insatiably curious about the forbidden: the world above the water and the humans who live in it. She craves adventure, going off to collect items from sunken ships and consulting a sea gull from above the ocean about them. She desires a life more then she has, but has remorse when she realizes she’s caused trouble for people she cares about.

(Image from Disney.wikia.com with thanks)

            Now, who is Ariel’s enemy? Ursula, a powerful and dangerous sea witches who strikes deals in a devil like fashion. She strikes people when they’re weak and in despair, offering them opportunities they could never otherwise have. She plays on hopes, and puts people at their highest-at which point she tears them down, takes their souls, and plants them in her kelp garden. She desires power among all else, can see through the eyes of her eels, who act as her spies. She was once in the palace but apparently Ariel’s father, the King Triton, wisely banished her. And though it’s clear Ursula was once more powerful, she still has the power of hypnotism and can disguise herself with magic.

            Ariel often gets criticism for the matter of her romance: many consider that she abandoned her family and risked her life for her first teenage idol encounter. And while yes, how she handled it was a little unorthodox, that was not entirely the case. She first spots the Prince Eric playing the flute and dancing, and indeed finds him handsome. This is why she’s still beside the ship when disaster strikes and the ship is destroyed. While many of the sailors were able to get away, Eric was not so lucky. Ariel saves his life. That is truly at the base of their romance; and it is known that when one person saves another they share a very strong bond. It’s quite the rush knowing you changed a person’s fate, and Ariel did that. And even though he only saw her for a moment when he came to on the shore, Eric searches for the girl who saved him because of that bond. The seeds of romance are planted then, and both are obviously in love before long. After two days of constant bonding once she gets her legs and loses her voice, they’re well on their way to a happy ending.

            Now, given earlier conversation, there were better ways to try to get to know him then to make a deal with the equivalent to the devil. But Ariel was in distress at that point because her father discovered how much of the human world she’d collected, and that she was in love with a human. They had a rather massive battle (more literal on his end, thanks to his magic trident), and her leaving could be compared to running away from home. Still, given the severity of the deal made (she had to make Eric kiss her in three days, without the use of her voice, or else be trapped in Ursula’s kelp garden) she could have thought about it more. She does hesitate, thinking about how it would mean never seeing her family again. But Ursula is influential and plays Devil’s advocate, and so the power of peer pressure is demonstrated.

            In terms of being a role model, Ariel is okay. She’s not horrid, but she tends to rush into things. Obviously her bravery is worth noting, and her loyalty to those she cares about. She demonstrates remorse when she realizes she’s done wrong, and was more then prepared to give up her romance at the end because of all the trouble it caused. Even though her father had the power to give her legs (proven at the end), she did not ask him to do so. She learned from her mistakes and grew, and curiosity about the world beyond her own is not a crime. A brave, kind hearted, sensitive, curious, loyal, and intelligent young woman: these are all things worth emulating. As for her rushing into things without a thought…well, she is sixteen.