I love to talk about Tiana when I talk about the princesses. TIANA IS SO FLAWLESS. Tiana's father, a chef with a dream of opening his own restaurant, died and it became Tiana's life goal to fulfill her father's dream. And sure, there's the standard fall-in-love-with-a-prince storyline, but Tiana resists him throughout the whole movie, opting instead to focus on her dreams. GO 'HEAD, TIANA.
(It should be noted that Disney classifies its princesses differently depending on the audience. For example, sometimes they'll lump Alice or Esmeralda in because they fit the general criteria for what a Disney Princess should be despite not actually being a "princess.")
Disney has also played around with their princesses. Princess Giselle (of Enchanted fame) was, for all intents and purposes, Disney making fun of their princesses. The film is packed with subtle references to princesses past and sly jabs at Disney's own princess mythos. An unfortunate side-effect of Enchanted is that Giselle is greatly under-represented and under-appreciated: because Giselle is the only live-action princess, Disney would have to pay Amy Adams royalties in order to produce merchandise and feature her heavily in the parks.
Which brings me to what I really wanted to talk about: how the Disney parks reinforce and market gender roles inherent in princess and pirate (superhero, if we're tying this to class readings and discussion) culture.
Last year, Disney announced that the Magic Kingdom at Walt Disney World was getting a bit of a makeover. Fantasyland, home to it's a small world and Peter Pan's Flight and all those other classic attractions, is expanding. They've effectively removed all of ToonTown (say goodbye to Mickey and Minnie's houses) to build onto Fantasyland.
"Cool!" says someone like me. "Oh," says someone like me when they read more details.
In place of ToonTown will be locations from the princess films that aren't already represented elsewhere. This means you'll get to check out Beast's castle and walk around Belle's provincial town. Ariel will have a "seaside" alcove. After the expansion, Fantasyland will be half classic attractions and half princesses. Which on one hand is awesome because Disney seems reluctant to change things up so drastically in the parks and on the other hand is bothersome because it brings up the question: What about the boys?
One of my beefs with Disney is that they don't really account for boys (forgive me for being strictly "girls=pink princesses; boys=blue and tough" because I really try not to be). Girls get princesses and the Bibbidi Bobbidi Boutique (which, by the way, check out their package names and descriptions--why go for "coach" when you can go for the "castle?"). Boys are stuck with pirates and maybe a bit of the Star Wars that goes down at Hollywood Studios.
Disney will frequently hold Princess and Pirate parties, where boys and girls can hang out with the princesses or Jack Sparrow and girls get to dance and listen to stories with and from the princesses and boys learn to sword fight with Jack Sparrow. Forgive me for being unimpressed. Walking through the parks, you'll find girls dressed as their favorite of 13 princesses and boys with a pirate hat and a plastic sword. Again, forgive me for being unimpressed.
The truth is that Disney knows its market. They're struggling to connect with boys (though perhaps their acquisition of Marvel will spice things up a bit), but they know they can get girls hook, line, and sinker--and that their parents will pay $200 for a castle package during their fairytale vacation.
Also of note: Pixar (Disney's partner) is preparing to release a film called "Brave," which features their first female protagonist (!) and is co-directed by a female (!!). It looks a little like Mulan (woman has to prove herself among men), but I'm hopeful that Pixar will stay true to its history and use it as a platform to say something about gender roles and expectations.
No comments:
Post a Comment