One of history's oldest stories.
In a recent
study of popular films in 11 countries, including the United States, only about 30 percent of the protagonists are women. That means, more often than not, female characters in film are the sidekick, the love interest, or the damsel in distress that needs to be saved. In fact, in examining 129 popular films in the U.S. between 2010 and 2013, much
less than half of those female characters are depicted as having a job, and those jobs fit a narrow range more likely to be nanny, nurse, or teacher than business executive, doctor, or engineer.
Dreams built upon fairy tales and fantasy, princes and princesses, and everything in-between can be some of the most cherished memories of childhood. But given the abovementioned data, the term "Disney princess" has taken on negative connotations in recent years. The argument being the classic female archetype seen in the likes of Snow White and Sleeping Beauty encourages young girls to define femininity by beauty, and sees the main goal in a woman's life as being romance and finding a "Prince Charming." And those sort of gender roles and stereotypes filter down into everyday life in the ways women are perceived in the boardroom and in politics. Disney has been well aware as to how this can sometimes come off, and for at least the past two decades tried to move their female characters away from these criticisms. Mulan is a warrior, both Tiana from The Princess and the Frog and Merida from Brave want independence and to achieve on their own merits, and with Frozen the story is about the love between two sisters and how they're saved by being true to themselves. Frozen has been hailed by some for feminist and progressive values, and been bashed by others for promoting a "pro-gay, pro-bestiality agenda." So you can't please everyone.
With the release of Kenneth Branagh's Cinderella this Friday, I thought a look at the movie might make for an interesting discussion of these issues. Especially given the film is a live-action remake of the 1950 animated film and changes some things for newer times.
Follow beneath the fold for more.
I told a female friend I was writing about this, and she warned me I was thinking about it all wrong. I expected her to say that maybe young female role models had shifted to characters like Katniss Everdeen from The Hunger Games, but her exact words to me were: "Girls don't wanna be princesses. They wanna be Kardashians." And she was fine with a daughter having fantasies of being a princess and finding a true love if that meant she could keep her innocence and wasn't trying to "break the internet" and look hot for likes on Instagram and Facebook.
From Caroline Siede
at BoingBoing:
Interestingly, the image of the “Disney princess” is still irreparably tied to the three women who kicked off the genre despite the leaps and bounds Disney made in the subsequent Renaissance and Revival eras. (In Batman terms, that’s like arguing that both the campy 1960s series and Christopher Nolan’s dark take on the character can only be judged as a packaged deal.) Unsurprisingly, the princess films made in the 1930s-1950s reflect the sexist gender politics of that era. (After all, Snow White was released only 17 years after women earned the right to vote). On the surface, these films reinforce rigid gender stereotypes: Women are good at cooking, cleaning, and looking beautiful. Men are good at rescuing ladies and fighting monsters.
Yet it’s women who are the titular characters in these three films. The leading ladies get the memorable songs, the iconic costumes, and the emotional journeys, while their male love interests are generic—often unnamed—supporting characters. The princes may do the physical rescuing, but they are very much presented as “prizes” for our heroines to win (albeit through conventional means of being beautiful and suffering silently). While contemporary blockbusters struggle to populate their worlds with more than one token woman, these early Disney films offer a wide range of female characters. Snow White’s Evil Queen, Cinderella’s Stepmother, and Sleeping Beauty’s Maleficent remain three of Hollywood’s most memorable female villains. And long before Frozen celebrated female friendships, Cinderella and Aurora relied on female fairies for help, guidance, and encouragement. These films troublingly imply that only beautiful women can be heroes, but it’s still a fairly progressive step to depict women as romantic leads, villains, and supporting characters all in one film.
Most of the Disney princesses are based on much older fairy tales, and these issues are usually also present in the source material and are sometimes
much, much worse (e.g., in some iterations of the
Sleeping Beauty story, she's actually raped by the Prince as she sleeps and awakens to discover that she's had children). With
Cinderella, the story is one that is rooted in most of recorded history, and has thousands of variants that occur in disparate cultures, each putting a unique spin on it while embracing the message of the goodness of an abused girl beating all odds and triumphing over injustice that's held her down.
The first known occurrence of the story is in the 1st century BC by the historian Strabo, where he related a tale about a Greek slave, Rhodopis, who the Egyptian god Horus pushes the Pharaoh to pursue using golden slippers. The story is thought to be based on a real woman of the same name in 6th century BC, and mentioned by Herodotus as being a fellow slave of Aesop. Another version of the Cinderella story occurs in 9th century China in the Miscellaneous Morsels from Youyang and was written during the Tang Dynasty by Duan Chengshi. Yeh-hsien's feet are said to be the smallest in the land, and are the only ones that will fit weightless shoes made of golden fish scales. In the version that appears in One Thousand and One Nights (aka Arabian Nights), the slipper is an anklet and a fairy found inside a magic jug bought at a market is the helper. In the German Brothers Grimm iteration, the slipper is made of gold and Aschenputtel's dead mother is helping her. The Grimm version is also notable for portraying Aschenputtel as having doubts that life with a prince is what she truly wants, and it is the basis for the depiction of the Cinderella character in the recent Into the Woods. It's not until the 17th century and Charles Perrault's version of Cinderella that the glass slippers, fairy godmother and all the elements of the modern story appear, which are the foundation of both the 1950 and 2015 Disney films.
Directed by Kenneth Branagh with a screenplay from Chris Weitz, this new iteration of
Cinderella is part of a trend by Disney to adapt their animated classics into live-action films. This film follows last year's
Maleficent starring Angelina Jolie and will soon be joined by
The Jungle Book and a
Beauty and the Beast adaptation with Emma Watson as Belle. Branagh's
Cinderella is largely a nostalgia trip where fans of the original 1950 film will see familiar plot points expanded on a bit. You can change some things in adapting it, but there's no way to get around the basic crux of the story in
Cinderella being girl meets boy, girl loves boy, and boy falls in love with girl. It is what it is. But the film goes in a much different direction than its predecessor with one character and puts a distinct spin on another's actions.
As the movie opens, 10-year-old Ella (Eloise Webb) loses her mother (Hayley Atwell), but not before mom passes along words of wisdom: “Have courage and be kind.” Ella grows into a beautiful young woman (Lily Carter, best known as Lady Rose on Downton Abbey) and lives happily with her merchant father (Ben Chaplin). But since this is a Disney movie based on a fairy tale that has to change, and it does when Ella's father marries Lady Tremaine (Cate Blanchett) shortly before dying on a business trip. Tremaine, her daughters Drisella (Sophie McShera) and Anastasia (Holliday Grainger), and cat, Lucifer, come into the home. Ella's treatment by her new family is a slow degradation where catty comments, like renaming her "Cinderella" after she's covered in soot, turn into bullying and finally proceeds to outright abuse.
Lily James as Ella ("Cinderella")
Unless you've been living under a rock, you probably know where the story goes from here, with kind animal friends that come to Ella's aid, a ditzy Fairy Godmother (Helena Bonham Carter) doing her "Bibbidi-Bobbidi-Boo," and the love of Prince Charming. And the film looks amazing. The production design captures the look and feel of the 1950 animated film with lavish costumes and sets. But one big and notable difference this time around is Prince "Kit" Charming (Richard Madden, better known as Robb Stark of
Game of Thrones), who's a fully realized character with his own story arc that adds a bit of depth to his infatuation with Cinderella. Instead of being love at first sight, the circumstances of their first encounter puts both characters on a more equal footing. It also fits the film's theme of children finding a path that's ultimately a reflection of their parents' values, whether it be Cinderella, the ugly stepsisters or the Prince.
So, if by chance people are going into this film expecting something that strays from the legend of Cinderella, this is not the film for you. It's still a story about the victory of decency and love. But it would be more accurate to say this Cinderella adds new dimensions to the story everyone knows by heart, especially with Blanchett's performance being both vicious and revisionist.
Cate Blanchett as Lady Tremaine, Holliday Grainger as Anastasia and Sophie McShera as Drizella
- Love is never free: The character of Lady Tremaine shares a universe with the likes of Maleficent (Sleeping Beauty), Jafar (Aladdin), Scar (The Lion King), and Chernabog (Fantasia), but as depicted in the 1950 film she is considered one of the most evil, and hateful characters in the entire Disney animated canon. Blanchett puts a slightly different spin on the character, where her malevolence is not hate for hate's sake. Instead, it's a woman that's been hardened by the world, and acts out of bitterness. Lady Tremaine wants to get ahead and give her daughters a leg up by any means necessary in a world where women's choices are limited, and narrow even further with age. It doesn't excuse her actions, but it grounds it in a reality where Lady Tremaine takes out her frustrations and personal demons on Cinderella.
- The Wicked Stepmother: This trope is a staple of fairy tales and Cinderella is one of the biggest examples of it. Anyone who has ever had a stepparent can attest to, at least in the beginning, feeling resentment and not wanting someone who replaces the person you consider mom or dad. And there is research which points to stepmothers experiencing higher levels of clinical depression than biological mothers or stepfathers. On the other hand, this trope can also be truth in television. The "Cinderella effect" is a claim by evolutionary psychologists that children are more likely to be abused by stepparents and cohabitating boyfriends and girlfriends of a parent.
- Waist controversy: The size of Lily James's waist in the film has been a topic of discussion on social media, with some accusing the production of digitally altering her waistline to portray an "unreal corset." However, James has denied it and argued the criticism is sexist: "Why do women always get pointed at for their bodies? And why is this whole thing happening and I'm constantly having to justify myself? International Women's Day has just gone, and it just feels just a bit sad that it's still happening. You know, I'm very healthy and I always have been."
- Romantic comedies: Most of the elements of modern romantic comedies can be found in Cinderella. There's a beautiful girl who no one recognizes as beautiful until someone gives her a makeover. It takes only a brief encounter for the characters to know fate wants them to be together, and they should devote every bit of their life (and the state's as well in going house to house making women try on a slipper) to making the relationship happen. There are forces trying to keep true love apart. And finally, the characters are being depressed, downtrodden or lead unfulfilled lives. The love story either serves to break the character from the cycle or exacerbates it, and the abuse gets worse before it gets better.