The Deeper Meaning

Deborah Ross writes in her essay Escape from wonderland just how important a role the movies that children watch or the ideas shown to them in Disney movies is. It talks through Alice in wonderland, the Little Mermaid and Beauty and the Beast, which is the story she favors to be the most satisfying. She informs us of her opinion of the roles these play in subliminal messaging into children’s minds and in particular little girls viewing these movies. I don’t believe she wrote this piece to slam Disney but it does puzzle me how after all the movies Disney has made and all the success they have why does she find it necessary to criticize the plot lines and analyze deeper than I think it is meant to be. Disney has done more than its fair share of movies and many of them we find entertaining and fun to watch regardless of what meanings they give. Strength of her points is how it is relatable evidence because looking deeper into it everything she states can be defended to be true, but its limitations are forgetting to mention in detail that these movies follow the stigmas of societies in which the time they were written, even in the new movie Frozen Disney tries something new in an attempt to keep the plot line dynamic but eventually these stereotypical plot lines have to occur in order to keep the movies enjoyable for people of all ages. Where as in Noah Berlatsky’s essay over twilight and the hunger games he explains the subtext rather than necessarily criticizing it. He does a good job in the article of showing how most modern women would obviously prefer Katniss and her spirit then Bella and her emotions. But he also explains that traditionally relationships follow the “opposites attract” theory so although we side with one character more closely we still might look for something different in significant others. Which could also be seen as a lesson to kids growing up watching these movies alongside with Disney ones, getting both the ideas of women discovering themselves and finding yourself is a big part of finding the perfect balance. The expected audience to both of these pieces is adults and teenagers to show some sort of hidden meaning so that we too may be able to share it with others.