Disney Does Romance

Many of you know that I love Disney. I have a Disney Christmas tree, Disney pajamas, Disney dishes, Disney collectables. Hell, I’ve been to Disneyland over two hundred times. Disney is famous for their animated prince and princess movies. Disney loves love. They like to see to people come together. These movies are a young girl’s first look at love and Disney likes to paint a pretty picture. But are they doing love justice? It horrifies me to say, no they aren’t

Snow White and the Seven Dwarves

You know the story. The evil queen gets jealous because Snow White is more beautiful than she is. She tries to have her heart cut from her chest. Snow runs and finds safety in the home of a group of diminutive miners.  After several songs about how freaking sweet it is to spend your days doing dishes and laundry, the evil queen shows up and poisons the beautiful Snow. The dwarves, completely devastated at the loss of the cook and housekeeper, enshrine her in a glass coffin where a prince rides in, kisses her, and magically brings her back from the dead.

Here’s the problem….

Let’s ignore the whole little person fetish thing for now. Let’s focus on the “happy” ending. A prince, we never actually learn his name, rides in on a horse and proceeds to make out with Snow White. Keep in mind that he thought she was dead. He was so overcome by his necrophilic urges that he leapt off his stallion, lifted the glass coffin lid, and kissed Snow’s cold dead lips. This little factoid is missed because Snow magically comes back to life. I don’t know if he had a defibrillator in his lips or what. All I know is that her coming back to life totally covered his whole, “I like dead people” thing.

Cinderella

Poor Cindy had been mistreated by her step-mother and step-sisters. They made her work her fingers to the bone with only her little mice friends to help. The Prince, hilariously named Charming, decides to have a ball so he can choose a wife. The brats get to go, Cindy is left home in a tattered dress. A fairy godmother swoops in, makes her pretty, gives her a ride, and accessorizes her coach with a few sweet footmen. Charming falls in love with Cindy after one dance. The clock strikes twelve, Cindy runs, she loses a shoe, her one night of happiness is over. Charming sends a whole fleet of dudes to find the woman whose foot fits that shoe proving that a really great pair of shoes can change your life.

Here’s the problem….

Am I the only one who missed the fact the every woman in the kingdom was summoned to the palace so Charming can take his pick of the herd. These aren’t blue ribbon hogs Charming, they're desperate young women who want you for your money and crown. Show a little respect. And don’t get me started on the fairy godmother. That bitch can’t make her spell last for more than a few hours? What? Did she drop out of Magic U? Does she enjoy showing someone their dream then ripping it away at the last moment? That’s sadistic. If the shoes don’t disappear why do the dress and all the other trappings of a night out in the kingdom? The fairy godmother is the real villain here.

Sleeping Beauty

The king and queen have a baby. The evil Maleficent gets all bent out of shape because she wasn’t invited to the celebration and curses the baby princess to die on her eighteenth birthday by pricking her finger on a spinning wheel. Three fairies cast their own spells to protect her then steal her away to raise her as a normal girl with three spinster aunts in the woods. Aurora meets Prince Phillip in the woods one day where they dance and sing. The fairies take Aurora back to the castle for her eighteenth birthday. Phillip gets captured. Aurora pricks her finger and falls into a deep sleep. The rest of the kingdom fall asleep. The fairies bust Phillip out. Maleficent turns into a dragon. Phillip kills her, he kisses Aurora, the fairies fight over the color of her dress.

Here’s the problem….

First of all, what kind of evil genius chooses a spinning wheel as a murder weapon? Bond villains aren’t that stupid. Oh and she tells everyone in the whole damn kingdom the exact day to expect princess to die. That’s a seriously stupid move. So what do they do, they hide her away until the day she’s supposed to die. Here’s a thought, maybe keep her out of spinning wheel range until after her big day. If that's too much to ask to save the life of your daughter, maybe don't hold a huge freaking party to announce her return. And then we’re back to the whole necrophilia thing. OK, Phillip knew she wasn’t really dead, so he gets a bit of wiggle room here. But she’s still in a magical coma. Last I checked the AMA frowns on sexual relations with coma patients.

Why do we keep buying tickets and DVDs for this kind of movie? Because no one notices the twisted side of the Disney fairy tale. Hell, Disney had to tone down the kink that was originally written. We see two characters fall in love and we leave the movie believing in true love if only for a moment. I’m totally cool with my daughter thinking all men are princes and all relationships end in a life and death struggle, a great dress, and some killer jewelry. She'll learn soon enough that the idea of a Prince Charming/Phillip/anonymous guy on a horse who digs dead chicks is mostly bull crap.