Step 1 :
Chosen animation : Cinderella
(DISNEY, W., et al. (2005). Cinderella.
Burbank, CA, Walt Disney Home Entertainment. (18th edition)_
Theme : Glamour and Envy
Quote : Glamour cannot exist without persona| social envy
being a common and widespread emotion. The industrial society which has moved
towards democracy and then stopped half way is the ideal society for generating
such an emotion. The pursuit of individual happiness has been acknowledged as a
universal right. Yet the existing social conditions make the individual feel
powerless, He lives in the contradiction between what he is and whet he would
like to be.
Relation : The tale of Cinderella is a story
of glamour and envy that is layer upon layer. On one hand, Disney fairytails
glamourize the life of nobility as the ultimate goal of happiness for the
heroine, and having all the characters striving to achieve it. On the other
hand, Cinderella’s nobility and kindness in the face of hardship itself
glamourized , becoming the face of what is good and desirable , (that every
young child wants to become- an ideal princess ), which in turn turned her into
the subject of envy for her step-mother and sister , and even more so when she
has achieve her goal of finding happiness with the prince.
Step 2 : Contextual research
Cinderella is
an American-made Disney animated feature in 1950, at the time when Disney was
experiencing a financial crisis after suffering from several office bombs like
Fantasia, Pinocchio and Bambi. The commercial success that came with it
rejuvenate Disney’s fame and its fortune. Subject-wise, being an adaption of
Charles Perrault’s work in 1679 ( a period when social ideas were vastly
different), and produced with Walt Disney own personal 50s era ideology , Cinderella
work is affected by gender stereotypes, where women was still considered to be
less than men and their goals and ambitions for security and escape was still
presented as the wedding ring, or how their place was at home and it is in
their best interest to the work that is expected of them. This of course is
clearly presented through multiple situations from Cinderella being forced to
become a house chore slave, to how she is helped along by “magical” forces that
more or less , the main catalyst for her dream to come true, and without which
, nothing would have changed ( the idea of a helpless woman being saved ).
Moreover , it also reinforce the old stereotypical traits of what good and
evil, ugly and beauty,….is.
Animation genre : Formal and Political
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