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February 1996, Week 5

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Subject:
From:
Donald Larsson <[log in to unmask]>
Reply To:
Film and TV Studies Discussion List <[log in to unmask]>
Date:
Wed, 28 Feb 1996 10:49:47 -0600
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Jerry comments:
"Right now I'm doing a study of how children engage the film texts offered
to them.  I'm receiving some very interesting feedback.  For instance, many
adults believe most Disney animated features to be very reactionary in that
the conflicts are always resolved with the re-establishment of the
patriarchal, heterosexual order.  But I recently asked two 8-year-old girls
what they thought of "Beauty and the Beast," and they both said they were
very dissapointed that the beast changed into a man at the end because he
was "boring" now. . . . "
 
 
When Greta Grabo saw Cocteau's version of the same story, she was supposed to
have cried out, "Give me back my Beast!"  (and there's some of that missing
*passion* that Gene Stavis alluded to--what is missing from video is the
*communal* aspect of viewing).
 
A similar observation could be made of THE LITTLE MERMAID.  Having Ariel give
up her mermaid status to happily marry the Prince can be seen as reactionary,
but how do specific viewers treat it?  Notice the film's marketing--I don't
think there are any Ariel toys, towels, lunchboxes, etc. that have her with
*legs*--and she's usually with Sebastian and Flounder Under the Sea (and
away from Daddy), not on dry land with the Prince.
 
It's also difficult to gauge any *specific* single reaction.  When I took my
son (for the second time) to the film along with a friend's daughter, she left
the film in tears and anger because Ariel would have to leave her father (her
own parents were recently separated).  "It doesn't have a happy ending!" she
angrily exclaimed.  (I was nonplussed.)
 
 
Don Larsson, Mankato State U (MN)
 
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