I love cartoons. My tv is set to international news and cartoons. Anything else makes me uneasy (except for 30 Rock.. that show is on fire). But I digress. Cartoons are not only entertainment; they are a window into various cultures. You can literally gauge where a society is at by it’s cartoons. For instance, Black cartoon characters have more or less come a long way from the blackface Elmer Fudd to the socially enlightening Little Bill (though we occasionally get a PJ’s thrown in there once in a while). Black cartoon characters more or less are stepping their game up all over, except for with Disney.
Dammit Disney, you just don’t get it. First off, go to Disneyworld. I want you to head to the Magical Kingdom (where Epcot Center is) and go around the world. For those that haven’t gone to Disney, the Magical Kingdom is one of the major sites (along with MGM Studios, Animal Kingdom, etc etc). The site features various countries, marked by large Embassy-looking buildings. So you can walk around the park and learn about countries ranging from Canada to China to England to Japan to Mexico, etc etc. FIND AN AFRICAN COUNTRY. I went around the Magical Kingdom twice only to find two small huts selling wooden giraffes and the shopkeeper telling me it was an outpost not a country. That’s just an example.
Disney is now working on it’s latest production: The Princess and the Frog, originally titled The Frog Princess. This movie will be Disney’s first feature-length animated film featuring a Black woman as the starring princess (those unfamiliar with Disney should know that it markets itself on its Princesses… Jasmine from Aladdin, Ariel from Little Mermaid, Mulan from Mulan, etc etc). And in true Disney fashion, the movie shall be a step backwards in every way fashionable.
The movie is set in New Orleans and features a Black chambermaid named Maddy. Let that sink in for a minute. A chamber maid named Maddy. Almost like a housemaid named Mammy.
How many Disney princesses have been maids? Let’s see…. nope. They’ve all been damn princesses. (Side note: due to impending controversy, Disney has now made Maddy “a heroine in the great tradition of Disney’s rich animated fairy tale legacy, and all other characters and aspects of the story will be treated with the greatest respect and sensitivity” according to spokeswoman Heidi Trotta. Along those veins they’ve also changed her name from Maddy to Tiana.
I also want to point out that this film is animated. What’s the last animated film you remember watching in the theatres? The answer is probably Treasure Planet, though most people didn’t see it. It came out around the same time as Shrek, when CGI (computer generated images) was already killing. The hot news topic at the time was “the death of animation.” So why the hell is the Black princess movie animated? Disney could break ground and not only do the first Black princess who was long overdue but also make her the first princess to be done in CGI. But the status quo is so easy to maintain. Sigh…
But let’s say Disney wanted to go with the classic animated look. Okay, I can see that. Now look at the image at the top of the post… are you serious? Another Quincy Jones frog? Didn’t WB have a dancing/singing frog for YEARS to introduce its Black shows? Oh yea…
And here we are again… another big-lipped frog ready to perform along side Black characters. But maybe… MAYBE i’m just paranoid, conspiracy theorist, reverse racist, blah blah. Let’s take another expert’s opinion. Let’s see what Senior Black Correspondent Larry Wilmore has to say about it.
http://www.thedailyshow.com/video/index.jhtml?videoId=84572&title=frog-princess
And for these indisputable reasons, Disney is holding my pocket.
7 responses so far ↓
J. West // December 1, 2008 at 12:41 pm |
Cinderella was a slave/maid to her step sisters and step mom…
blackdiplomacy // December 1, 2008 at 12:46 pm |
J. West:
Fantastic Point.
1) Cinderella is not a Disney original (nor is Snow White, Sleeping Beauty, and a host of other movies). Among the Disney originals (Mulan, Poccahantas… it’s original with the way they changed history, and so forth) this princess is unique in that she was not set to be a princess at all. Just a chamber maid.
A. Anderson // December 2, 2008 at 3:13 pm |
Mulan isn’t a princess traditionally either. By all rights she’s currently not a princess now because she married a Chinese warrior rather than a member of the royal family. Also Belle didn’t begin as a princess; she just married into royalty when she finally kissed the Beast.
I haven’t seen the movie (although I am excited to) so I can’t say much about the plot or anything but I get the feeling that this story is going to be a revised Beauty and the Beast with a creole twist. I’m also unsure of whether the frog can talk or not, but something tells me he might be mute so I think there won’t be cooning there. Finally, I would argue that most of the coon-like activity that you might see in the movie (like the firefly character) is more reflective of the bayou culture (white and black) and not a skewed perception of Black culture.
If this is at all incoherent its because I’m in class and I’m trying to listen to lecture at the same time.
blackdiplomacy // December 3, 2008 at 1:13 am |
Whether you call them princesses, heroines, or just favored Disney female protagonists, they are all marketed the same way. And honestly, if you’ve ever seen the toy line, they pretty much call them princesses (little girls like princesses).
Again, keep in mind the dynamics of the movie have changed due to pre-existing controversy. Maddy went from chamber maid to Tiana the princess in an attempt to be less offensive. I imagine other changes were made in the same manner.
To get into specifics, the “cooning” frog is a bit of an exaggeration. I simply find it amusing that this frog has big lips. Draw your own conclusions.
The firefly, sure, I could take that as creole culture.
The fact that it’s animated and not CGI? Get that outta here. Disney would have to do a lot of marketing outside the usual in order to make this film a success.
EB // December 28, 2008 at 3:56 pm |
You neglected to mention that the Animal Kingdom is an entire theme park revolving around the cultures, landscapes, and inhabitants of Africa. Disney did, indeed neglect this continent when they originally designed Epcot, and I won’t defend them for that. But lets not completely ignore the steps forward they’ve taken in recent years to remedy past mistakes.
blackdiplomacy // December 28, 2008 at 9:08 pm |
EB:
True. I’ve been to Animal Kingdom a few years ago; tell me if this still applies:
Animal Kingdom is divided into two halves: Asia and Africa. On the Asian side, you have all the unique/exotic/etc animals from the Asian continent. They even have Asian tour guides to help you around. On the African side, you have all the unique/exotic/etc animals from the African continent. They even have Asian tour guides to help you around.
No, that’s not a mistype. Yes Disney built half a themepark dedicated to African wildlife, but it’s still a half-a$$ed half a theme park.
(from a technical standpoint, as far as zoos go, Animal Kingdom is off the chain and I recommend anyone who enjoys zoos to visit it just for the exhibits’ sake)
Elisheba // September 16, 2009 at 6:02 am |
Now, I have been going off for years and have sent countless emails and letters to disney about why there is not a black animated movie. When i first heard about this I was excited. Then when I found out the Maddy name, and the fact that the prince was white, I was outraged again. What is this saying about our black men? Why is it that a black man is not fit to be a prince? This could have been an excellent tool to see black men in a positive light instead of the negative one that is everywhere and they replace him with a white man! Disney will not get a dime out of me and Im telling everyone to boycott it too and send letters to disney about themselves. I do not think they had any black people working on this film or these issues would have been addressed already. If they want to tackle interracial dating then they need to do it on the next film. How bout a black man with a white woman? Lets really cause a fire! White people will boycott them then.
btw I am glad that Disney did it as a 2d simply because most of their 3d movies have been CRAP. We do not want another “The Wild”. My 4 year old walked out on that movie!