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A Rant about Disney

At Disney, nobody fucks with the mouse -- Harlan Ellison

Everybody loves Disney. We grew up with it. If it wasn't the Mickey Mouse club, it was a theme park. Maybe it was a movie. Do you remember the Wonderful World of Disney? Of course. It was on Sunday nights at 7 PM when I was growing up. I looked forward to it.

But nowadays you can't avoid Disney. You can't even escape them. Disney has become Philip K. Dick's Ubik. It's a spray-on, a roll-on, a floor wax with the face of a cartoon mouse. Disney is a movie tie-in. It's a lunchbox. It's a backpack. It's a tie with a duck.

Is this such a bad thing? Disney provides common ground. We all know what Mickey Mouse is. We all want to go to Disneyland. Disney is a shared experience. Everyone has at least this much in common. In our splintered society, we have this little thing we all know. Who could object to that?

But then there's the other side of the Rodent's Domain.

Disney might be something we all share - but it's so white. Oh boy, Pocahantas^TM wasn't white. Big deal. Maybe that balances out Song of the South. And it seems strange that Aladdin^TM looks very Caucasian. Gee, I thought the story was set in Arabia. I must have read Richard Burton wrong.

I admit I haven't seen Aladdin. I just go by all the media I've been drenched in. But I really do wonder how many times Allah was mentioned in the Disney film. Or did the fact that Islam is central to the culture just get quietly pushed aside? Hey, who cares - we've got Robin Williams hamming it up!

While I'm on a roll, let's take a short look at The Lion King. Our story: King's brother kills king, blames prince. Prince runs away and pouts. Prince's girlfriend visits and tells how bad life is under brother, and only he can save them. Son returns, vanquishes uncle, ushering in new era: rainbows, sunsets, animal harmony, etc. Simple, right? What could be better?

Well, how about the fact that none of the rest of the lions could (or apparently even tried to) vanquish the villainous uncle? Only Simba^TM could do it because he was the prince. What an awful message to send to people! Were the Calvinists right? Do we in fact live in castes? Are most people unable to help themselves?

And while I'm at it, does anyone remember that in the original story of the little mermaid, she dies? The original Aladdin wasn't anyone you really wanted to know: a hooligan who became a good person after he became rich. Money = virtue.

But my objections to these films are off the subject. The crux of my argument was made by Roald Dahl:

IT ROTS THE SENSES IN THE HEAD!
IT KILLS IMAGINATION DEAD!
IT CLOGS AND CLUTTERS UP THE MIND!
IT MAKES A CHILD SO DULL AND BLIND
HE CAN NO LONGER UNDERSTAND
A FANTASY, A FAIRYLAND!
HIS BRAIN BECOMES AS SOFT AS CHEESE!
HE CANNOT THINK - HE ONLY SEES!

Disney is passive. Disney doesn't invite us to imagine what happened next. What happened to the little mermaid? I don't know, but if I want to find out I can watch the animated series. We don't need to read or think or imagine anymore. We can just watch a film. When that's over we can rewind it, or turn on the Disney channel.

Disney is puerile. They have no qualms about taking a story and remolding it to their purposes (appealing characters, animal sidekicks, an obvious villain, a happy ending, strong marketing prospects, oh, and some songs). But in keeping to this formula, they rob stories of their value. If a brutish, bestial hunchback can now become a lovable aria-singing hero, then what's next? Hitler as a poor misunderstood artist? No, that will never happen, because

Disney is product. Disney's got amazing marketing clout. But Disney is acutely aware of customer perception, and will bend over to avoid controversy (which could hurt its profits). In the Rodent Resorts you'll never see a beard on the staff. It's only proper to be cleanshaven. And to sell product, image is everything.

It seems strange to me that people haven't gotten sick of something that's everywhere, but people still want more.

Disney is something everyone knows. This is known as a least common denominator. Should we be happy that something so pervasive is a least common denominator? Nobody goes to McDonalds for the delicious cuisine. So why do we do this with entertainment? Why do we treat our minds with such disrespect?

Postscript

I was just musing about Fantasia. It could not be made by Disney today. That's not "would", it's "could". Disney (the corporation, not the person) has lost that kind of vision. The sylvan scene would be deemed to be espousing non-Christian beliefs and would be nixed before the first cel was ever painted.

If Fantasia was the Golden Age of Disney, that age has passed.

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