Ernest Alba's Blog

The Little Mermaid: Feminist Values or Sexist Values?

I bought Disney's The Little Mermaid a couple of days ago. I've seen it a few times since then. It's such a good movie!

But there is a lot in this movie that is sexist. There is also a lot in this movie that encourages good feminist values. I'll list what I saw that encouraged a feminist view and I'll also list what didn't encourage one.

Feminist (supporting the right of women to hold equal status in society):

1. Ariel wants to know exactly how the pipe and the fork work and what they are for. She is inquisitive.
2. Ariel sings 'Part of Your World" and says "Betcha on land they understand, bet they don't reprimand their daughters. bright young women, sick of swimming, ready to stand." Also, while flipping through a book, "ask them some questions and get some answers." finally, "what's a fire and why does it burn?" - that is a scientist in the making.
3. Ariel saves the life of Eric.
4. Ariel defies her father's commands in order to follow her dreams.
5. While exploring the kingdom with Eric, she maintains her interest in how everything works (the puppets, the carriage, etc). Eric also lets her take control of the reins, a significant symbolic move.
6. Ursula is completely equal to King Triton in influence and power. Best shown at the end, where she shows him her contract, he attempts to destroy it, and she defies him with ease and confidence.

Sexist (exemplifying entrenched discriminatory and sexist traditions):

1. After she falls in love, she stops doing everything except for laying around, trying to think of ways to get Eric's attention.
2. King Triton is completely pleased that his daughter has fallen in love. His fears are completely assuaged;  she's found her calling in life, and he's done his job.
3. While whatever Ursula says can be construed as wrong and evil, I doubt children will make that leap in logic. They will take what she says at face value. As such, she says a lot of things that are damaging to girls' beliefs about life. She calls a large girl and skinny boy "poor unfortunate souls' and graphically "fixes" them, transforming them into a curvaceous girl and buff guy who hug each other and smile.
4. The most damaging thing Ursula says, though, is "I want your voice. You'll never even miss it." And why not? Because "You'll have your looks, your pretty face. Men don't like a lot of blabber. It's much preferred for ladies not to say a word. It's she who holds her tongue who gets her man."
5. Sebastian says, "You gotta bat your eyes and pucker up your lips." He is defining what it is to be feminine.
6. All of that "following her dreams and being inquisitive" stuff is fine, but ultimately it leads up to (or is replaced completely with) falling in love with a rich, handsome man and getting married.

It's important to understand that movies like this are extremely influential to young people. Indeed, I put the movie on in my room, and almost immediately two girls, Yvette and Joanna, came into my room and started singing along. They left, and a few minutes later, all the girls in the hall had put it on in one of their rooms and were watching it. These are college girls, mind you, girls who have begun defining themselves in the context of the real world. However they act, whatever decisions they make, it is influenced to some degree by how they grew up, and what they believed as children. If, as children, they believed in a world where personal development is second to falling in love, finding a husband, and acting "feminine" they'll continue to believe that in the future, especially if they continue to be subjected to those ideas by people they respect as they grow up. How often would parents rather have their daughters go to graduate school than to find a good husband? Become the successful CEO of a large corporation or provide granddaughters for them? Whatever the response, would they hold their sons to that same standard?

I would show The Little Mermaid to my daughters, but I would be sure to qualify some of the statements and ideas put forth in the movie, the good ones and the bad ones.

Film Review: Babel

Babel is in many ways similar to last year's Best Picture, Crash. In each, seemingly unrelated stories involving people of different racial and ethnic backgrounds come together in a subtle and poignant way as the stories unfold. This film could be entitled Crash II: International Edition because the stories, instead of taking place entirely within the United States, take place all over the world including Mexico, Japan, the U.S., and the predominantly Arab nation of Morocco. In one story, an American tourist is shot by accident by two Moroccan children with a rifle. In another, a Mexican nanny takes the two American children in her care to a wedding just across the border without the permission of the children's parents. In the third story, a deaf-mute Japanese teenager is experiencing feelings of sexual frustration, loneliness, and depression after the death of her mother and her estranged relationship with her father. These different stories are connected in seemingly arbitrary ways. The points of intersection in Crash were much more meaningful than the ones here. However, the reason for the connections being so small that they could indeed have not even been placed in the film is that it reflects the reality of our world. Only now can we be so far apart from each other that the signs of a global, connected community are that small. However, the connections are there, miniscule as they may be. If the current trend towards globalization remains, the connecting points will only increase in magnitude and frequency. For now, they remain as small and insignificant as the ones in this film.

While these stories are captivating and moving, I experienced a sense of frustration at some of the reactions of the characters. I felt that a reasonable person in a situation such as the ones in which they found themselves would act differently. Not only would they act differently, but the exact actions that they took were the exact OPPOSITE of what a reasonable person would do. They seemed to be sensationalist liberties taken by the screenwriter to liven up the story.

For example, as the police scour the countryside for the owner of the gun that shot the tourist, they spot the two children and the father walking quickly alongside a hill toting the rifle. The father and the two children see the police and the father says, "Run!" Now, in some circumstances, this would make sense. In this case, not at all. First of all, they are completely open and visible to the police, who are in vehicles, and there is nowhere to hide. Even if they did hide, the cops would still find them easily. Second of all, the child did it on accident. It wasn't an intentional shooting. The best thing to do would be to explain that to the cops. Finally, even if they did escape, the cops have a positive ID and know where they live and who they are. Eventually, they would get them anyway. While it might be hard to consider all of this at the spur of the moment, after they do run and hide behind a rock, they have ample time to consider their situation. Instead, they do something even more idiotic that I won't discuss, but it soured me to that story quite quickly. The actions of the father and children were completely irrational at that point. I sincerely doubt that anyone in real life would have done anything like what they did at that point.

For the most part, however, I related to and empathized with the people and their emotions, motivations, and actions. I was particularly moved the story of Choiko, the Japanese deaf-mute girl. It was incredibly sad to see how desperately she wanted affection and how unwilling people were to give it to her. Many of us live life lonely as she does. Because we are different in some way, because we do not conform to norms, we are shunned and ridiculed. We are mocked and hated. Because people are unwilling to embrace differences, we suffer not only from pure loneliness but from the knowledge that people don't accept us. It can be hard to deal with something that people abhor in you and that you can't change. Men don't accept women, straights don't accept gays, whites don't accept minorities, Christians don't accept Jews, the rich don't accept the poor, people in power don't accept the powerless. Because so many of us fall into more than one of these undesirable categories, Choiko's story strikes a resonant chord with us on a powerful human level.

In all, Babel was a great film, well worth watching. It's miles above anything else that has been released this year, though that alone isn't saying much. If you'll allow me to digress for a moment, it seems that 2006 has been a stagnant year for films. While 2005 saw an array of extremely good films including "Hustle and Flow," "Capote," "Brokeback Mountain," "King Kong," and "Crash," 2006 has yet to exhibit any noteworthy films. Many of the touted great movies like "Superman Returns," "The Da Vinci Code," and Pirates 3 were below expectations. The only good films so far were "V for Vendetta," "United 93," X-Men 3, " "The Descent," and "The Departed," only a couple of which are Oscar-worthy. In a year such as 2005, Babel would only be a bit above average. In a year like this, it's an oasis in the middle of a desert of bad and average movies.

Babel is sure to be nominated for several awards. I expect Adriana Barraza's portrayal of Amelia, the Mexican nanny of two American children, will receive a nomination for Best Supporting Actress. She took on a daunting role as the most complex character in the film, and she nailed every emotion without going over the top. That can be tricky when having to deal with children because being around children already incites a natural tendency to put on an act for them. Also good is the dark performance of Rinko Kikuchi as Choiko. Her gaze can penetrate you to your very soul. That gaze says a million things that her mouth is unable to express.

Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Glorious Benefit Nation of Kazhakstan

Borat (as I will refer to the movie from now on) has gained publicity mostly through Myspace and word of mouth. Most people I talk to don't know who Borat, Sasha Baron Cohen, or even Ali G are. I'm surprised, considering the influence he has had on British comedy. He is so big in England that he has been able to replicate his show in the U.S. with success. I've been familiar with his work for awhile now, ever since his extremely hilarious interview with David Beckham and Victoria Beckham some years ago. It was one of the first viral videos. Borat is an extension of one of the characters he plays on his show - the Ali G Show. Borat is a journalist from Kazhakstan, a real country south of Russia. The plot of the movie centers around his journey to America to make a documentary about his experiences with the people of America and the American culture. He organizes a trip to New York City to do interviews there, but when he sees Baywatch for the first time, he falls in love with Pamela Anderson and decides to go on a road trip across the United States to California. By taking the road, he can still complete his documentary while going to meet his dream girl, Pamela Anderson. Along the way, he meets and greets people, pretending to be a racist, backwards, ignorant buffoon. Most of the people he interviews and encounters have no idea of his true identity. They believe at face value that he is a reporter from Kazakhstan.

Did I enjoy Borat? Yes and no. Many parts of it were extremely funny. Many parts of it made me uncomfortable. Some parts disgusted me greatly, i.e. two hairy, naked men, one fat and one thin, pretending to have sex. The importance of it wasn't lost on me though. Not totally. Borat does what few films do, and what fewer films do well. It exposes the ugly racism, bigotry, misogyny, and jingioism that exist in America, and it doesn't do it by any other means than allowing real, unsuspecting people to express themselves.

After inviting Borat to sing the national anthem at a rodeo in Alabama, the president (or something) of the rodeo, an old, bespectacled cowboy-type sees Borat with his thick moustache for the first time and tells him that before going on he should cut it off. Borat asks why he should. The man tells him that he looks like a Muslim, and they don't like Muslims. Then Borat tries to kiss him on the cheek (as is customary in his country) and the man pulls away in disgust. He goes on to express his desire for homosexuals to be killed. These atrocious statements were made under no duress. They were simply the expression of what that man, and apparently several of the people who were attending the rodeo, believed to be true. I understood the point then. I felt that to me, this point was moot. I've gone to the far end where even Hitler and Hussein have my understanding. After all, they are human like all of us. While I hate their actions, I can't hate them. Neither can I hate Germans or Iraqis because of them. But many people are still either struggling with the idea of hate, or giving into it without a second thought.

This film also seems to indicate that people who are severely oppressed, who live on the outskirts of society have a greater ability to understand and accept people who are different. The people who were most open to, respectful of, and happy in the company of Borat were people we consider to be the dredges of society: the flaming homosexuals at the Gay Pride March in D.C., a heavy-set prostitute from Georgia, a group of urban black teenagers. The most backward, ignorant, and hypocritical? The college student, the rich pastor and his wife, the commuters on a NYC subway. These people, unexposed to the many deviants from "normal" society, were unable to reach out to people different from them. Gays, women, Muslims, Jews, prostitutes, foreigners all were shunned be these people who should know better. People who have been taught about the values of righteousness, equality, and justice since grade school. People who are familiar with the teachings of Jesus.

Because this movie is so successful (and rightfully so because it is an entertaining movie), it will be seen by many people. Its highly offensive material will be enjoyed (as Jackass and Van Wilder were) and then it will be dissected and discussed. The public will be forced to reconsider what they consider to be right and true. Thus, this film is much more important than I gave it credit for while I was watching it. At the time, I got that it was important. I just didn't realize how important. It's very important.

The War in Iraq

There is no doubt that this war is unpopular. Most polls conducted in the past couple of weeks have found that only 30-35% of voters approve of the handling of Iraq. Many people believe it was a mistake. I am one of them. Kerry highlighted in a speech on a college campus a few days ago one of the worst things about going to war in America. Because the army recruits on a volunteer basis, many of the people that enlist are poor, uneducated minorities. For some reason, he's getting a lot of flak for pointing that out. Critics are outraged that he is calling our troops dumb. As if being uneducated means you're stupid.

My cousin is a year older than me. I grew up with him, and I consider him to be a boy. He's not a man. Yet, due to many circumstances outside of his control, he was forced to grow up quickly. Still a teenager, the only work he found was at a construction company doing back-breaking physical labor outside in the worst of Texas heat. There's no way he could have lasted very long there. It came as no surprise, then, that this summer he broke the news to me that he was enlisting in the Army. He figured it was the best way for him to get the money to pay for an education and get out of the rut people often fall into when they don't/can't continue their education after high school. For me, it's especially heart-breaking to see him go because I've seen his potential.

We went to the same high school. He was a bright, intelligent person. He took AP classes and excelled in them. He was a Photoshop expert and a whiz in mechanics. That some politicians got it in their heads to send boys and girls like him to the other side of the world to die for their bullshit is enough to make me cry. It pisses me off fiercely. How was the resolution to go to war ever passed through Congress? How could Democrats have supported this war?

There is only one noble aspect to our presence in Iraq, removing Hussein. He killed thousands upon thousands of innocent people, and no one should have the power to do that. After all the other excuses for going fell through, stopped making sense once we learned that Hussein was not helping terrorists, he wasn't developing WMDs, and we weren't being greeted as liberators, that sole reason remained as our comfort. It was our JUSTIFICATION. Well, it turns out that we've caused way more terror than we were prepared to handle. Islamic fundamentalist terrorism is now resurging. We've also caused Iraqi citizens terror, pain, and misery. A recent, widely reported MIT funded survey put the death toll in Iraq at more than 600,000. This bullshit has to stop. How can a President not show complete remorse? How can he not be crying as he answers the question, "How many are dead in Iraq?" He was asked that question just a couple of months ago. His response was, "Um...thirty thousand, more or less." I can't believe he's so callous. There is no single issue I think more about than the fact that we've made one of the biggest mistakes in American history. Perhaps I'm looking at this through the lense of someone who has only lived here for 20 years. But my life changed completely on September 11th. I realized I was a part of a human family. And I had a responsibility to care for it. Along with everyone else who lives here with me. And we have not been taking care of each other. We've been looking out for ourselves. We must be more careful in the future, before ever considering actions that could lead to violence. And war is never a solution. Because it doesn't lead to violence, it is violence. Therefore, when we choose to engage in war, we've already lost.