I know that may sound a little harsh but it's true! The other day I was watching, “Finding Nemo” and my niece got upset in the beginning because Nemo's mother died. For whatever reason I then began to think about it and you know, many of Disney's most classic movies have nurturing good mothers until one day, BLAMO! The mother gets killed off quicker than a dumb blonde in a horror movie. So now lets go through the Disney Classics to further prove our point.
7. Pocahontas
a. Her mother had died while giving birth to her.
6. Cinderella
a. Mother dies leaving her alone and her father remarries leaving her with a mean step-mother.
5. Aladdin
a. Aladdin’s father left and mother died leaving him an orphan.
4. Beauty and the Beast
a. The main character’s mother dies and she is raised solely by her father.
3. Tarzan
a. Tarzan’s mother dies of natural causes leaving him in the Jungle alone with the apes.
2. Jungle Book
a. Mogali's parents die leaving him alone to be raised by wolves.
1. Bambi
a. Possibly the most emotionally scaring of all the Disney mother deaths; Bambi’s mom gets blown away by a hunter and single handedly made 1,000’s of life long vegetarians overnight.
Interestingly enough, there are only two Disney movies with both parents present and don't die during the movie (do you know which ones?). The legend goes that after the massive success of his first major production, Snow White, Walt Disney purchased a new home for his parents. The furnace in the house was faulty and eventually led to his mother dieing from asphyxiation. This deeply hurt Walt Disney and is thought by some to be the main cause of the lack of maternal figures in his movies. This incident had happened before the production of Bambi which clearly display's Walt Disney's feelings for his mother.
So it seems that there is a logical explanation for Disney's killing of mothers in it's movies. If you can think of the two Disney movies that don't have dead parents in them be sure to leave a comment.
Cheers,
Ryan
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Well...
ReplyDeleteKing Stefan and Queen Leah (Sleeping Beauty's parents) both survive, as well as Perdy and Pongo (101 dalmatians parents). Or could you be referring to Zeus and Hera, Hercules' parents? They never die, either -- in fact, they're immortal. Technically we don't know where Ariel's mom is, so we could assume she's dead (unless King Triton went through a nasty divorce... perhaps that's why he hates Ursula so much...). And oh wait, Mulan's mom and dad are both alive and well, too.
But you're right, there is a lot of momicide in Disney flicks. To add to your seven, I'd also include Hunchback of Notre Dame (Quasi's mom dies in the first scene). Dumbo has a mom but no dad, and so does Simba. I think we can safely assume Alice has both parents, but, sadly, Peter Pan ran away from his to Neverland.
What a depressing topic for Father's Day! Nevertheless, I'll never turn down talking Disney.
Hakuna Matata