Thursday, May 7, 2015

Dumbo

I had not seen Dumbo in a long time and barely remembered what happened, so I was shocked in class watching the movie. It did not seem like a childrens' movie at all. The way he was separated from his mother was heartbreaking, and there was a lot of violence towards the mother during the scene at the circus when people were making fun of Dumbo. It was also so sad that he was ostracized from both the human and animal communities. The only person who accepted him was the mouse. That could have been a storyline to try to show kids how hurtful words could be, but it still did not seem like a good movie for young kids. I have no idea how I liked that movie when I was younger.

5 comments:

  1. This comment has been removed by the author.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Yeah me neither. I generally think kid movies look weird when we rewatch as adults.
    they had to be on acid when they made that one scene

    ReplyDelete
  3. I thought the crows in the movie were interesting. They're very obviously meant to represent African-Americans; however, they're also the only characters in the movie who acknowledge that their initial perception of Dumbo was wrong, and they're also the only ones who attempt to make up for laughing at him. They're also the most significant supporting characters in the film, because teaching Dumbo to fly resulted in him gaining acceptance by the circus community at the film's conclusion. I just think it's a little strange that backwards racial caricature occupies such a huge place in the resolution of the plot.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I thought the exact same thing! I believe that yes, portraying them as crows was probably pretty racist (what with the Jim Crowe laws back in the day) and you can definitely tell they were African American by the stereotypes they were portrayed with, but I thought they were 'good guys' of the movie. The circus in itself existed and held animals in captivity and no matter how someone tries to spin it (the animals being portrayed as happy in the film, mostly in the opening sequence with the storks and the babies and then later when they're being loaded into the train) it's still cruel and these animals would have much rather liked being wild. So the circus itself had no redeeming qualities. The clowns wanted to make themselves greater by putting Dumbo's life at risk. The other elephants were rude. The only ones on Dumbo's side was the mouse, his mom, and eventually, the Crows. After all, they did give Dumbo the placebo to fly and knew it would work to give him enough courage to try. They felt sympathy for him when they learned his story. They were happy to see Dumbo fly and saw him off at the end of the movie.

      Delete
  4. i feel like there are a multitude of Disney movies that have dark and mature themes. Disney doesn't sugar coat things, and they do this to communicate an upfront message. they have tackled issues such as colonialism, animal rights, overcoming the loss of a loved one, rejecting parental control and social norm to pursue personal desires, self love, etc. we don't understand them as children because we're so young and only focus on the entertainment aspect, but examining them now can give way to tons of evocative, deep meanings (: !

    ReplyDelete