Walt Disney began his company in 1923 in Holly-Vermont Los Angles with his brother Roy. The two brothers produced a short animation film called the Alice Comedies for the company Laugh-O-Grams in Kansas City which eventually went bankrupt. They soon moved to Los Angles where he created Micky Mouse, Pluto, Goofy, and Donald Duck in 1928. In 1937, Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs was Disney’s first full length animation feature. The film produced at the unheard cost of $1,499,000 during the depths of the Depression, the film is still considered one of the great feats and imperishable monuments of the motion picture industry. Within the next five years, Walt Disney Studios completed other full-length animated classics such as Pinocchio, Fantasia, Dumbo, and Bambi. It has been said that Walt Disney is a legend/hero of the 20th century and that his worldwide popularity was based upon the ideals which his name represents which are: imagination, optimism, creation, and self-made success in the American tradition.
Implicit messages have been described as messages that are not said out right but expressed by visuals or hidden within the context. Film makers also embed ideological messages in the films make, be it explicit or implicit. An example of explicit an ideological message in a film is commonly in the title of the film, or is identifiable by what a character explicitly says. On the other hand, implicit ideology in films is not what is said or shown, but what the deeper meaning of the film is, what is meant but not said. Many Science-Fiction films use implicit ideological messages, as while they show space ships and robots, they are almost tell the audience something about the present. There has been several examples of Disney films that have been said to have implicit messages within them. The issues they are dealing with are women, race, and culture to name a few. In M. Keith Booker’s book ‘Disney, Pixar, and the Hidden Messages of Children’s Films she talks about the structural assumptions of Disney films which should be carefully distinguished from the ideologies they embody which are: animated animals ( presented as to appear friendly) have an innocence, these animals serve as stand ins for children, the strategically inserted musical numbers help hold the attention of young viewers, magic, children find the slapstick violence entertaining, the violence and danger helps keep the children interested in the plot and all threats will be banished leading to a happy ending, children must be protected from any hint of sexuality, and lastly physical labor is shown to be pleasant, and highly rewardable.
Even though it was not uncontroversial in the 1930s Snow White and most of the other if not all of the Disney princesses are perceived as a helpless victim who must be saved by a man and whose main talents seem to involve singing and doing housework. Snow White is seen as the ‘mother’ towards the dwarfs as she lives with them, they need someone to clean. Her only enemy is her step-mother. Within Disney films the villain is usually an evil older women with more power and she is always destroyed. All in all Snow White basically is a happy homemaker who waits for a man to come along and bring her back to life.
Racism is another that pops up within certain Disney films. An example is Aladdin, if you look at the character’s skin colour within the film you can see that Aladdin is much paler than some of the others and the evil characters like Jafar look very Arabic. As well Aladdin asks for people to call him ‘Al’ which is not an Arabic name more of an American one. The Lion King as well shows signs of racism with the animals characters. The main character Simba who is the hero has an American accent while two of the villain hyenas do not. There are various videos available online that portray gender and disney as well as some subliminal messages.
One of the newer examples of Disney movies having implicit ideologies is Wall-E. While this film is not showing ideologies about gender or racism it is focusing on global warming. Within each Disney Pixar film there is at least one member of the team is human and one is not but possesses human levels of intelligence. Within each film technology plays an important part especially with Wall-E and UP! In Wall-E specifically the human race is saved from self-induced extinction by a machine. From the outset hearing about this film from the poster and hearing the film title does not indicate what type of plot it will consists of. The ideological message that it being sent to the audience becomes clear when they watch the film. Without it being a cute children’s film about a robot who falls in love, it becomes a hyperbolic version of the future where Americans are so reliant on technology they can no longer do anything for themselves because they have damaged the Earth so much with their pollution.
There are several different ideologies hidden within different Disney films. There are the Disney princesses who have to wait for their young and handsome prince to save the day. There are the films like Wall-E and Mulan have to work together on a team to save the day. “The message hidden inside Pixar’s magnificent films is this: humanity does not have a monopoly on personhood. In whatever form non- or super-human intelligence takes, it will need brave souls on both sides to defend what is right. If we can live up to this burden, humanity and the world we live in will be better for it.”
http://studioservices.go.com/disneystudios/history.html
Booker, K.,M. (2010) ‘Disney, Pixar, and the hidden messages of children’s films’: Greenwood Publishing Group
http://www.newint.org/easier-english/Disney/diswomen.html
http://www.esfmedia.com/page/Wall-E+-+Ideology
http://vigilantcitizen.com/latestnews/the-hidden-message-in-pixars-films/
Cinema and Society 2012 