Pocahontas – A Post-Colonialist Review

The next movie I decided to look at was Pocahontas. This classic Disney film was made in 1995 and is still very popular today. I deiced to do a post-colonialist review of this movie because of being of “historical facts” I wanted to see how this movie might affect the children who saw this move at a young age.

The movie opens with men in a shipyard signing up with the East Indian Trading Company to head off to the New World to search for gold and fame. One thing I noticed was there were only white people who were signing up for this adventure who were all portrayed as a hero for doing this. Then we are introduced to John Smith, out blond hair, blue eyed, white skinned hero. Somebody asks him what will happen if there are savages there in which he replies “I’ll take care of them just like all of the other savages I’ve taken care of.” This is already giving the audience who is watching this movie as view of the Native Americans as a “radical other” just like we’ve read by reading Said.

After seeing the scene at the harbor t changes to a picture of the Native Americans tribe of their Chef coming home from a battle. Some things we notice about the Native Americans is their communication with nature and the spirits. Being a children’s movie not many children would find this confusing and still see them as an “other” because that is not what we do in our country. This is followed directly when Pocahontas sees the sails of the boat in the background and announces that there is a strange set of clouds coming into the picture. Even though she has never seen them, we get the idea that she is “dumb” for not knowing what they are.

The biggest scene comes when John Smith and Pocahontas meet for the first time and are having a conversation. During this scene Smith and Pocahontas have a dialog in which we can see many examples of colonization. During this scene, Smith implores the ideas of using IRA’s to help Pocahontas learn about his culture. He precedes to teacher her about a handshake, a compass, his helmet and the town of London. This is were Smith makes a mistake and calls her ignorant for not knowing about the town of London in which he states “It’s only because you don’t know any better.”

When Pocahontas is introducing Smith to Meeko, her pet raccoon, Smith gives him a cookie. Meeko enjoys the cookie so much he goes into his bag to find more to eat. This is a good example of changing the entire ecosystem and domestication of the land and animals that are surrounding it. Meeko in fact gets into more trouble by sneaking into the camp to eat more of the colonists food in which he starts to eat dog biscuits. By having the new settlers inhabit all of the animals will need to find new food sources or depend off of the humans. This would be a good example of a RIA because if you take the food away from the people, they will be under your control.

Mulan - A Feminist Critique

Many of us are familiar with the story of Mulan. In this popular Disney classic we follow Mulans quest to help save her father and her country by going off and fighting in the fight against the Huns. The movie opens with Mulan following the typical stereotypical role of a woman: helping out with the morning chores along with getting the men ready for their day (i.e bringing them their morning tea). She is also told that she is getting older and she must start thinking about getting married so she can start a family which is giving the impression of that a womens’ place is in the home and not in the work force.

On her way to see the Matchmaker, where she shall be arranged with a husband, we see two male children sword fighting in which in the process they take a little girls doll who cannot get the doll back by herself. This is another attack towards women and showing that they are weaker than men and showing they need help in defending themselves and their possessions.
Next we find out about the Huns invasion and every family must send one member to fight in which Mulan volunteers for her family in which she is deigned. When she starts to question why she cannot fight the Emperor's consul yells to her father “Teach your daughter to hold her tongue in a mans presence." This goes to further the oppression of women in this story. Mulan hatches a plan to change her appearance so she can take her fathers place in the war and try and bring honor to her family because it is almost impossible for women to bring honor to their family. Once she joins the army and they are on their quest to fight against the Huns she must suppress her feminity to be with the men. In a later scene we see one of the Hun’s eagles bring the leader the doll we saw at the beginning which tells the Hun’s their location of their village. I thought this was a very interesting fact that they found a doll which the little girls almost make it out to be her fault for playing with a doll. They could have easily used a little boys toy car to give the exact same details that the doll gave.

Another very interesting part was the part where Mulan decides to bathe. It reminded me very much of the bath seen in A Rose For Emily because she was taking a very calm and relaxing bath until three men decided to bathe as well. During this scene the men where rough housing in which one of the men jumps up onto a rock and proclaims “I am the king of this rock and there is nothing you girls can do about it” which we know is a man proclaiming his superiority over women because women are not able to fight back.

My next piece of evidence was a song they sang on their way to help hold off the Hun’s which was called “A Girl Worth Fighting For.” During this song all of the men sing about what a perfect woman would be like: beautiful, caring, and a great good cook. This is reinforcing the idea that women should be mostly homemakers and nothing else. When it comes to Mulan to say what women should be like she says “A girl who speaks her mind?” in which the chorus of men reply “Naw.”

Soon after a battle with the Hun’s she manages to save her commanding officers life even though she was wounded in battle. They get her help and fixed but her secret is found out in which the entire camp turns on her. Emperor's consul calls her many degrading names and one including calling her a “snake” which even though she saved the entire army she is still seen as a second class citizen by everyone in the army.

For my final piece of analysis I wanted to look at the ending after Mulan saved the entire city from the Hun’s. She is offered a job by the Emperor as the Emperor's consul in which she refuses so she can return home and be with her family. This was the most shocking moment because she had the chance to be empowered beyond many men and yet she decided to return home. This gave me the speculation of her in the end playing into the stereotype of what women should be like: homemakers.