In the 2003 Universal Pictures version of “Peter Pan,” the children are depicted as strong, independent individuals with their own agency throughout a great portion of the film. However, there are numerous examples of interpellation, during which the children fight against and conform to the interpellation of family and society. In the following paragraphs, I will explain how “Peter Pan” is a movie with both interpellation and agency. Also, I will explain how the film is adult-centered in spite of the agency the child characters possess.
The movie “Peter Pan” begins with three children living in a nursery all together. One day, the children overhear the adults talking about Wendy, the oldest child in the nursery. They are saying that
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it is time for her to grow up and spend more time with adults. Wendy does not like the idea of growing up, and the children go on a magical adventure where children never grow up, where there are pirates, fairies, and countless adventures. However, soon Wendy realizes that she truly does wish to grow up and decides to return to her home with her parents. In the end, Wendy, her brothers, and the lost boys all end up home with parents. However, Peter Pan still refuses to give up his childhood fantasies and flies away forever. The adult characters in “Peter Pan” are highly interpellated into their roles in society. For example, the mother and father are wealthy socialites who attend grand parties, wear grand clothing, and (attempt to) conduct themselves in a dignified, proper manner. At one point, the father is seen practicing his small talk because Aunt Millicent has told him that “wit is very fashionable at the moment.” They are very much concerned with what the neighbors will think of them and their proper place in society. Wendy’s adult family has been interpellated into their roles in society. However, the children are still concerned with fun, games, and adventures. The thought of growing up is not an appealing one for them at this point. It simply does not look like it is any fun. In one scene, the entire family is gathered together in a family room.
The children are telling stories and being generally silly. When Wendy begins to talk of her dreams of adventure, her Aunt Millicent puts a stop to it. After all, a young lady should not think of adventure, but marriage according to the interpellation in this film. During this scene, Wendy talks with her Aunt Millicent about her future plans. “My unfulfilled ambition is to write a great novel, in three parts, about my adventures,” Wendy says. Aunt Millicent replies, “What adventures?” “I’m going to have them,” Wendy says, “they’ll be perfectly thrilling.” Aunt Millicent clearly indicates what role she believes Wendy should possess in society with her reply, “But child, novelists are not highly thought of in good society, and there is nothing so difficult to marry as a novelist.” In this same scene, Aunt Millicent asks Wendy to walk toward her and turn around so that she might appraise her. Afterward, she declares Wendy as having possession of a “woman’s chin” and a “hidden kiss” on the corner of her mouth. She declares the kiss as the “greatest adventure of all” and states that it “belongs to” someone else. Aunt Millicent clearly thinks that Wendy will believe that possessing woman-like qualities will make her want to act more grown up and that possessing a hidden kiss that belongs to someone else will begin Wendy’s search for a respectable husband. Aunt Millicent is attempting to …show more content…
convince Wendy that her proper place in society will be an adventure if only she lives up to the expectations of her family. Aunt Millicent is attempting to interpellate Wendy into a certain role. She addresses the “problems” of Wendy’s need for adventure and desire to become a novelist, neither of which will do for a young lady in high society. In spite of all of the agency the children display during the Neverland scenes, I would argue that this film is adult centered.
After being in the Neverland for a while, Wendy realizes that she does not belong there and chooses to return to the safety of her family. Even the Lost Boys desperately want a parental figure in their lives, and they end up returning home with Wendy and her brothers to live with their parents. Wendy has been interpellated by her parents after all. She realizes that she wants her life that she left behind. The power that Wendy felt at the beginning of the film seemed repressive to her; however, it has become ideological. In other words, the ideological power that Wendy’s family has over her has worked. She now sees that her happiness lies in the role that her family has been trying to establish for her. Furthermore, Wendy’s brothers and the Lost Boys all realize that they want to have parents who will care for them and that growing up is not all that bad. In the end, all of the children have parents except one. And, all of the children seem happy except one – Peter
Pan. While it is odd to think of a film having both interpellation and agency, I am suggesting just that. However, I am also suggesting that there are two separate worlds in this film in which the two issues occur. Interpellation clearly occurs in the beginning of the film while the children are with their parents and Aunt Millicent. They are taught how life should be and who they should be when they grow up. The Neverland world is a place where children have agency. It is clear to the adults and children in Neverland that children are to be taken seriously and treated as equals. However, in the end, the children choose interpellation over agency and return to the nursery and their home with their parents. In this film, the children have to believe that their role at home will be much more fulfilling and rewarding than the agency available to them by remaining children forever in Neverland. In closing, Peter Pan is a complicated film that displays agency and interpellation. While it displays both, the film is adult centered, as the children end up interpellated into the roles their families wished for them.
Rudolfo Anaya’s, Bless Me, Ultima and Guillermo del Toro’s, Pan’s Labyrinth are two coming-of-age stories. Both the novel and the movie are full of events that contribute to the disillusionment of the main character’s childhood idealism and the realization of the real world they live in. Both protagonists absorb themselves in a mythical world full of fantasy and each receives exposure to religious theology and trauma by the violence of men. Despite the fact that Antonio and Ofelia have different familial role models and travel along different paths, their childlike innocence, disillusionment, and initiation into adulthood comes about through similar themes: myth, religion, and violence.
Children are seen as adorable, fun loving, and hard to control. Ida Fink uses a child in “The Key Game” to be the key to this family’s life. The setting is placed during the start of World War II; Jews all around were being taken. Fink uses a boy who doesn’t look the traditional Jewish, “And their chubby, blue-eyed, three-year-old child” (Fink). As they read on the emotional connection is stronger because there is a face to go with this character. Fink draws a reader in by making connections to a family member the reader may know. A blue-eyed, chubby child is the picture child of America. A child in any story makes readers more attached especially if they have children of their own. The child is three way too young to be responsible for the safety of the father, yet has to be. Throughout the story, we see how the mother struggles with making her child play the game because no child should be responsible like
Film analysis with a critical eye can give the viewer how animation giant Disney uses literary element to relay key messages to the audience. Walt Disney’s “The Princess and the Frog” is a perfect example how different literary theories like ‘the Marxist theory’ and ‘Archetypal theory’ can be embedded in the simplest of the fairy tales. The different literary elements in the movie, shows a person how characters like ‘the banker’ and the setting of the houses helps to portray the socio-economic differences in New Orleans at that time. Applying ‘the Marxist theory’ and ‘the Archetypal theory’ to the plot, characters and the setting, shows how movies can be a medium to confront social issues and to prove that all fairy tales are of the same base.
Presently, Disney known for its mass media entertainment and amusement parks technically bring warm feelings to many children and some adults. Personally, Disney elicits magical fantasies that children enjoy and further encourages imagination and creativity. For decades Disney has exist as an unavoidable entity with its famous global sensation and reach. Furthermore, Disney is a multibillion dollar empire with an unlimited grasp on individuals and territories. An empire per se, since they own many media outlets, markets, shops, etc., you name it they got it. However, the film Mickey Mouse Monopoly presents an entirely new perspective on the presumed innocence projected in Disney films. This film exposes certain traits Disney employs and exclusively portrays through its media productions, specifically cartoons for directing and nurturing influence beginning with children. Mickey Mouse Monopoly points out camouflaged messages of class, race, and gender issues in Disney films that occur behind the scenes intended to sway viewers towards adopting Disney values.
This quote near the end of the book summarizes the whole story, “The thing with kids is, if they want to grab for the gold ring, you have to let them do it, and not say anything. If they fall off, they fall off, but it’s not bad if you say anything to them” (211). In this quote he finally realizes that he has to let her find out about the world on her own. He can’t protect her for her whole life. He accepts now that he cannot be the catcher in the rye anymore. He can’t do this because he now knows that kids will eventually lose their innocence it is just a matter of time until they do. In a persons life they are going to go through things that will help for them to see the world how it really. No matter how hard one tries they cannot shield someone from falling from innocence. They can only help them on their journey.
Children have often been viewed as innocent and innocent may be a nicer way to call children naive. Since children’s lives are so worry free they lack the knowledge of how to transition from being a child to becoming an adolescent. Their lack of knowledge may be a large part of their difficulties growing up, which could be a few rough years for many. In books like the boy in the striped pajamas the story is told from the point of view of a little boy, this way we get a full view of how innocent he is. In this book the writer shows the reader first hand how a child viewed the holocaust and how his innocence cost him his life. Then in books like the perks of being a wallflower Charlie is a teen whom is struggling with the transition from being a child to becoming an adolescent. In this book the writer gives a first hand look at how difficult it can be to transition into an adolescent. Charlie has many difficulties in this book; he is in search of his identity and how to fit in.
Barrie presents Mr. Darling as the worker of the family, a proud businessman. He persistently demands respect and obedience from his wife, children, and Nana the dog. As well as this, he boasts to Wendy that Mrs. Darling not only loves him, but respects him. This outlook is linked to the stereotypical view of the male gender as the main source of income, with a resilient disposition and a necessity for order. When Mrs. Darling talks to him about Peter Pan, he dismisses her concerns, suggesting indifference and a lack of concern for others’ views.
Mr. Darling, Mrs. Darling, Wendy, and Peter Pan all embody the conventional gender stereotypes and roles of the Victorian era. Paternal and maternal qualities are demonstrated through Wendy and Peter, resulting in the understanding that growing up is inevitable. Like Mrs. Darling, motherhood and acting as a caretaker is attractive to Wendy, while Peter personifies male superiority comparable to Wendy’s father.
Peter Pan has appeared in many adaptations, sequels, and prequels. Peter Pan first appeared in a section of The Little White Bird, a 1902 novel that was originally written for adults. In 1904, Peter Pan was turned into a play and since the play was so successful Barrie’s publishers, extracted chapters 13–18 of The Little White Bird and republished them in 1906 under a different title. This story was adapted and changed into a novel, was published in 1911 as Peter and Wendy, later the name changed to Peter Pan and Wendy, and then changed to Peter Pan, as we know it today. The tale that we are familiar with was even expanded more. In 1953 Walt D...
Zipes, Jack. Fairy tales and the art of subversion the classical genre for children and the process
Instructor’s comment: This student’s essay performs the admirable trick of being both intensely personal and intelligently literary. While using children’s literature to reflect on what she lost in growing up, she shows in the grace of her language that she has gained something as well: an intelligent understanding of what in childhood is worth reclaiming. We all should make the effort to find our inner child
John Milton’s epic Paradise Lost and Mark Water’s movie Mean Girls display how different parental styles affect children. Parents are important characters in all works, whether it be a novel, play, movie, epic, or television show. As a result of the many mediums in which parents are portrayed, often different representations of parents can appear. This is the case with Paradise Lost and Mean Girls. Not only do these works showcase the different ways parental figures govern over children, but they also show how the reactions children have to these controls can be very similar even in different situations. As is apparent with the parent and/or divine leader roles of God the Father and Satan in Paradise Lost and Mrs. George and Mr. and Mrs. Heron in Mean Girls. An analysis of both Paradise Lost and Mean Girls
The point of many films is to convey a message to its viewers, such as morals and ethics. Consequently, films intended for adults convey messages suitable for adults; while children’s films do likewise for their target age groups, as one might expect. These children’s films, directed towards particularly younger audiences, prove useful when they contain beneficial maxims. Although at times, these films elicit less than healthy social views. Disney’s Aladdin is a prime example of a children’s film that immerses the audience in unhealthy views towards women. This film is an irresponsible in its portrayal of women - it sexually objectifies the female protagonist and enforces sexist ideologies, which directly affects the female characters within the story’s patriarchal system. The idea of sexism towards women is rampant throughout the movie Aladdin by making the following three claims: a woman’s worth is defined by men, women are incapable of making their own choices, and that women are inadequate and thus require saving by a man.
Norton, D. E., & Norton. S. (2011). Through The Eyes Of a Child. An Introduction To Children’s Literature. Boston, MA, 02116: Eight-Edition Pearson Education
Many characters do not recognize that Wendy also needs to grow and has a life of her own. Rather, Smee suggests to Captain Hook that they “kidnap these boys’ mother and make her our mother” (Barrie 86). Throughout the story, although mothers are highly praised by a clear majority of the characters for differing reasons, it seems that women are only portrayed as mothers who stay home to complete household chores, clean up, and look after children. This, in fact, does not display the true capacity of women and what they do for societies today. The pirates, who are the villains in this story, merely see Wendy as a mother and nothing else, and selfishly wish to have her against her will. It is crucial to understand that the pirates are not entitled to Wendy and cannot force her to do what they please. She is still young and must learn skills to live as well as be brought up by her parents rather than look after others at her young age. Although she matures more rapidly than the other children, she still requires guidance and words of advice from her parents. Often, parents give their children a sense of emotional stability and teach them to be the best person they can, therefore, if one lacks this, it can negatively affect them in the future. The pirates also do not consider Wendy’s personal choice in the matter, whereas Peter does when he says he