Ariel, Belle, Jasmine, Cinderella, nothing reminds me more of my childhood than a Disney princess. Admit it, you pranced around the house singing “Part of Your World” as loud as you could too. I bet you can still belt it out verbatim (I can). Seriously, what little girl doesn’t want a pair of glass slippers, a pet tiger, or to be motherless.
Wait, motherless? Yeah, you read that right. Crazy though it may seem, not a single one of these chicks has a mom. Even crazier: this is actually the norm in animated Disney flicks. From “Snow White” to “Monster’s Inc,” in the house of mouse, moms get the short stick. Sure, there’s a few super moms like Helen Parr, aka Elastigirl, and Duchess from “The Aristocats.” But they are few and far between. Statistically, if you’re a mom in a Disney film, most likely you’re dead.
Don’t believe me? Check out the handy dandy pie chart below. We’ve sorted animated Disney (and Pixar) features with singular plot lines by the main type of mom in the film. We’ve got ‘dead mom’ films where the main character’s mom is sadly no longer with the living. ‘No mom’ films that don’t have a mom-role. ‘Trivial mom” films where there is a mom but her character is so inconsequential the movie could function without her. And finally, the very rare ‘super mom’ who is vital to the story and usually kicks ass.
No, you don’t need a geometry refresher, it’s true that nearly 1 out of every 2 Disney movies have deceased matriarchs, and that’s including films where there isn’t even a mom role to begin with! The worst part? Disney doesn’t just mention in passing that mom died. Oh no, they’ll often have her violently murdered before your very eyes. Who out there didn’t need therapy after watching “Bambi” for the first time? It’s like a right of passage, the terror of realizing someone could shoot not just Bambi’s mom, but your mom. Or, remember “Finding Nemo”? One minute you’re happy as a clam watching Coral and Marlin get frisky in their sea anemone, the next you’re crying your eyeballs out because she’s now barracuda food. In the wonderful world of Disney, life’s a bitch and then your mom dies.
So why so many MIA mommies? There’s a lot of potential reasons, and not just that every Disney animator for the last 80 years had a Norman Bates complex (though whoever thought up shooting Bambi’s mother, that guy was psycho). Traditionally, mothers symbolized safety and comfort, a security blanket (or ‘woobie’ as I like to call mine) against all the ills of the world. For much of the golden age of Disney animation, America was in chaotic social upheaval. Cultural norms were changing rapidly and many people struggled to adjust. Perhaps, the removal of the archetypal mom mirrored those turbulent times, reflected the feeling that nothing was certain any more, not even the love of dear old mom.
Another reason may be that eliminating “mom” liberated a younger generation of women from traditional gender roles. Daughters showing their daddies who was boss is a common theme throughout many Disney flicks of the 80s and 90s. “The Little Mermaid,” “Aladdin,” “Pocahontas,” and “Mulan” all feature strong-willed young women coming into their own, with or without their father or society’s approval. Those catchy Howard Ashman lyrics we all belted out as tots are really battle cries for female independence and living life as we see fit. My personal anthem growing up came straight out of the mouth of Belle.
Like her, I don’t want to marry the town stud and be a brood mare:
‘I want adventure in the great wide somewhere
I want it more than I can tell
And for once it might be grand
To have someone understand
I want so much more than they’ve got planned.’
Pretty progressive stuff for a company branded on traditional family values. Disney’s earned some kudos for raising the gender equality bar. Heck yeah, girls should have interesting exciting lives with partners who support and understand them. Hopefully, one day she can do it with mom by her side.
What about Sarah Hawkins in Treasure Planet? Not only is she a single mom running her own business after her husband walked out on her, but one of the biggest things driving Jim throughout the film is wanting to prove to his mother that he can in fact make her proud.
That is genius right there.
Also, I HATE the dead-mommy concept. Why is it such a necessity? And Ariel? No mom and THEN she has to NEVER see her father AGAIN? (Fuck the sequel, I don’t count that drivel) According to the finale of the 1st movie – she must choose.
All I have to say is now that she’s got legs and a vagina, that prince better give her the best damn head, ever.
yeah, but as my college fiction teacher pointed out: it’s very rare for mothers to be the source of a gentle guiding hand, if they’re seen. is the only way to have a “good” mother in fiction is to have her be there, but just in happy memories?
i really like this reading of Disney films. for a long time, my very feminist older sisters who were bent on molding me into one, too, would get into debates over the significance of absent Disney mothers.
something else to think about is the Fairy Godmother thing. granted, not all Disney movies include a Fairy Godmother, per se, but there’s nearly always some little sidekick — with a dude’s voice — who accompanies the heroine everywhere she goes. Lumiére, Mushu, the little crab guy, etc. and more often than not, they’re even more prominent than the girl’s actual father. curious.