“‘Wendy,’ he said in a voice that no woman has ever yet been able to resist, ‘Wendy, one girl is more use than twenty boys.’” – Peter Pan, with no help from Me.
It is no secret to my intimates that I am a deep devotee of the Twilight series, and though I have no plans to read the books (they seem uncommonly peculiar to me, not at all the sort of literature I enjoy, and I am not one to scorn a sappy YA read), I find the movies addictive. They are such silly, exciting, melodramatic films that I am always more than happy to attend a marathon screening. The baseball scene alone should have garnered universal acclaim.
However, most generous Reader, though I did request it, Twilight was not the film I most recently watched, but instead the new Peter Pan and Wendy movie. My expectations for the film, given the complex nature of the story and the inability of the promotional materials to capture it, were exceedingly low, and the film made no effort to meet them.
I have not yet attempted to chronicle here my attachment to Peter Pan, largely because I fear my words insufficient to record the richness and beauty of Mr. Barrie’s writing, and certainly my feelings surrounding it. It is an area of my life over which I have not yet won the battle against anxiety.
Yet, seized by the unfortunate affliction of those of our day, I am disinclined to praise, and more than ready to denounce… and there was much to denounce in this movie. But fear not, I will not take your readership for granted by detailing to you my every grievance with this new film. Instead, I hope you will bear with me as I endeavor to draw a much larger point.
Reader, I was thoroughly displeased with Disney’s latest portrayal of Wendy Moira Angela Darling, the primary reason being the result of a trend I have noticed of late toward portraying female characters as “strong,” and in doing so, totally stripping them of their core personas. We as a society have rightly demanded for the inclusion of interesting and dynamic women in stories as they exist in real life, and having seen an evolution in female portrayal, have allowed ourselves to be satisfied by the most base and unimaginative women to grace our screens in the modern age.
Reader, Wendy Darling is not strong because she picks up a sword and asserts her dominance over Peter Pan, but because she is uncommonly true to herself and her desires, and believes wholeheartedly in the magic of her youth. She is not to be heralded as a great character because she leads with brute force, but with creativity, love, and a kind of delightful, just-so courage unique to her. She is not complex because she is a woman with masculine traits, but because she grapples with the awakening of her unrequited affection for Peter, for her pull toward adulthood in the midst of a world that can only exist by and for children. In stripping her of her delicacy, we have also stripped her of her strength, and the result is an unlikeable, unrelatable, totally uninteresting character I abhorred to acknowledge as the portrayal of one of my heroes.
It must further be noted that in the novel, one of Wendy’s chief desires was to be a mother – a key aspect of her character excluded from the film. Beyond that to support women necessitates that we support all women in their desires, even those that are domestic or traditional, it is an insult to mothers everywhere to imply such a wish lacks strength or independence. My own mother, and the mothers of friends who raised me, are the fiercest, kindest, most determined and loving people I have ever had the privilege of knowing. Is it not possible that Wendy Darling saw these characteristics in the woman who cared for her, and in her limited view of the world as a child in 1904, deduced that to manifest these traits in herself she had to follow the path of the one who exhibited them?
I now ask, Reader, that you allow me to illustrate for you an adjacent case to the one I have just explained, that of Belle in the recent live-action remake of Beauty and the Beast. Not only was the lady’s gown an abomination, but her character was even more vague, pallid, and vapid, if you can believe such a thing.
I have not read the original book, but I have spent many hours researching its history while preparing to perform in the stage adaptation, and I have seen the 1991 film more times than I can count (or would care to admit, for fear or being labeled a Disney Adult), and I feel confident in my understanding of the story and its players.
This new rendition of Belle is an inventor and enthusiast of science and physical creation – an offensive, diluted depiction of a woman whose skills were anything but and strength a tenfold greater. Belle’s power came from the creativity of her mind and the empathy and wisdom afforded to her by her artistic pursuits. She was not a methodological mind, but an expressive one. She would not have thought to invent an early washing machine, but is no less wonderful a woman for it. There was no lack of spirit in her love of books, but an entirely different, and far more multifaceted, type of firmness rooted in her gentility and persuasions than existed when she was portrayed as a champion of STEM.
Let the women who are excited by math, who long to pick up a sword, who dream of leading armies into battle – let these women set the example of such bravery for the younger generations. And let Wendy and Belle remind us that a woman does not have to wear pants or run into the male-dominated fray to be brave, bold, and brilliant.
This ugly depiction is why I speak of Twilight, Reader – because in rejecting the idea that women need to be saved, we have created a host of characters who are just as unappealing as their helpless counterparts. Twilight has a horrendous reputation for misogynistic portrayals of women, and though I will not say Ms. Swan is the type of woman I would like to be, I feel its influence over young women has less to do with their desire to be saved and more with their wish to have someone with which to share. We are reacting to and condemning phenomena that bolsters an entire industry (romance is one of the best-selling fiction book genres) and loping the female characters who do not fit the lazy cookie-cutter mold of a liberated woman with it. There are innumerable differences between a woman fixing a car in a bikini, Bella Swan, Daphne Bridgerton, and Belle. It is not so very difficult to write fewer women in peril, and more who seek partners, in whatever form that may be…and it is not so very difficult to uphold a character’s integrity in the practice.
You are a gift, Reader, and I thank you for your attention. I look forward to our next encounter.
Love,
Lettie Anne