Feminisney: “The Black Cauldron” and “The Great Mouse Detective”
Disney’s oft-forgotten return to the United Kingdom
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These two movies are part of the weird, often ignored period of time in Disney animation during the 1980s, which was full of many critical and commercial failures that nearly drove Walt Disney Studios out of the animated movie business. Imagine that travesty. In fact, The Black Cauldron is generally pointed to as the single film that nearly brought the death blow to the studio… while the very next film, The Great Mouse Detective, is the one that saved it just long enough to usher in the Disney Renaissance through The Little Mermaid. They saw the introduction of computer animation to the Disney style (one being more impressive than the other on that front, in my opinion) and see a return to the United Kingdom for story source material. But considering the mixed feminist results of the last British tales… can we really expect this one to do better?
The Black Cauldron
When I say this one is a UK story, it’s a little more loosely connected than the other three films in that category. It’s specifically based on the first two books of the five book series The Chronicles of Prydain by Lloyd Alexander, which are in turn based on Welsh mythology. As a mythology geek who loves the underappreciated mythos of the world (i.e. anything that isn’t Greek, Roman, Norse, Egyptian, and maybe Hindi), this interests me personally. But it also makes the film a very different tone for most Disney movies. It’s notably darker, with scenes being reworked after test audiences showed it to be too frightening for kids. It was their first to be rated PG as a result (which was a pretty big deal for Disney). It was the first recorded in Dolby Stereo. It was also, according to the film’s production manager Don Hahn, the most expensive animated film ever made at that point, with a $44 million budget. It lost them nearly $23 million and set them behind neophyte studio Nelvana, who earned more money from The Care Bear Movie. The animation style was also distinctly different. Afterward, the animation director Richard Rich left Disney in the 1980s and his very next film was The Swan Princess, which utilizes some of the same sound effects and everything.
But enough about the complicated and fascinating history of this Disney movie that, let’s be honest, you have almost certainly never seen. (If you have, I would love to hear your opinions.) The question raised today is: How feminist is it really?
Number of named characters with speaking lines: 8 (9 if we include The Horned King)
Number of named female characters with speaking lines: 2
Does the film pass the Bechdel Test? Nope. The three witches talk about the Black Cauldron among each other and with the men, but two of them (Orddu and Orwen) are never named outside of the credits.
Number of named non-white characters: 0
Number of named non-white female characters: 0
Number of openly non-heterosexual characters: 0
Number of openly transsexual characters: 0
Is there a heterosexual romance? Yes: Taran and Princess Eilonwy
True Love’s Kiss? No.
Number of female mentors or rulers? 0
Number of named female characters wearing “men’s clothes” (pants instead of dresses): 0 (With 0 men wearing “women’s clothes”.)
Main character male or female? Male
Number of named female characters saved from peril by male characters: 1-ish: Eilonwy
Number of times named female characters saved from peril by male characters: 1: Taran’s use of the sword helps them both escape the immediate peril of soldiers attacking them.
Number of named male characters saved from peril by female characters: 1-ish: Taran
Number of times named male characters saved from peril by female characters: 1: Eilonwy helps Taran escape the castle.
Number of named female characters breaking gender stereotypes with their actions (performing “masculine” feats): 0
Number of named male characters breaking gender stereotypes with their actions (performing “feminine” feats): 0
As the numbers show, there isn’t much for feminism here. Only two of the females with lines are ever named aloud: Princess Eilonwy and one of the three witch sisters, Orwen. And there are positives and negatives for both.
Orwen, for example, nicely shows her asserted sexuality. But it’s complicated, as she’s seen as undesirable by the focus of her affections, Fflewddur. This seems to be a common theme in many films, especially cartoons. Give overt sexual tones to curvy and buxom women who are undesired by men, especially those they like. It feels like a fat shaming trend. It makes it seem like fat women in particular are undesirable as sexual creatures.
Then there’s Eilonwy. She vacillates kind of wildly between seeming fairly feminist and falling back on damsel-in-distress tropes. For example: We meet her mid-escape from the castle, something she has clearly orchestrated largely on her own. (Maybe with help from her magic friend.) And in the original novels, she is certainly more feminist, discussing her genealogy in terms of the matriarchal line, trained as a sorcerer, capable of using weapons and willing to fight until fully incapacitated. Whereas in the movie… well, we don’t see any of that. We see her willingness to be fiery, and then she ends up cowering. Examples: we went from Eilonwy showing no real fear in orchestrating her castle escape to cowering and begging for help to be saved. When Taran, the PIG FARMER’S APPRENTICE WITH ZERO SWORD EXPERIENCE, says, “What does a girl know about swords, anyway!” Eilonwy verbally smacks the crap out of Taran by pointing out she busted him out. …then she immediately starts crying when he calls her a silly girl. Basically, any time she seems fairly feminist in the film, she ends up doing something stereotypically “girly,” like freaking out at frogs.
One note for her: Eilonwy is of course the one sewing, but it’s great that she’s terrible at it.
Other than the women, there’s how the men react to them. Taran has your traditional looking down on women sexism thrown in (partly to mask his feelings). Both Gulgi and one of the fairy kids use the “she’s so pretty” trope as though her attractiveness is all that matters. And the heterosexual romance between Taran and Eilonwy has zero development. Partly because Eilonwy doesn’t get much development. What is she the princess of, for example?
Ultimately, this film had more potential than, say, The Sword in the Stone, but it feels a bit wasted. It’s an interesting watch, though.
Fun Notes:
Holy crap, the narrator is Gandalf the Grey from the animated Rankin-Bass Hobbit film, which are far superior to the Peter Jackson versions. Which is interesting to me as the Black Cauldron is not dissimilar to the One Ring.
Well, we’re certainly breaking pig stereotypes, what with a pig who enjoys being clean and not covered in mud.
I’m always a little saddened by “Daydreaming leads to bad things” stories, since daydreaming is so nice.
It’s hard to remember all of them, but this might be the first Disney animated movie to show blood. Not much, but it happens.
How does Eilonwy never get included in lists of Disney Princesses? Is it because this isn’t a musical? Or because it was a flop?
Grave robbing. That’s new for Disney, for sure.
Taran’s desperation to be a warrior makes him make pretty ridiculous choices, like having a desperate attachment to a sword he can’t even use. But it’s magic, so it works out for him.
Why does Eilonwy think it’s a bad idea to find the Black Cauldron and destroy it? I mean, does she see into the trope of “finding the hidden object leads the bad guy to it”? Is she that genre savvy?
The fact that this sword Taran found like two hours ago is his “dearest possession” is… kinda depressing, really.
Necromancy. Also new for Disney.
I’m annoyed that the sword is given no explanation or history. I think this movie could’ve been a solid 15–30 minutes longer and given better development for plot and characters.
The Great Mouse Detective
This movie’s connection to the UK is far more obvious, as it takes place in London, 1897. I’ve already talked a lot about my favorite Disney film ever in the CineNation post about the most underrated Disney animated features. Read that for the details and just know this movie is amazing and my favorite Sherlock Holmes interpretation for a reason. (A lot of that reason is the underrealized brilliance of Professor Ratigan, voiced by Vincent Price.) But the critique is afoot, Dawson!
Number of named characters with speaking lines: 8
Number of named female characters with speaking lines: 2 (The Mouse Queen is never named, and while the singer Miss Kitty Mouse is given a name in the credits, she’s never named in the course of the film.)
Does the film pass the Bechdel Test? Nope. The two named female characters don’t ever really converse. Mrs. Judson merely talks at Olivia.
Number of named non-white characters: 0
Number of named non-white female characters: 0
Number of openly non-heterosexual characters: 0
Number of openly transsexual characters: 0
Is there a heterosexual romance? No.
True Love’s Kiss? No.
Number of female mentors or rulers? 1 — The Mouse Queen
Number of named female characters wearing “men’s clothes” (pants instead of dresses): 0 (With 0 men wearing “women’s clothes”.)
Main character male or female? Male (I would love to say Olivia’s the main character, but Basil is the titular character and holds the arc of growth/change.)
Number of named female characters saved from peril by male characters: 1: Olivia (The Queen isn’t named, but is saved.)
Number of times named female characters saved from peril by male characters: 2: When Basil saves all of them from Ratigan’s trap and when he saves her from the gear crushing her to death.
Number of named male characters saved from peril by female characters: 1: Basil
Number of times named male characters saved from peril by female characters: 1: Olivia warns him about the encroaching danger of Professor Ratigan in the clock tower.
Number of named female characters breaking gender stereotypes with their actions (performing “masculine” feats): 0
Number of named male characters breaking gender stereotypes with their actions (performing “feminine” feats): 0
While this movie has some feminist positives, like a female ruler and multiple female characters, it ends up being not dissimilar in its feminist flaws to Robin Hood. For example, Mrs. Judson only has a handful of lines before disappearing forever. However, Olivia Flaversham is wonderful. She’s a strong personality who manages to browbeat Basil into allowing her to travel with them, has instantly gained the loyalty of Toby, and even fights against Ratigan who is approximately 400 times her size. While she ends up kidnapped and requiring rescue… she’s a child, so there’s some allowances there.
There’s also a very sexualized scene, particularly for Disney, involving Miss Kitty Mouse (unnamed in the film) singing “Let Me Be Good to You.” She performs with two other mice and wears a fairly revealing outfit, dancing in a performance reminiscent of traditional burlesque.
It’s difficult to say where this lands on the feminism scale. On the one hand, no shame for women showing their bodies and willingly working in that type of performance (assuming it was willing). On the other hand, in the film, it ends up making them look simply like sexual objects. It’s difficult to say what the purpose of the scene was other than to comically show how far gone Dawson is and to serve as a distraction for Dawson and Basil to 1) find Fidget and 2) escape the bar unnoticed. This one I think is more up to you, dear reader, and your interpretation.
That’s about it for the feminism. Otherwise, I just want to remind everyone of the greatness of Ratigan. The fact that Ratigan’s villain song is essentially the audience’s introduction to him is one of the reasons it’s an absolutely brilliant piece. We not only hear about his villainy but also watch his remorseless ability to kill his own allies merely for insulting him. He can smoothly swap from murder to suave charm. It’s terrifying and wonderful. Seriously, the lyrics include “Worse than the widows and orphans you’ve drowned.” Ratigan might be the worst Disney villain of them all.
Fun Notes:
Love that Mr. Flaversham (listed as Hiram on IMDb) is voiced by Disney’s once resident Scotsman Alan Young, who voiced Scrooge McDuck. This of course means David Tennant will play him in the remake that is wholly unnecessary but inevitable.
I can’t remember which, but either this film or Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (1990) introduced me to the word “crumpet.”
Look at the ballsiness of Flaversham. He’s reminded that Ratigan could have him killed and says “Screw you” immediately. Only the threat on his daughter brings him back.
The toy store scene is definitely one of the darker, more frightening scenes in a pre-Renaissance Disney film.
This Sherlock Holmes iteration is far more humanized than either the Benedict Cumberbatch or Robert Downey Jr. versions. Irony being is he’s a mouse.
I’m glad that this movie makes Dawson (the Watson character) intelligent enough to know that sodium chloride is salt. Some Watsons seem completely stupid. But he is a doctor. A surgeon, even. I don’t know that there are many wholly unintelligent surgeons in the world.
An octopus, two lizards, a bat, and a frog are the only non-rodent critters seen in this world.
Judging Ratigan’s lair for its lack of cleanliness seems like something Cumberbatch’s Holmes would possibly do.
Allowing Basil to be wholly and obsessively demoralized by being outwitted is one of the reasons this is my favorite Sherlock interpretation. The fact that Ratigan took the time to compose and record a song to mock and bid adieu to his nemesis cements that love.
Movie flaw that always bugged me, even in my youth: There is no such thing as the square root of an isosceles triangle.
That robot is way more impressive than one realizes at first, considering it can translate Scottish into the Queen’s English.
For a bat with a crippled wing, Fidget sure seems to have full strength in its use outside of flight.
Casual thought: Would a fall like that kill a mouse? Is it heavy enough to go splat from terminal velocity?
Also, talk about most frightening villain. Rabid Ratigan is worse even than giant Ursula.
That’ll be the last we hear from any British citizens until we get to 1995’s Pocahontas. Let me know what you think about the movies and these columns in the meantime. Next week, I’ll be finishing up the post-Walt, pre-Renaissance era with a kitten, a fox, and several dogs.
