I recently rewatched Tangled (2010), a nostalgic comfort film of mine. It is a beautiful animated retelling of the fairy tale about Rapunzel, a young girl with unimaginably long hair who has been trapped within a tower. In the Disney retelling of this story, she stays locked in the tower with who she believes is her parent, Mother Gothel. I always had an affinity for Mother Gothel, despite her being a greedy and irredeemable villain. In my most recent rewatch, I had a realization that her character design was completely based around outdated antisemitic stereotypes. This is not the only case of this happening in film made for children.
Tangled (2010)
Mother Gothel follows some of the most prominent phenotypes of a Jewish person. She hits the mark on almost all the features in propaganda, like the “Happy Merchant” stereotype (as shown above), which is widely used by Nazis and other hate groups. She has the signature nose and dark curly hair. These are all standing opposite to the protagonist who stands at the opposite of the spectrum, with both blonde hair and a small upturned nose. The young Rapunzel has features that are associated with innocence and beauty, which then highlights how Mother Gothel's adjacent looks are then impure, ugly, and dirty. The Jewish stereotypes continue with her character's persona. Jewish people have always battled the notion of being greedy, which Disney perpetuates here. Mother Gothel kidnaps a baby, Rapunzel, and locks her away for the sole purpose of maintaining her youth. This is a heinous crime done for oneself with zero regard to others and how to get there. This is eerily similar to a myth that any Jewish wealth is accumulated by greed, scamming, and cunningness to get what they want.
Barbie of Swan Lake (2003)
The main antagonist of this film is called Rothbart and is the embodiment of Jewish coded villains. The name Rothbart itself has German and Ashkenazi Jewish origins, which almost directly relates to the causation of his characterizations in the film. Furthermore, he is the spitting image of the previously referenced “Happy Merchant” meme. Every detail from a protruding hooked nose, to large ears, and pointy sharp scary features. This is another instance of the stunning differences shown when he is propped up against Barbie, the epitome of beauty standards. He is told to have grown up in royalty but was overly ambitious for power and unethically learned and utilized dark wizardry in hopes of using it to rule the entire forest. He is evil and uses incredibly unethical methods to achieve his selfish goals which, once more, furthers the idea that Gentiles are greedy and selfish in their means of achievement.
The Smurfs (2011)
The main antagonist in the live remake of the older cartoon is called Gargamel. He is partially bald with dark hair and matching bushy eyebrows, has the classic enormous hooked nose, and bad snaggle teeth. These features are also accompanied with a slouch and large ears. He hates the smurfs and is determined to capture and destroy every last one. This is his goal because he discovered that using smurfs in a certain potion creates gold and he could make an incredible fortune at the price of all the innocent smurfs. This is the same recurring concept of crushing those around themselves for their own needs and ambitions. Gargamel's goals are most on the nose as it is exactly as the stereotypes suggest; he obtains a fortune of money with zero regard of what it takes to achieve that.
In the end, these are all recycled and recurring antisemitic stereotypes that children are being taught by the media to associate with a specific demonised phenotype. Antisemitism is still a widespread issue which the film and other media spoon feed to kids and are taught hate at very young ages. In addition, it perpetuates beauty standards of the specified blonde hair blue eyes and that anything that differs is both ugly and scary. Although most of the villains in these films are not explicitly mentioned to be Jewish, they are heavily designed in both looks and personality implicitly implying that. Kids are impressionable and are able to interpret patterns that they see constantly, this is engraved in their heads and should not be as acceptable as it is still today. The next time you watch a film made for kids, take an extra second to look at the villain and see how they look, how they act, and watch that teaches the next generation.
Comments