Wireless Disney

As a prospect electrical engineer, I feel an obligation towards commenting this news.

Disney is building the rooms of the future!

Rooms where you don´t need to plug your phone to charge it!

Just walk in and watch the technology magically (not really, with engineering and not disney magic) charge your phone!

Actually, you can call it magic if you want!

Zootopia Oscars

After the big scares in the BAFTA Awards (the UK's Academy Awards) where Zootopia nor Moana won the best Animated film, the Academy Awards (Oscars) come with the truth!

Zootopia wins best animated film in the Academy Awards 2017.

Gender and Imagery in Disney Animation

Are you a villain for being a female that looks and talks like a male or a male that looks and talks like a female? Will a villain always be a female that looks and talks like a male or a male that looks and talks like a female?

Are you a villain for dressing black, red, and/or lime green? Will a villain never dress something different than black, red, and/or lime green?

Will a person that is ugly under your eyes necessarily be a villain? For being good do you only need to look elegant and nice?

These are small generalizations that Disney makes in all movies (exclude the most recent ones).

Examples

1) 1937 Snow White and The Seven Dwarves - Snow White vs. Evil Queen

Just looking at the image is enough. Snow White is this beautiful young girl. The Evil Queen is so jealous of Snow White and this is the reason why the queen wants to kill Snow White.

Finally, we have two views that portray the Evil Queen. The first is under her Queen costume where she doesn't look ugly, but her face scares me, while the other is her witch side, which only the view scares me away, she is definitely old and ugly and wearing black. She clearly doesn't have the sweet voice. She is obviously the villain!

2) 1959 Sleeping Beauty - Aurora vs. Maleficent

Just looking at the image is enough. Aurora can be described in one word: beautiful. Maleficent can be described in one word too: demon. She looks exactly like a demon added to the fact that she wears black and purple and has horns. 

You can clearly distinguish this generalized views of heroes and villains in Disney animated movies.

3) 1989 The Little Mermaid - Ariel vs. Ursula

The Little Mermaid is one of the classics Disney animated movies.

The image is more than enough to reinforce the clear stereotypes reinforced by Disney. Aurora is a beautiful princess with sweet voice (and an amazing singer), and Ursula is not only jealous from Aurora's voice that she forces her to sign a contract for the voice, but also is an ugly female that has really strong male characteristics.

There is no need to point that all scenes with Ursula all surrounded with black, purple, and lime green colors. Also, Ursula's voice, hair, and some characteristics are extremely close to a man, although she is a woman. Ursula is fat and ugly, and without a doubt, the stereotyped villain.

4) 2009 The Princess and the Frog - Tiana vs. Doctor Facillier

The Princess and the Frog and The Little Mermaid are two of the best examples of the stereotypes reinforced by Disney in their animated films.

Doesn't the image talk by itself? Tiana is this beautiful female character while the villain, Dr. Facillier, besides of the fact that he is continuously related to death symbols and voodoo, he wears black and all his scenes are related with black and lime green. He is a male with a few female characteristics.

Inner Working

Disney Moana is being released in DVD tomorrow! I am completely excited! If you haven't watched it you MUST buy and watch. This DVD also comes with one amazing and interesting short animated films that Disney previews before some films

The name is Inner Workings and here is a youtube trailer for the short film! Enjoy!

Beauty and The Beast Live Action

We are three weeks away for the live action of the Beauty and the Beast. I can't believe that I am so excited for this movie (I used to hate it when I was a child!) Well, well, well, here we go! Almost there and Emma Watson is the BEST Belle ever.

No doubt that she was the best Hermoine and Hermoine is nice and smart (my childhood crush) just like Belle (because she reads a lot!). Emma Watson, please bring the magic! (Again!)

The Beauty and The Beast

As a child I hated this movie. It was one of those movies that made no sense at all. One of those movies that was so boring and took so much time to get to the point. One of those movies that simply made me want to fall asleep.

I also hated this movie because it made no logical sense and I couldn’t understand it with my child’s mind. I saw a beautiful young lady kidnapped in a castle with absolutely no hope. I saw a crazy monster that only screamed, yelled, kidnapped, cruelly treated others. I saw an extreme villain masqueraded under a hero, or at least a hero at the end of the movie. I couldn’t understand see any logical sense.

I saw an evil, handsome, and dumb villain Gaston. Usually Disney related being handsome to heroes and being ugly to villains, and I guess that spontaneous swap passing from The Little Mermaid to The Beauty and the Beast was a small fact that I didn’t like.

Now that I re-watched the movie I realized the deep meaning behind the story. I am viewing it through other eyes and I like it. I see a whole village developing: we get introduced to a lot of different people in the village and we burst that bubble where a fairytale is only about the hero and the villain. There is much more going on and we get to view it!

I also get to understand the meaning behind the love story that back when I was child I couldn’t even see: Disney was giving a different meaning of good and evil! First, a hero was not strictly linked to being beautiful and a villain was not related with being ugly anymore. Disney was breaking a new frontier with this movie and I find it interesting because we got to see past the physical appearance of someone. We got to understand that ugly didn’t necessarily mean bad nor beauty necessarily meant being good. Second, Disney was breaking the barrier of love and was looking into the heart of things. This movie shows us specifically that we fall in love with what someone had in the inside and not just by looking at someone and saying “he is cute, I’m in love with him” like what Ariel would do.

The Beauty and the Beast is a movie that now I see as a love story. It is a love story that starts with some fighting like any relationship (although it is pretty intense in the movie). Followed by a classic “you saved my life” scene when the Beast rescues the Beauty, Belle, from a wolf pack attack in the forest and ends with actions of love that totally transform the relationship from the inside out. It is a love story that I used to hate because I found uninteresting and boring but I know think that it is much more than what I thought it was!

The Little Mermaid

Many will argue with me that if you exclude the movies from the last decade, The Lion King is the best Disney animated movie, but I must say that whenever I see The Lion King I don’t really find it that intriguing. The Lion King is, for me, just one more Disney movie with a good soundtrack. 

The Little Mermaid, on the other hand, is one of my favorite movies from childhood with the best soundtrack (although you must exclude the movies from the last decade because those have great soundtracks)! My favorite song is and will always be Under The Sea for two main reasons: the tune and the imagery.

This song is so amazing that whenever you hear it you want to stand up and sing and dance through it. The lyrics and the tune are so friendly and they easily get stuck in your head. Whenever you hear it you can’t stop yourself from singing it. If you don’t sing it out loud it is probably because you think you have a terrible voice and I assure you that you will be singing it all day round inside your head.

WARNING: If you don’t want to start singing don’t watch the video below.

The second reason why this song is so catchy and intriguing is because of the imagery it shows you while you hear it. Can’t you see all those bubbles everywhere? 

Or all those colorful fishes?

Or everything beautiful shown under the sea? 

When I watch this song I feel like I want to live under the sea. I feel like I want my entire world to be underwater.

This is one of the best songs in the entire Disney film industry and it is one of the reasons why I could watch The Little Mermaid over and over and I wouldn’t get bored at the beginning. Well, not only because the song is amazing, but also because I like the storyline and the background message a lot!

The most important question that rises after watching this song is, why would anyone leave? Well, this is what the story is about. In our world, we always want what we don’t have and this is especially strong when we are teenagers.  

Ariel, the little Mermaid, is a classical teenager that falls in love with the outside world and wants to experience that world, but her only problem is that she has no legs because, after all, she is a mermaid. She makes a deal with a witch from the sea named Ursula where she gives up her beautiful voice. The deal allowed Ariel to obtain legs for three days, but she had to obtain a true love kiss from Eric, a handsome man, or she would be transformed back into a mermaid and belong to Ursula just like many others that are trapped like small dead trees in Ursula’s backyard.

This movie is one that I love because it represented the person I used to be when I was a teenager a few years ago. I only wanted what I couldn’t have, just like Ariel. No matter what I had, it would never be enough!