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| From Pixar's Facebook. |
It is not often that we get to see a mother/daughter movie. Brave grasps the complexity of the relationship between a maturing girl and her mother and centers this awkward time around the conflict of the princess’s impending marriage.
The girl, Princess Merida, rejects her mother and becomes so caught up in herself that she ends up causing major trouble for her whole family, specifically her mother. Through a twist of fate, she ends up being the only one who stands with her mother when things get really tough out in the wild. Merida discovers that she was wrong and that her mother has always loved her deeply. The queen discovers that having some hunting skills can be very useful (although she still insists that princesses do not put their weapons on the table).
In the course of the story, Merida begins to follow the path of one of the characters from one of the legends her mother taught her. In fact, Brave cleverly takes two stories separated by generations (Merida’s life and a legend her mother describes) and contrasts them against each other to teach valuable lessons.
In both cases, someone feels like they are not being treated fairly. Both decide to take fate into their own hands. Both tear their families asunder.
Repentance, however, leads to redemption. In the end the film shows the consequences of breaking the 5th commandment as well as the Scripture that says “do not provoke your children to wrath.”
I encourage anyone to see the movie. It is the only mother/daughter movie that I have seen that really is not a “girl's movie” and can be enjoyed by anyone. When I saw the promotions for Brave I knew that it would be a must see. The acting is grand (the little girl reminds me of my little sister). The music is breathtaking. The animation is flawless. In the trailers, they wisely leave out major plot points so that you don’t know where the movie is going, so you really can get caught up in enjoying the movie.
And as has become custom in Pixar movies, they touched my heart, and I cried.
Review by Jeremiah Lorrig
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(Listen to the music! It is amazing.)
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Though I think you've done a great job pegging one train of thought running throughout the movie, I think there's another that is problematic. We see in the development of the mother/daughter relationship that Merida wishes to change her fate by securing her own desires, and these desires conflict with the express command of her mother. Though the methods Merida employs to fulfill these desires are portrayed negatively, she still ultimately gets what she wants, with her mother repentantly convinced of her error.
ReplyDeleteFirst, I'm hesitant to condone movies that are subversive of traditional family roles. But there's also the question of whether what she wants is good. So what is it that Merida wants? Well, there's a couple things. She wants to be free from the arranged marriage, for one, something that our Western sensibilities are all okay with (mine included). But this gets conflated with the second thing she desires. She wants freedom in abstracto, she wants to throw off any constraints of tradition or natural law (with all that baggage of traditional gender roles that comes with it). She wants to craft her own fate in a sort of essence-less "I am the master of my fate: I am the captain of my soul" kind of notion. Again, something that goes over well with our Western sensibilities, but seems to run smack up against Christian doctrine, which teaches that who we are and what we do emanates from God's particular calling, not subjective desires.
So I'd agree that there was a lot that was done quite well with the movie, but the ambiguity (at least) or radical individualism (at most) was frustrating.
I'm not an expert on the subject, but it's my understanding that every story explores a conflict, and the greater the contrast, the more interesting the story. To obtain drama of this level usually requires overly exaggerated characters of opposing view points - i.e., Merida (quintessential free spirit) and the Queen Mother (quintessential conformist).
DeleteAs Jeremiah pointed out, neither side came away untempered. Both extremes had issues, and needed to learn something - and I think they did. I understand your reservations about Merida's "freedom in abstracto" (though I think it's a stretch to say she wanted to throw off natural law), but this is only the starting point, not the concluding moral of the story.
Nick, that's an excellent point. People are only "free" when they live the way they were made to live. Americans in particular don't like the idea of "limits," but as humans we do indeed have natural roles that function within proper limits. These roles manifest themselves in callings or vocations. The "free spirit" urge is actually rather inhuman, I think, and is in a way power-mongering. Selfless people who actually do good to others or for society usually have a high respect for authority and are careful to preserve and nurture the right kind of human relationships.
DeleteCan't wait to see it :)
ReplyDeleteOh yeah, that song is amazing. =)
ReplyDeleteI agree. I love it.
DeleteThe full song with translation is here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x6Xa1sh5qeo&feature=related
DeleteThe main lines of the story seem to challenge our typical freedom-as-self-invention American individualist tendencies... but some moments in the story, certain bits of dialogue (including, tragically, the final voice-over), and most of the (English-language) lyrics, seemed to be pulling in a different direction. I felt there was a degree of dissonance, as if the film-makers never quite finished figuring out exactly what story they were trying to tell before they told it. Given previous Pixar triumphs (including Wall-E's brilliant pro-creation and pro-human vision, the marvelously pro-family The Incredibles, and the essentially perfect Toy Story 3), I came away somewhat disappointed.
ReplyDelete