Disney, retrospectively

Aladdin (1992)

First of all, we've expressed our adoration for Disney renaissance sufficiently before, so you should know we do love this film. To say that it is without serious problems is a massive understatement in our opinion, though. When we were kids, we really liked all the morbid details of fairy tales or folklores (eg. when Cinderella's sisters cut off their heels to fit the glass shoe or when Lemminkäinen decapitates the master of Pohjola in Kalevala), so we were kind of disappointed when they decided to change the line "cutting off ears" in the opening song of Aladdin. Obviously we're not endorsing or encouraging cultural appropriation or the misrepresentation of cultures, but we really don't believe that censorship is the solution to this problem.  We mean, c'mon, replacing one line in one song in a movie that's a little racist in general won't change the fact that the film is misrepresenting Middle Eastern cultures quite constantly. What else could you expect from Disney, though? They don't exactly have the best track record of depicting cultures that aren't American/Western European. Anyway, let's move on to our analysis of the characters and the story.

 

The characters

Aladdin: In a nutshell, a liar. Aladdin & Simba are the main characters that probably annoy us the most from the renaissance period. However, Aladdin gets the honours of making our blood boil the most. It's established that he has some common sense and is generally rather quick-witted and street smart, nevertheless he must be one of the irritatingly dumbest main characters ever! He's only ever shown to be clever when he's getting away from trouble, in most any other situation his intelligence is pretty non-existent. We like him the most when he is being honest and himself, unfortunately, the story doesn't really allow him to be that often. Our biggest beef with this guy, though, has to be his lack of sincerity and his low opinion of his supposed-love interest, Jasmine.
Genie: He's the main reason to watch this movie for us. Granted, all the modern references start to get on your nerves as you get older, but to be honest, in the Finnish dub they don't bother you as much. In addition, the Finnish dub has the ultimate Genie, even Disney admitted it. Everything he does works.
Jasmine: She probably has the best attitude out of anyone in this movie. She sort of reminds us of Marion. The problem is, Aladdin is no Indy. Also, boy, is Jasmine a victim of patriarchy. She's constrained mainly by the story to only have attitude and say shit, but she never really gets to do anything of consequence or make a difference in the film. We hate to see that such an awesome character as Jasmine is made pretty much obsolete. In addition, she'd definitely make hands down the best sultan in the movie.
Minor characters: Jafar is an entertaining villain to the very end and thus preferable to Scar for us. He is a total creep, though. Not a full-time creep like Frollo, but a part-time pervert, at the very least. But the Sultan, oh dear god! He's the most incompetent ruler ever, no wonder his people live in poverty... He's not the best father either, for instance, somehow a guy who is continually dishonest managed to convince him to change the law and not his daughter's evident unhappiness. The rest of the minor characters are almost on par with Genie on the entertainment scale.

 
 

The story

What bothers us the most is that the story seems to have been written at the expense of the characters. This is best manifested with Aladdin's inability to tell the truth to Jasmine  and his assumptions about her feelings. We wouldn't mind so much if the lying was part of his personality, but it's doubtful that Disney meant it that way, so it comes off more as a plot point to further the story and that makes the storytelling seem a little lazy. It feels more like the characters are pulled by strings instead of living a life of their own. Ultimately they're sacrificing the likability of the characters and their development for the sake of the storyline. Although story is very important for us, we always prefer a story that's driven by characters instead of a plot. Otherwise the story is pretty engaging and there is enough action  to keep viewers interested. 

Miscellaneous

The music, as usual, is the best part, with Genie, and damn if he doesn't steal every scene he's in. We did wanna have a magic carpet because of this movie.