Film Review: Tangled

[Three]

It's not finished, but I was so eager to share what I had, I felt like posting. Enjoy





In the film Tangled, Disney's version of Rapunzel, the story begins by having the film's anti-hero, Flynn Rider, give the audience back-story which introduces us to our main characters. Rapunzel is a daughter of royalty. Her parents rule over an unnamed kingdom that is home to a magical golden flower that has the incredible ability to heal wounds, illnesses, and even reverse aging. However, the flower is only a legend to the King and Queen as well as to the rest of the kingdom. The only person who is certain of this flower's existence and its location is the film's antagonist, Mother Gothel. Mother Gothel is a very old woman who uses the flower to to stay forever young and beautiful. In order to continue using it, she hoards it by making sure it is hidden under an artificial bush. When the Queen is pregnant with Rapunzel, she becomes struck with a fatal illness. Desperate to keep his wife alive, the King sent his army to search for the Golden Flower to use its healing properties. The film then shows us Mother Gothel attempting to use the flower again. Before she can activate its power, she becomes startled by the sound of a squad of the Kings' soldier's footsteps moving towards her location, so she quickly rushes to conceal the flower with her fake bush and hides. Unwittingly, the accidentally knocks over the flower's cover with her foot as she hurries to get out of the approaching men's sight, leaving the glowing magical flower visible. Once the soldiers see the flower, they immediately take it back to the castle and use its magic to save the Queen. Thus, a healthy baby Rapunzel is born.

Rapunzel was not merely healthy, though. Thanks to the potion's magic, Rapunzel was born with golden blond hair with the flower's ability to heal. All seemed well in the Kingdom, but Mother Gothel was not unaware of Rapunzel's whereabouts. In fact, she followed the guards and witnessed what became of the flower. Eager to keep getting her fix of age reversing magic, Gothel kidnapped Rapunzel and took her to a faraway tower where she decided to raise the baby as her own daughter. It is at this point our exposition scene ends and the actual film begins. So far, my first impressions towards the film are very positive. The animation is breathtakingly gorgeous, the humor is charming, and the pacing is just right for my taste. And while there is much to say about the technical aspects of the films, my purpose in this review is to bring attention to the more disturbing and subtle psychological themes within the film, so my main focus will be on the characters. I do want to be clear that I am not a psychologist and thus am not trained to diagnose mental illnesses. These are simply my thoughts that I will try to make a rational case for with the help of some very useful material I've read. Some of the terms I'll be using are based on highly complex concepts that have a plethora of literature written about them, which I have only been exposed to a small percentage of, so I'm in no way an expert.





The first character that I want to explore is the evil Mother Gothel. I originally thought this character was a typical narcissist. Her gross obsession with youth and beauty, the multiple mirrors in her house, as well as her exploitative tendencies, all of these things seemed indicative that Gothel was a Narcissist. However, after giving the idea more thought I realized that, due to Gothel's willingness to murder, kidnap infants, and chronically lie to get what she wants, I decided that she would best be described as a sociopath, although it is clear that she exhibits classic narcissistic characteristics, such as vanity. To use the helpful distinction that clinical psychologist Martha Stout lays out in her fascinating book “the sociopath next door”, the difference between Narcissism and Sociopathy is that ”Narcissism is, in a metaphorical sense, one half of what sociopathy is. Even clinical narcissists are able to feel most emotions as strongly as anyone else does, from guilt and sadness to desperate love and passion. The half that is missing is the crucial ability to understand what other people are feeling. Narcissism is a failure not of conscience but of empathy, which is the capacity to perceive emotions in others and so react to them appropriately.” Thus, simply put, Narcissism is a lack of empathy, while sociopathy is a lack of conscience.



The way that sociopathy is portrayed in most films is not entirely accurate. Most of the time the villains in cinema are exaggerated characatures of sociopaths at best. Sociopaths in reality are not so obvious or grand. They do not normally kidnap babies. They do not wear dark, hooded cloaks. They do not laugh maniacally. In fact, according to Martha Stout, “the only emotions that sociopaths seem to feel genuinely are the so-called 'primitive' affective reactions that result from immediate physical pain and pleasure, or from short-term frustrations and successes.” Dinsey villains appear to be passionate about being evil, but sociopaths cannot experience love, passion or joy. They are in fact not usually violent. How do I know this? Well, have you ever came across anybody like this in your life? Probably not,(I genuinely hope not) but statistically you have certainly came into contact with a sociopath. It is estimated that 1 in 25 Americans are sociopath. That is more than anorexia, which is considered to be an epidemic. The fact that you most likely cannot recall where or when this occurred demonstrates what I mean when I say that sociopaths are much more subtle and hidden. It is this subtle and hidden nature of sociopathy that I think Tangled portrays quite well in some instances, most notably in the interactions between Rapunzel and Mother Gothel when Rapunzel is an adult.





(For more on the dispassionate nature of the Sociopath, please check out my article "Sociopathy is nothing to Envy"  http://board.freedomainradio.com/topic/39611-vengeance-and-out-sun-bathing-the-lizard-sociopathy-is-nothing-to-envy/ )

After the film's exposition scene, we are introduced to Rapunzel, who is now a young adult. She starts off the main plot of the film with a wonderful song entitled “When Will My Life Begin.” The song communicates her weariness and frustration at living in a tower,regardless of having as much time as she wants to spend on improving her plethora of skills and talents, such as, pottery making,painting, ballet, guitar playing, and sewing. My interpretation of this scene is that mere productivity without growth is not living. So much of what we do during the day, what we call "living life" is not actually living. Each day, without striving towards a noble goal, such as individuation, living with integrity, and speaking the truth, simply becomes a photocopy of the last day. And in much of the same way a copy of a copy becomes more and more degraded, so too do our lives lose definition when do not raise our standards. So, why does Rapunzel stay inside and continue to choose the comfort of routine and repetition? Because her "mother won't allow her to leave." is her stated reason. Yet, as she soon discovered, her prison was only internal for she eventually left the tower. She could have left anytime. Perhaps that's why many of us choose the familiar. To avoid the pain of knowing that the jail cell that we thought was permanently sealed, the cell that we spent years of our lives in for the sake of appeasing empty people, was unlocked the entire time. 

The following sequence struck a deep emotional chord with me. It was almost as if every interaction I had been in where I ended up being on the receiving end of some type of emotional abuse was spliced together so that I no longer felt like I was watching a film based on an old fairy tale, but was rather reviewing my own memories. Because of this, it was very difficult for me to re watch these scenes. It is these exchanges between Mother Gothal and Rapunzel that motivated me to write this paper. One of the main purposes of emotional abuse is to obscure the source of the abuse. Unlike physical abuse or even some verbal abuse where the victim can clearly see what is being done to them, emotional abuse makes the victim feel like she is in a fog so that when she feels hurt she isn't able to figure out why. This keeps her in a perpetual state of confusion, which is then taken advantage of by the abuser to continue the abuse usually to convince the victim that she is imagining things, there is no abuse, and that she is misinterpreting the situation. An error of reality processing on the victims part. If the abuser is successful in convincing her that her pain is entirely self generated by her erroneous thinking, then she has been programmed to abuse herself. Nothing could be more satisfying to a sadist. It's the perfect scam. To abuse anyone in such a way as to get the victim to doubt her own ability to press reality is called gaslighting.


Mother Gothel arrives at the tower and calls Rapunzel to let down her hair. Immediately, the first interaction that we see between the two is entirely destructive to Rapunzel. After Gothel is pulled up from the tower she asks Rapunzel with an obviously disingenuous tone of voice “Oh, Rapunzel. How do you manage to do that every single day without fail? It looks absolutely exhausting, darling!” Rapunzel hesitantly replies, ”Oh, it's nothing.” “Then I don't know why it takes you so long.”, Gothel tauntingly says in which is followed by a hearty laugh at her own “joke”. “Oh, darling I'm just teasing!” Rapunzel says nothing with a confused look on her face. Gothel walks towards her mirror to inspect her reflection. Rapunzel follows and tries to express what's been on her mind. “All right...so, mother. As you know tomorrow is a very big day” Gothel interrupts showing no sign that she's listened.“Rapunzel look in that mirror. You know what I see? There's a short pause and during this moment you an see by her uneasy facial expression on that Rapunzel is anticipating another attack. “I see a strong confident beautiful young lady.“ Rapunzel is relieved that no put down was made. She lets her guard and even allows herself to smile. Then the trap is sprung. “Oh, look! You're here too!” Gothel one again ejects an intensely derisive laugh like cannon fire. Rapunzel's distress becomes more apparent by the expression on her face. Gothel continues the abuse, “I'm just teasing, stop taking everything so seriously.” .


So, here we have in manipulation put forth as compassion and concern, put downs and insults disguised as humor, invalidation of the the person's feelings, which then finished off by gas lighting. And the order in which these things occur is no accident. There is certainly a kind of brilliance in the way that these abusive strategies are executed. For example, a good action film doesn't start with the most intense sequence nor does it keep the action non stop. If it did, the audience would lose interest or find the excess of stimuli unbearable. Instead, a good action film builds the tension gradually. Once the tension of an action scene reaches its pinnacle, it is then released by allowing the next sequence to be more focused on dialogue and character development in a relaxed environment. This allows the audience to relax before the next action scene wherein the tension becomes even greater. Similarly, a good abuser, such as Gothel, always leaves room for “down time”, where she compliments Rapunzel or asks a question out of “concern”. This allows Rapunzel to relax and thus let her guard down, which only makes the next blow's impact is that much greater. As Vin Deisal says in the film Riddick “It's always the punch you don't see that puts you down.” It is not hair, but Rapunzel herself that is tangled, tangled in Gothel's web emotional vampirism and abuse.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dIs9sFyFSDk

http://www.daughtersofnarcissisticmothers.com/characteristics-of-narcissistic-mothers.html
 




Perhaps the most tragic thing about being tortured in this way for many years is that the abuser becomes internalized. Internalization is the process by which the attitudes, values, standards and opinions of others is integrated into one's own sense of identity. It happens automatically and cannot be undone. The result is that even after Rapunzel escapes her prison and her torturer,  Gothel is still in her head. Remember how I said that gaslighting, getting the victim to doubt her ability to process reality, leads the victim to attack herself? Again, this is something the film portrays surprisingly well, which is not only the abuse, but its effects. After Rapunzel is free she constantly doubts her decision and castigates herself, proclaiming that, "she is a bad daughter", "breaking her mother's heart", and a "horrible person". And for anyone who has gone through the rough process of breaking out of abusive relationships, it is not uncommon for this doubt and self flagulation to occur. Even when the person has treated you egregiously your entire life, this process can take years.