Imaginary Relations

 By Kit Noussis

It is common today for TV to offer ‘cultural sensitivity’ warnings. When a Disney film as old Dumbo or Snow White is screened, it will come with an advance disavowal of the moral backwardness of these classics, typically of a racial or sexual character: “This film contains stereotypes from another time. They were wrong then, and they are wrong now.” Such disclaimers, cousins to trigger warnings, are unobjectionable. I do not partake in the false outrage that this is a kind of ‘censorship’ or ‘bowdlerizing’; the disclaimers are ideally used instead of burying these films and pretending they never happened. Of course, Disney is making a virtue out of necessity when they applaud themselves for this candidness—the megacorp merely tails the popular consensus so that it may continue to extract rents from its ancient intellectual property.
 
My real problem with the warnings is that they do not go far enough. Noticing how values have changed is only the first step, but for many, the placard before the film will be the only time they think about the film critically: during the film they will be spellbound, and the moment it ends, Netflix will autoplay another spectacle the algorithm thinks you might like. There is no time for reflection. And why would anyone bother? The standard dogma is that ‘everyone is entitled to his opinion’ and that ‘art is above all subjective’. Why is it that the only criticism we cannot be trusted to supply for ourselves is the determination ‘there is racism in this old movie’? We need to bring the same sort of disclaimer into the present tense: “The Disney film you are about to watch is a product of our current historical era. Viewer beware: It remains to be seen which cliches will eventually be proven to be evil.”

The recent Disney film Zootopia 2 deserves such a disclaimer. The film is a story that is perfectly up-to-date, despite being nearly identical to its decade-old prequel. Even Shakira is recalled to do the theme song, when to include her in 2016 was already a throwback. In both films, we find a grand social conspiracy of the “this goes straight to the top!” variety paired with a buddy-cop love story. ChatGPT claims that the formula for these films is ‘comedy for the whole family’ mixed with ‘meaningful social commentary’. The comedy and the morals of the film are expertly and cynically interwoven to ensure palatability and profitability. Disney would never stray from their target of smack-dab-in-the-middle of public opinion; to stray into the past or speculate on future values would expose them to criticism, boycotts, and worse. True art engages with the aporia of the moment and anticipates the future; in a Disney film we only get a rehashing of the same old platitudes. If the producers can make something look and feel fresh while adhering to the proven scripts and proven actors, they will have a hit on their hands, and indeed, both Zootopia films are billion dollar properties. The critical consensus, in its current mood of poptimism, appears to validate the kid-friendly parable about ethnic conflict. Yet what message, explicit or implicit, is impressed on a child who drinks in this colorful spectacle?
Consider one scene from the sketchy speakeasy in the swamp district. Our heroes, Judy and Nick, are fugitive cops on the trail of a mystery. Forced into hiding, they must seek clues in the underbelly of society, not only to clear their own names but so they can restore the great Zootopia to justice. In a scene that alludes to the infamous monkey-brains dinner of Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom, our mammal heroes are instructed to partake of the food offered by their reptile host. Children will no doubt be delighted by the classic gag, whereby our heroes have little choice but to eat the repulsive bowl of worms. In an apparent subversion of the old joke, the host cracks up the moment Nick takes a bite of the worm: “Hey everybody, he actually ate it! Just messing with you. Waiter,  clear this stuff away and bring me a scone!” Thus, the filmmakers score some laughs for repeating the old ‘disgusting food of the Other’ joke, but disavow it in the next instant, since the reptile character is really a fan of posh English scones. Yet reptiles, in reality, do not eat scones any more than rabbits or foxes. The joke writer wants to have it both ways here, like the uncle who tells a racist joke ‘ironically’—the onus is on you for taking it seriously. This confusing example is typical of the jokes in the film that play on types and expectations: the logic of the joke or dramatic point demands a familiarity with convention and reinforces a stereotype, but the tediously repeated message in both films is that prejudice is wrong.

They say that Disney is great at ‘putting in jokes for the adults,’ but I usually feel that these jokes insult my intelligence; what affects the children subliminally is manifest to my ears. Defenders of the film insist that that the equation of species to ethnicity must not be taken too seriously, but the filmmakers do everything in their power to emphasize it. Is the Mexican accent of the underworld reptile ironic? And the pseudo-lesbian police partners, I suppose they are only fat and disfigured warthogs out of irony? Don’t even get me started on the animal and voice actor which they chose to represent the chief of police Bogo. Zootopia and its sequel derive their narrative force and their ‘wholesome’ message from a critique of bigotry. Yet in repeating the fundamental analogy of types of people to types of animal, they are only binding the audience tighter to an ideology of rigidly separate identities.  Thus the decision to present the story as a modernist fable where the symbolism of the animal kingdom is the basic material is at odds with the message of the film that our bodies do not define our minds.

The animal world is truly a rich support for the imagination and has long been an elemental setting for inducting children into their ideology. Since the time of Aesop, children have been fascinated by fables and the apparent ‘personalities’ of the animals. In an oral culture, proverbs and stories helped to pin culture down in the memory. Aesop has two fables that seem to contradict each other: in one of them, a Lion spares the life of a little mouse. Later, the Lion somehow becomes bound in ropes; the mouse frees him in gratitude. The moral is obviously one of mercy and ‘good karma’. In another fable, The Wolf and the Crane, a wolf has a bone lodged in his throat; the crane helps him to remove it; the wolf betrays the crane.

What is an ancient Greek girl to think of these stories? Why trust a lion but not a wolf? Because, for Aesop, the Lion is understood to be a symbol of nobility, whereas the wolf is only ever a brigand. The true character of the real animals is ignored (in fact no wolf or lion can ever transcend its ‘vicious’ instinct to predate), because their purpose here is  as imaginary supports for human morals. It’s the same way with Disney films.

In the first Zootopia, the idea of ‘savage predators’ is the crux of the plot. Zootopia, despite the fact that predators and prey live cheek-to-jowl, is a flawed but peaceful consumer metropolis.  Yet peace is disturbed by a spate of violence from predator animals, which incites widespread distrust and prejudice. Obviously, the adults in the room can see the parallels here to the moral panics of modern history (Hilary Clinton’s ‘Superpredators’ comment comes to mind). Eventually, the real cause is revealed to be a sort of terrorist with a bio-weapon, Merry Bellwether: the lamb politician who wishes to exploit popular division for personal empowerment.

We sophisticated viewers of Disney are encouraged to pat ourselves on the back for recognizing the obvious social commentary, while the children are invited to ponder, possibly for the first time, the corruptions of power. Yet the commercial and critical success of the Zootopia films indicates to me that such a moral remains socially useless, because there are few people who can recognize the cynical manipulation that constitutes the Zootopia films themselves. Consider how the stereotypes of femininity and docility embodied in the Merry the lamb are exploited for dramatic and comic effect in both films. The ‘twist’ whereby the little lamb character is revealed to be the evil mastermind is of course a calculated subversion of expectations for drama and laughs. We want kids to learn to look past appearances and avoid prejudice, but if they really did that, they would miss all of the fun in the Disney movies.  No dramatic or comedic beat comes without its visual or musical emphasis: for children to interpret them smoothly they must be quite heavy-handed and conventional. But should our children only be fed soft pap even into their teenage years, or even into adulthood, as the in ‘Disney Adults’ phenomenon?

 Children are defenseless to the sort of moral aesthetics that have always been the stock-in-trade of Disney, whereby witches are ugly and knights are beautiful; a gag is underscored with a “boi-oi-oing” and a death with a violin. Of course, Disney can no longer present these stereotypes without some kink in the lines (the movie Wicked asks the question “What if the Wicked Witch had childhood trauma?”) but that does not mean that we have finally overcome these seductive and immature ways of seeing.
So the ironic negations of Disney’s own classic formulas have not succeeded in transcending them, but they have given audiences the false belief that we are more sophisticated now than our grandparents were. But as Lacan said, it is the non-dupes who are fooled. When you believe that the symbolism that stains us to the marrow (our curse as the only animals who talk) does not color your thoughts, it shows a lack of humility. The ancient association in Western culture of snakes and reptiles with the demonic and the alien is not simply dispelled by acknowledging it as a primitive superstition. Thus when Zootopia 2 portrays that reptiles can be re-integrated into society after an unjust banishment, our reaction should be one of outrage. Can Disney seriously be comparing such oppressions as the pogroms and the Japanese internments to this children’s fable? Do you really mean to say ‘yes, we nations be as different as snakes and puppies, but we should love each other anyways’ ?

It is deeply misguided to structure a racial allegory in a children’s story in terms of species. The children will follow the images and the music more closely than the words. But such a vulnerability is useful to Disney, because they can make films that appeal to childish instincts that appear, to the adults, to contain nothing offensive.

A crucial emotional beat of the film is when the lovers at the core of the plot are dramatically separated during an intense argument that unites the personal and social sides to the plot. Nick is on the verge of giving up the fight for justice, convinced that it is time to abandon idealism and embrace a pragmatic truce with the status quo; Judy is resolutely committed to justice at any cost.  The disagreement seems irresolvable when Judy states “I guess we’re just… different”. At that very moment, the two are dramatically separated by a collapsing building. Of course, the film eventually ends in a happy reunion after the evil-doers get their comeuppance: snakes are welcomed back into society overnight once the populace are informed that their prejudice was mere propaganda (if only the real world worked like this!) Yet we must actually embody the bravery of the renegade detective and say with Judy Hopps: “No. We are different—we will not resign ourselves to the conclusion that it is our animal nature that prevents us from living in utopia. If that means that we must evade the long arm of Disney for the rest of our days, then so be it.”