"The Little Mermaid", a Disney animated film released in 1989, the story of the film is based on Hans Christian Andersen's fairy tale "The Daughter of the Sea", which tells the story of a mermaid who falls in love with a human prince and sacrifices her beautiful singing voice to replace the tail of the lower body with human legs to bravely court---
However, unlike the tragic color of the original, the story rhythm of the animated film is quite lively, and the ending has been changed to a reunion ending, and Disney's drastic adaptation of this fairy tale has made this excellent story burst into a new life
In particular, the protagonist of the film --- Ariel the Little Mermaid. A change in the original tragic image of sacrificing herself for love, but to become an independent, even rebellious modern woman--- full of perseverance in love, brave to chase happiness, such a female image is very different from the weak princess in the previous animation.
It can be said that Ariel's image shaping made Disney's fairy tale movie jump out of the original shackles, turning to cater to the times, seductive resonance, to this day Ariel and her friends around --- flounder, red crab minister is still a familiar image.
With the rapid development of film technology, the special effects scenes in the film screen have become more and more realistic, and some film directors have begun to think of adapting the characters or stories in past novels, anime, and games into live-action versions and then putting them on the big screen to relive the classics.
In this regard, American Comics' superheroes are the forerunners of such live-action movies, such as 1994's "Fantastic Four", and 2002's "Spider-Man" starring Toby Maguire and so on.
Similarly, seeing the infinite prospects of live-action movies, Disney also has plans to make its own Disney princesses live-action.
The live-action princesses that have appeared so far are --- Jasmine (Aladdin), Belle (Beauty and the Beast), Ella (Cinderella), Arlo (Sleeping Beauty), Alice, etc., and each live-action princess has a pretty good image in the movie.
Two years ago, Disney also planned to make its proud work "The Little Mermaid" into a live-action version, but this time, it attracted a lot of people's scolding, why this is so, it is not because there is a problem with the selection of people!
<h1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right" data-track="23" >01.Disney: Even if you oppose it, I will keep shooting! </h1>
Judging from the public information at the time, the selection of the heroine Ariel had been decided, and the person who won the award was the young black singer --- Halley Bailey.
this... First of all, the skin color aside, this facial structure, this braided hairstyle, Disney, you said that this is a supporting role in the "Little Mermaid" live-action movie I believe, and you tell me that it is Ariel's live-action version of the look?
It was simply difficult to accept, and many netizens at that time also expressed their inability to accept it, hoping that the shooting plan of this film could be terminated and not to ruin everyone's childhood.
Two years later, the film's plan has been repeatedly shelved due to various problems, I thought that this matter could not be solved in the end, but the result was that recently, the relevant stills of "The Little Mermaid" were exposed to the Internet...
According to the stills exposed online, the scene is on a beach in Italy, where the little mermaid played by Halle Bailey and the white prince sit on the beach, and the interaction between the two looks very intimate, and the mermaid's fish tail can be seen.
From the photo, the smile of the "Little Mermaid" is quite bright, but your smile does not have the temperament that Ariel should have...
Judging from the filming actions of the two stills, this plot should be the plot of Ariel when she just rescued the prince on the shore.
Judging from the several photos released here, the shooting process is quite smooth, and there seems to be no obstacle during the period, that is, I don't know whether this was released after the crew took the entire shot, or whether it was sent after the shooting of this shot.
According to sources, the film was remade earlier this year, directed by Rob Marshall, written by Jane Goodman, and the song was re-created by Lin Manuel Miranda and Disney's legendary composer Alan Manken.
Therefore, from this situation, the release of the live-action version of "The Little Mermaid" movie is already a foregone conclusion.
As we all know, after Disney decided on the candidate, the scolding about this film has not disappeared, and every time the news is made public, it has attracted many netizens to complain.
In the end, I just don't understand why Disney will have such a "word of mouth overturning" phenomenon in this selection?
<h1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right" data-track="92" >02. </h1>
Looking back at the other live-action Disney princesses above, even if the image of each princess is not exactly the same as the original, at least the image temperament is still enough to restore, but only this time there is a very huge gap in the casting of Ariel.
For this decision, disney gave the reason is --- "she has Ariel's unique comprehensive quality, soul, heart, youth, innocence and strength, and a beautiful singing voice", well, since the above conditions are all set, why did she miss the appearance!
If it weren't for Disney's aesthetic problems, there would be only one reasonable answer--- "political correctness."
Political correctness, political correctness... The trend of "caring for" the vulnerable groups that has been prevalent in modern American society really makes many people can't help but complain.
However, as a world-class large company, Disney's business intuition is quite accurate, especially it is very good at capturing the commercial value contained in the current social trend, such as sniffing out the smell of money in the mouth of this group of people.
Just like Marvel, which is now acquired by Disney, there are often some old new heroes with "political correct" elements recently, as for the popularity... Of course, it is not as good as the old ones.
But this prevents Disney from continuing to make "politically correct" money, because the current social trend is like this, and years of experience tell itself to follow up.
Here I also say my personal speculation, the time of the birth of the "Little Mermaid" animation is 1989, and this time the United States is sandwiched between the second and third wave of feminist movements in China, which at that time further promoted the laying of modern feminist ideas and the liberation of American women.
And the little mermaid Ariel just happened to be Disney's first princess with a modern female independent spirit, such a character is not inconsistent with the original intention of women's self-reliance and self-reliance promoted by feminism.
That is to say, Disney has actually been taking the "political correctness" route, is it because the role of Ariel represented the awakening of women in the new era at that time, and now he wants to use her historical significance to prove "political correctness" again?
I'm really afraid to say this, unless there is more evidence to prove it, but it is certain that Disney was right at that time, but this time we really can't accept it.
<h1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right" data-track="93" >03</h1>
Speaking of the experience of the film from the beginning of the plan to the present, it is really a twist and turn.
After the casting was made public, the whole network was all spit and attacked; in the second year after that, it had to stop filming in the face of the epidemic; after that, the casting of the original male protagonist withdrew without authorization;
But now, the stills filmed have been exposed, indicating that even God can't stop Disney's "grand plan", is this the strength of the top big companies?
But then again, the fact that the "Little Mermaid" was actually cast this time is enough to illustrate how obsessed Disney is to "political correctness."
It can be seen that in order to make its own big money, Disney sometimes really even destroys the classics in everyone's mind, which is the face of the capitalists...