Disney's Aladdin

I found Disney’s Aladdin (1992) to be a very fun movie to watch. However, throughout it there are some very interesting portrayals of culture and gender. Overall, it feels like the movie is trying to critique Arab culture, specifically how many Arab countries restrict the rights of women. I think critiquing this is an okay thing to do, but it’s somewhat hypocritical given that the movie also shows very sexist western ideas throughout it.

            To start, and what is probably the biggest problem of the movie, is how women are portrayed. Jasmine is constantly shown wearing this outfit that’s sexy and revealing, showing her midriff and cleavage. And it’s not like she’s wearing it in a way that’s empowering, it’s just her default outfit. Combined with people constantly making remarks about her beauty, it shows the idea that beauty is the primary concern when it comes to liking a woman. Aladdin does try to address other positive qualities about her, and the movie displays them too. She’s clever and doesn’t like the backwards rules of society. Aladdin describes her as “smart” and “fun”, but right after he does that he starts to reference her beauty and goes on to give an extended description, including her big eyes that the movie makers gave her. The film also only really portrays women in the city as two things, either skinny/curvy and sexy, or overweight and ugly.

This is problematic for obvious reasons, as it portrays beauty as a singular appearance and defines women as either being pretty or not.

            I also found it interesting how noses were shown in the film. Aladdin and Jasmine seem to have very “white” noses, where as other character have bigger and some times bumpy(?) or hooked noses. It’s somewhat telling that the main characters are portrayed with western standards while other characters, including the bad guys, have pronounced Middle Eastern features. It’s also interesting that all of the characters were voiced by white voice actors. Given the diversity in Hollywood at the time, it’s not surprising, but I will say I’m glad the 2019 remake has non-white people playing non-white characters.

            The story also seems to address class struggle, but I’m not sure what opinion I have on its portrayal. It tries to show Aladdin as more than just a poor street rat, even having him say there’s more to him than that. But the entire time he’s dreaming of being rich and in the palace. I don’t think it’s bad to have aspirations to be wealthy or not be living in poverty, but Aladdin gets out of poverty for no obvious reasons. They show that he is a good guy, with him giving bread to the hungry kids and such, but the reason he ends up becoming the heir to the Sultan is because of a genie. The movie definitely doesn’t have a message of just working hard to overcome poverty (which like in today’s society might not be that simple), but it does seem to try to say something about being a good person paying off in the long run.

            One last small thing I found funny was the scene where Aladdin offers Jasmin a ride on her carpet. She doesn’t want to talk to him, but when she sees his carpet she’s interested. It reminded me of those videos where a guy hits on a girl and she’s not interested, but when he walks over to his Lamborghini all of a sudden, she’s into him. Given, this is a magic carpet so I think just about everyone would be interested in taking a ride.