Guest Essay
Speaker: Bia

The anchorchain tying me to my childhood...

The Little Mermaid. Always, always The Little Mermaid, Die Kleine Meerjungfrau. I can't imagine myself without this story, it would be worse than cutting my own hand off, it would be like ripping part of my heart out. Ever since I can think, there's been this headstrong redheaded little mermaid, Arielle, a mystical being more graceful and swift in her slightest movements than any creature on land, but also a girl secretly burning with the knowledge that that isn't what she wants to be, it's not where she belongs. She knows also it's wrong, and ridiculous to consider more than once, but she lives her dream, it's burning like a flame of the fire she wants to see and feel for once.

I can't look at this film rationally, I know it like the back of my hand, I know every cel of the animation, every note in the music, every line of the dialogue, in both the old German version and the English original now. Like other people have grown up with Aladdin, which I in turn can't warm up to because there's been a time gap of ten years, I can't critizise The Little Mermaid. Though I don't know what there would be to critizise, either.

Like, one thing I don't get is how people constantly complain about the film being "not true to the original fairy tale, bah." Listen, you people. I've grown up with that fairy tale, in German I know it practically by heart. But what you've got to understand is this: Disney never claimed to be true to the original fairy tale, it is not true to it, but it's proud of being what it is, and that's what made me trust into it, what will always make me trust into it. Disney was inspired by this story, and rightly so. Both Andersen's story and Disney's take on it spring from the same root: The power of dreaming, of imagining, of picturing the "What if". What if, down in the lowest depths of the deep mysterious realm we simply call the sea, an insultingly short term in the face of everything that the ocean holds, there was a race of people roaming and ruling this otherworld like humans do on land, human-like, humanoid, but still detached, perpetually cut off from human ideas and concepts. What if we could catch a glance down there, see what it would be like?

And what if one single of this mysterious race dared to reach up and cross the border?

That has always been my favourite aspect of the story, the one that's been accompanying me all my life, and it's that aspect Disney manages to capture perfectly. The whole movie is like a daydream, a wonderful ode to impossibility, to the "What if", and to the differences and the beauty of two realms bordering each other and yet universes apart. There's a fascination in this, a fascination we see in Ariel's innocent eyes, sparkling with wonder at things we would consider totally insignificant, exploring the two worlds joined in her physique with this wide-eyed, childlike curiosity.

The only thing people seem to realize comparing the fairy tale to the movie is the lightened ending - but there's more! In the fairy tale, the witch hands the little mermaid the potion and tells her to take it up to the shore and drink it at sunrise. And from that point onwards the witch has no more concern with the princess, she's given her what she desired, for a price, but now the mermaid has the potion on her hands, crystal clear, and is left on her own. Which means that she could have turned back, she could've changed her mind about drinking the potion. Had she wanted to, she could've refrained from transforming her tail into legs, she could've given both the potion and herself back to the sea, mute forever, certainly, but with the knowledge that it was her own decision in the end.

Compared to that, how different is Ariel's story, and her relationship to Ursula. Ursula granted Ariel's wish, but she also made sure that it would be her setting the conditions and that Ariel would always be bound to their deal, because Ursula needs this mermaid as a vital part in her greater scheme. Once Ariel has signed the contract and given her payment, the voice, it's no longer her decision but Ursula's - Ariel is made a human, inevitably, and Ursula is sadistic enough to make the transformation visibly painful and also underwater, where Ariel is now helpless. From the beginning Ursula controls her, giving her just enough time to reach the surface before death can claim her. And while Andersen's little mermaid is only dependent on the prince and his feelings for her, Ariel hovers reliant on the will of the prince (Eric) and the witch (Ursula) while at the same time being cut off from her home world and her family, all on her own.

Another thing people keep saying is how the relationship between Ariel and Eric isn't realistic. Come on, she's only seen him for five minutes and the next thing you know she sings for him and is in love. Some first-class fangirl-material here....

Well, I agree with that. It's incredibly short-termed, this love, but that's not what's important. You've got to remember what this movie is about at heart: Ariel's dream, her desire. Ariel has always dreamed of being part of that world, but it's always been a vague dream, mixed with passionate curiosity about the world that isn't hers, it was there, but up until Eric appears in her life, she could never nail it down to anything definite - and it may be that she knew about the seawitch's powers all along, but she was too scared to take the final step, leave her world and be a human. (if we're taking this a little further, the first German translation of "Part of your World" might have got that aspect wrong) Eric was the key to that last step, he's what made her come to final terms with her desire, what made it focus and kept her going, he's the one she's willing to give her hand to lead her through this other world she's only been fantasizing about. Thus, taking the potion and growing legs and lungs wasn't only a way to make her dreams come true, it was also a sacrifice. You remember when she's been turned into a human and she struggles and fights to get her first breath of air? Human air. I'm not talking about the colorful hairflip for once, what's important to me is what that scene signifies - Ariel wanted to be a human, she wanted to leave the ocean, and now she has to, because the sea isn't made for the being she's agreed to be changed into. It is a sacrifice.The taking of her voice (Oh, that scene...the whirling colors, Ursula's spell, and Ariel's mesmerizing singing holding you in the center of it...probably the most powerful scene in the movie) is only secondary for me. Because there we have the fairy tale again!

For those who can see with an open heart, down to the bottom of it all, this movie is a masterpiece. But to me it's much more than that...

©Bia: 8 April 2005