Disney’s Tangled Deserves Your Love

By Wolfen Moondaughter

Before I begin, in the interest of full disclosure, I must mention that my parents work in Disney World. I would still highly recommend this film, though, even if they worked for Universal instead ….

In the nine months or so between seeing the first trailer and the film’s release date, I was both greatly eager and hesitant to see it. On the one hand, the trailers looked awesome and Flynn is hawt. On the other hand, well, trailers are not always (make that seldom) indicative of the final work, and the articles that suggested Disney was looking to make a Shrek-like film did not encourage me, as I don’t really care for that franchise much. Well, I’m happy to report that, even though the trailers were indeed a bit misleading, I loved this film! It’s funny, sweet, and moving, with charming characters, has some great songs and scores, and is gorgeously rendered. It’s a very worthy film for having the honour of being the 50th animated release from the Disney Animation Studios — even despite it’s being CGI instead of hand-drawn. And if you know me, you know that’s saying a lot. Not that I hate CGI anymore (I used to), but hand-drawn will always have a soft spot in my heart. Still, for this film, I am embracing the CGI wholeheartedly.

Now I’m going to get a little spoilery — although not really any more so than the trailers. Still, I know people who don’t even want to see trailers, so if you’re like that, turn back now. If you’re staying with me, rest assured that I’ll warn you again when I get to talking about specifics ….

Thanks to their highly appealing designs, their exceedingly well-posed expressions, their snappy dialogue, and the brilliant vocal performances by Mandy Moore and Zachary Levi, Rapunzel and Flynn have become my new favourite Disney couple — as well as my fave new Disney heroine and (anti-)hero, individually! (Perhaps that’s because I relate a little too well to Rapunzel’s situation — in the sense of being stuck in the middle of nowhere with limited means of mobility. Plus we’re both artists and book-lovers. Then Flynn’s design reminds me of a character of my own — though Flynn is even better looking. So basically, I have some personal biases in favour of each of them.)

Having been sheltered her whole life, Rapunzel actually has a legitimate reason to be a damsel, an excuse to just sit and wait to be saved, but instead (and unlike her Grimm Brothers counterpart) she fights her fears and stands up for herself against a domineering parent, something even the most worldly people can have trouble with. She’s a smart cookie, as well as a bit of a manipulator (probably thanks to watching her mother, the pro). She’s also pretty capable of defending herself — even kicking the hero’s ass (multiple times), and saving him from others (again, multiple times)! Her going on a journey with Flynn isn’t so much a matter of a rescue so much as a matter of practicality: when you’re going into unfamiliar territory, you get yourself a guide. She gets herself out of the tower, both in the literal / physical sense and in that she plots the opportunity.

Meanwhile, unlike the hero of the Grimm tale, Flynn is a rogue, not a prince, and initially has zero interest in saving the damsel. Granted, Anti-heroes are nothing new in the world of Disney, many of the previous male leads having flaws to overcome, but I find Flynn’s particular road of redemption even more compelling than my other Disney anti-hero faves, the irresponsible Naveen or angry Beast!

Sure, Aladdin and Robin Hood (another fave of mine) were thieves too, but that was an integral part of the original versions of their stories; they couldn’t not be thieves. Plus Aladdin and Robin were also noble as thieves, Aladdin stealing just for survival and putting the survival of those even less fortunate first, and Robin stealing for others in the first place. Flynn, however, starts out as an out-and-out bad guy, stealing from good people (the king and queen) for himself and betraying his fellow thieving companions. And really, that’s a big part of what makes Flynn so refreshing compared to the usual princely hero. Moreover, it means that, unlike most of the other Disney princes, the ones who are second billing to their princesses, Flynn has his own story going on, independent of his princess — well, at least until they meet, but then his life becomes as much a part of hers as hers does his.

Even his method of redemption is refreshing, in that this isn’t a clichéd “girl likes the bad boy because she sees him a s a challenge, someone to transform him with her love” scenario. While Rapunzel certainly influences Flynn’s change of heart, she does so indirectly, by setting a good example and by placing her faith in him, showing that someone believes he can be good and offering him a reason to prove her faith justified. In fact, Rapunzel’s aim in the beginning is simply to manipulate him for her own ends — well, it’s bargaining, really, but the point is that she’s not focused on him. Instead, her feelings for him sneak up on her as they travel. Any demands she makes of him are the demands of a customer to a client, not a girlfriend to a suitor; any remarks she makes about him otherwise are observations or suggestions rather than orders. She accepts him as he is — even the aspects of him that he’d previously cast aside. She doesn’t mold him, but rather acts as a mirror that allows him to take a good look at himself. Flynn makes the conscious decision to be a nicer guy all on his own, based on his changing life-dreams, rather than through her expressed expectations — and therefore comes by those changes honestly.

(This paragraph is slightly more spoilery.) While we’re on the subject of romance, though, I should mention that it’s a point of irritation of mine that so many films out there have the leads falling in love and getting married in the span of a day or two, and Disney is one of the worst offenders in that regard. Yet … while I still would have liked to have seen Flynn and Rapunzel’s journey together take longer, I’m thoroughly convinced of their feelings by the time they sing “I See the Light” (which not only reinforces what an exceptional singer Moore is, but also revealed to me that Levi is a highly talented crooner himself). With that song, they give us what I count as one of the most romantic moments in animated (perhaps even non-animated) movie history, right up there with the spaghetti scene in Lady and the Tramp. Their falling in love may happen quickly, but you can really see them falling for each other, moment by moment, and it doesn’t feel rushed. The way they look at each other during the big number, in awe and realisation, is very moving. Of course the song and the scenery helps, but each element stands strong on its own as well!

Overall, the music is great, much more appealing than the tunes of The Princess and the Frog were to me, but they don’t quite reach being as memorable as, say, other treasures like the The Little Mermaid, Beauty and the Beast, or Aladdin soundtracks (all of which Alan Menkin also had a hand in, as he did for Tangled). However, the aforementioned “I See the Light” actually brought me to tears (much like Lion King‘s “The Circle of Life”); it’s now tied with “Love Will Find a Way” (The Lion King II: Simba’s Pride) as my all-time fave Disney love song! The recurring “Healing Chant” is also hauntingly beautiful, especially when Rapunzel sings it for Flynn. Rapunzel’s “When Will My Life Begin”, while not exactly as “sing-along”-ready or as moving as Ariel’s “Part of Your World” or Quasimodo’s “Out There” (probably because there’s not so much of a tone of yearning in), is pretty catchy and fun (and somewhat painfully relatable). Likewise, Mother Gothel’s “Mother Knows Best” isn’t quite Ursula’s “Poor Unfortunate Soul”, but it’s still amusing. (Slight spoiler in the rest of this paragraph.) “I’ve Got a Dream”, a song sung by a tavern full of thugs (two voiced by Brad Garrett and by Jeffrey Tambor), is reminiscent of “Gaston”, if not quite as catchy. And I really loved “Kingdom Dance”, the lovely medieval-sounding instrumental music that plays as Rapunzel and Flynn spend some time in town.

Moving along to the sidekicks now ….

Rapunzel having a chameleon for a pet is a little unusual, but just tell yourself that this story’s a) a fantasy and b) not set in the real world. Pascal’s a delightful and adorable little fellow that, while he’s not expressly necessary to the present day of the narrative, surely kept Rapunzel from going completely out of her mind with boredom and loneliness over the years. And he’s got her back, which is pretty much the raison d’etre of a sidekick, sou desu ne?

In order to talk about Maximus, the horse, I have to get really spoilery, so you may want to skip this paragraph. Still with me? Okay, here’s the thing: in the trailers, Maximus seemed to be Flynn’s super-intelligent steed, just like Prince Phillip had Samson, Phoebus had Achilles, Hercules had Pegasus, Mulan had Kahn, and even Belle had Phillip (er, the horse, not the prince). So it puzzled me that Maximus and Flynn, in said Tangled trailers, seemed to bear so much animosity towards each other. Why would they be partners, then? The answer is simple: they aren’t. While he does end up giving Flynn a lift twice (once unintentionally), Maximus isn’t Flynn’s steed, trusty or otherwise! In fact, Maximus is (for the most part) Flynn’s enemy! (Well, one of them.) What a brilliant move! Kudos to Disney for thinking outside the box!

Moving along again, you can’t have a great faerytale without a great villain. Just as Rapunzel and Flynn are wonderfully dimensional, so too is Mother Gothel. She’s arguably the most cunning of the villians, for one, and exquisitely skilled at manipulation. She’s also different from most other Disney villains, in that the heroine loves her. Granted, Gothel’s a terrible mother, on par with Joan Crawford, yet … well, for all her insanity, I get the sense that she does care for Rapunzel, however twisted her love is, that she believes her own rhetoric. One can even see how she might justify to herself having taken Rapunzel as a baby: in a roundabout way, she was taking back her property, a power she had found and claimed, even if no one else knew about it.

Speaking of that backstory, and lest I have you thinking that this was a completely perfect film, I will also admit that there were some lamentable plot-holes in the premise, ones that riddle the very foundation of the film and make aspects of it a bit contrived. I’ve got to get more spoilery here, so skip to the next paragraph if you want to avoid such things. The premise is that a spark of sunlight falls to earth and becomes a flower with healing power; the sorceress Gothel finds the flower and uses it to keep herself young. When the pregnant queen falls ill, the kingdom falls out to find this miraculous plant, to save her, and find it when Gothel accidentally kicks over the protective covering she made for it, in her haste to hide herself. Well, that’s a rather convenient happening, isn’t it, that she just happened to kick it over? And while I appreciate that this version doesn’t have Rapunzel’s parents being thieves (in the original, her mother had cravings for treats from her neighbor’s garden, and her husband feared she would die if she didn’t have them), how did the people of the kingdom know about the plant at all? It fell to earth miles away from the castle! How did they know a spark of falling sunlight (huh??) would become a flower all, much less one with healing power? How did Gothel know how to harness its power? It actually speaks well of her that she was able to use it without killing it, whereas the people of the kingdom ripped it from the earth and put it in a brew for the queen!

Another nitpick I have is that, despite how long her hair is and the fact that it’s not sentient (the trailers seemed to suggest otherwise), Rapunzel doesn’t get it caught on any and everything. Even when it’s only shoulder-length, my hair still tends to get caught in all sorts of things! And how did she get it untangled again from things which she purposefully wrapped it around? One moment it’s holding her up like a vine, and the next it’s trailing prettily behind her, with no effort expended! She runs about in the woods without it getting full of leaves or critters. And yet they find it necessary to have it braided in town, which pretties her up for what basically is a date. Alternately ignoring and invoking problems as is convenient for the narrative is a bit irritating. They do the same with a satchel: Rapunzel has it, then stashes it and is walking around without it, then has it again without having had an opportunity to fetch it!

All the same, I was able to overlook those few points enough to greatly enjoy the rest of the film, so I still highly recommend it!

As for the “Shrek-ness”, if that was Disney’s aim, then, to my relief, I don’t think they really reached the target (although if the attempt is what made this film it so funny, more power to them). To me, the Shrek films, on the whole, try a bit too hard to be funny, making their respective plots into excuses for gags and parody; they weary me after a while. With Tangled, though, humour is simply a tool used (quite effectively) to move the story, rather than being the reason for it, and it isn’t over-the-top / in your face. There are also plenty of (deliciously) serious moments. In fact, if anything, this film is a great study in subtlety and good use of body language, both in comedy and in drama!

Now to get a lot more spoilery as I make observations and talk about my fave bits from the movie ….

Despite the misgivings I mentioned earlier, I do think the whole concept of having Gothel need the flower to stay young, having the queen ingest the power and pass it to Rapunzel, and having Rapunzel’s hair lose it’s power when cut were clever way to explain why Gothel needed to kidnap the child and keep her imprisoned, much better than the original Grimm premise.

The crown theft and subsequent chase scene with Flynn and his partners does a great job of showing us what kind of person Flynn is, how self-centered and dishonorable — and friendless. Can I just say, though, that Flynn lying on the floor, out cold, was dreamy? Anytime he was vulnerable-looking like that — not just when asleep, but also when having a soft, thoughtful or loving look in his eye — I was completely smitten. And the fact that he’s so sarcastic and narcissistic just makes those moments when he’s compassionate — or even just quiet — stand out all the more.

Rapunzel’s repeated attempts to get Flynn’s unconscious body into her wardrobe had me in stitches. Slapstick: yer doin’ it right!

Despite having parallels with other Disney heroines, it strikes me that Rapunzel would likely best relate to a guy: Quasimodo! They both lived in a tower. Both were locked away for their entire childhood by someone insisting it was for their own good. Both dreamt constantly of attending an event outside. Both snuck out. Both likes to swing around (Quasimodo from ropes, Rapunzel from her own hair). And both had evil parental figure who fell to their deaths after trying to kill them.

I love that Rapunzel was cunning enough to switch gears when Gothel revealed she would never let her leave the tower, that she was able to work up the courage to lie to Gothel and was able to so quickly come up with a plan to get the woman to leave on a journey that would give her enough time to do what she wanted to.

Loved Rapunzel’s bipolar episode after her escape from the tower! It makes sense that she would be so torn between extreme elation and extreme guilt, considering her mentally-abusive mother is the poster child for Borderline Personality Disorder. The scenes were funny on the surface and great drama beneath that.

When one first hears it, one might think “I’ve Got a Dream” a throwaway song, but cleverly, elements that appear innocuous are actually set-ups for later storypoints: one character pointing out his hook, another having ceramic unicorns, Flynn’s telling of his own dream (it’s a sign of his character growth that he realises that being with Rapunzel is better, that he was chasing a foolish dream before), and the simple fact that these thugs are, despite their rough exteriors, nice and well-rounded guys.

I love how, when they’re trapped in the cave, Flynn tells Rapunzel not to go into the water looking for an exit, saying that there’s no point. Why do I love it? because It’s the first moment that he really shows any sort of consideration for her — until then, every action he’d had towards her focused on getting his satchel or getting away from her. And then a few moments later, when she gets all down on herself for getting them into that mess, he gives her what he refused to give her before: information about himself, in the form of a confession that his name is really Eugene Fitzherbert!

Their chat a little later, around the campfire, is a great follow-up to the cave talk. Rapunzel places a lot of trust in this thief, showing him her power, even telling about how it can be destroyed! Despite how we’ve seen just how greedy and untrustworthy he is, we see no dollar signs in his eyes; it doesn’t seem to even occur to hum that he could be one of the people Gothel warned Rapunzel against, that he could sell her for her power. Instead, we see pity there, something he probably hasn’t felt for anyone but himself for a very long time. Trust begets trust, and he opens up a little more, revealing that he was an orphan and why he calls himself Flynn Rider. When she remarks that she prefers Eugene to Flynn, it’s very telling that he says, wryly, that she’s the first to feel that way, suggesting that both characters mean who he is as a person, rather than just his name: she’s the first to like him for his true self. A couple of scenes later, after Gothel plays a head-game while Eugene is getting firewood, when he returns, he’s wondering aloud if he might get super-strength in his hand — not whether she can give him more power, even, just if he will get power from what already occurred — but when he notices that something is wrong, he abruptly stops his musings in favour of seeing if she’s all right. It’s all both great character development for them as individuals and a wonderful way to slowly build their relationship!

“He’s a bad horse!” Did anyone else think of Dr. Horrible when Eugene said that?

The scenes in town are a lot of fun, especially the little girls excitedly braiding and decorating Rapunzel’s hair (making her, to me, the most lovely Disney princess), and the dance scene/painting the street montage. It’s like the scene where Prince Eric takes Ariel out on the town in The Little Mermaid — but as much as I love those scenes in Mermaid, these were way better! Likewise with the musical boat scenes: the “Kiss the Girl” sequence in Mermaid were great comedy and sort of sweet, but I like the beauty and romance of Eugene taking Rapunzel out onto the lake to see her lanterns about a billion times more. It had incredibly gorgeous visuals, and was a deeply touching scene for the characters both individually and as a couple. I want to see the whole film again, but that’s one of the scenes I’m most eager to revisit (the other being the last tower sequence).

Speaking of the lanterns, the scene between the king and queen, before they launched the first one, was very moving, the particularly with king looking so very forlorn. I love that, just like how the whole kingdom went looking for the flower, they also join their king and queen in setting the lanterns free, hoping for the safe return of the princess, and even celebrated her birthday in the streets all the day long, showing that she was well missed and would never be forgotten. It makes me think a little of how so many people in the UK — really, people all over — reacted to the death of Princess Diana, the outpouring of love.

Getting back to Eugene and Rapunzel, I loved how the bit with her returning the satchel played out, how it made it look like he really was betraying her but what he was really doing was righting a wrong of sorts — his having betrayed the twins (and what an interesting choice that was, to try to mend fences with them rather than return the crown to the royal family!) — so that he could move on with Rapunzel with a clean slate. For that matter, I had been wondering what Gothel was up to when she enlisted the evil twins, and was muy impressed when her involving them plan turned out to be all about convincing Rapunzel that Eugene didn’t love her.

I love that they had it turn out that Rapunzel, who became so enamoured of the sun symbol of her kingdom, was subconsciously including them into her artwork, apparently having remembered it from her childhood. Nice way to tie what seemed just a throwaway detail about her into the story!

Love the prison break-out scenes! I also love the peace reached between Eugene and Maximus, especially Eugene’s little heartfelt speech about how maybe they were just misunderstanding one another.

I adore the whole sequence of Eugene’s attempt to rescue Rapunzel from Gothel, from start to finish. His love for his princess has transformed Eugene magnificently, his struggles to save her after being mortally wounded a thing of beauty to watch — as was Rapunzel’s hearftelt pleas to her mother, the deal she struck. And it all just got more an more moving as the scene went, with every passing second that Rapunzel held Eugene in her arms, what with his own daring sacrifice of cutting her hair before she cold save him, their heartbreaking goodbye (Eugene: “You were my new dream.” Rapunzel: “And you were mine.”), his death, her grief, her healing tears, and, finally, their first kiss.

(Moulin Rouge creator Baz Lurhman, take notes: just because you tell us in the beginning that a character will die doesn’t mean they have to stay that way!)

Note the similarities to another of my fave princess films here: Eugene is stabbed by the enemy, just as Beast was, and Rapunzel’s tears save him, like Belle’s saved her Beast. As much as I love the climax of Beauty and the Beast, though, I love this one far more. And the tears aren’t them copying themselves: that’s how Rapunzel saves the prince in the Grimm tale as well.

The sequence is also fascinatingly multifaceted. One way to look at it is that Eugene did it to save her, and was dooming himself in the process. It was brave and selfless in that respect, a beautiful sacrifice. Yet this can also be seen as bad in that it makes her a rescued damsel. Further, he can be seen as selfish in that he took her choice away from her. He also depowered her, violating her physically by cutting her hair off a la the biblical Sampson — it can be arguably seen as a sort of rape, both metaphorically and physically. But, then again, she was on the verge of violating him by healing him when he refused; he would have been guilt-ridden for the rest of his life, knowing that she would be Gothel’s prisoner for eternity because she sacrificed herself for him. And in that sense, his cutting her hair can be seen as an effort to emancipate her rather than a violation: her hair was a shackle that tied her to Gothel, and a burden that she herself basically said had kept her from her own dream for many years.

So yes, she’s a “saved damsel” — but she saves her hero (for the third time at least, as she saved him from the thugs and Maximus) in return here, restoring him to life. And that aside, the fact that she was fully prepared to sacrifice herself to save him (well, being slave to Gothel would be akin to dying, as Eugene himself states) makes her just as much of a hero as he is. Her “damsel”ness is further set off by the fact that Eugene is the one who becomes a king by marrying her, rather than the other way around, and by the fact that, in marrying him, she fulfills his (albeit abandoned) dream of being rich enough to be free to do as he pleases.

Basically, they each save both each other and themselves, making each of them their own hero, and their relationship into a partnership of equals. And this isn’t even the first time Disney has had heroes and heroines on the same level, being equally included in screen-time, character development, and activity — but I think this story is the best example of heroine/hero equality from their animation studios thus far.

So how sweet was the reunion scene between Rapunzel and her folks? (Yeah, okay, I am wondering how they were so sure it was her, what with her being almost 18 years older and having a different haircolour, but whatever — we’ll assume it was a mom thing.) The best part for me in that scene, though, wasn’t actually Rapunzel meeting her parents (though that was great too), but rather the queen reaching out to bring Eugene into their group hug, and the king subsequently putting an arm around him, making it a four-way hug. The orphan finally has parents, albeit in the form of in-laws.

I’ll probably get hate-mail for saying this, but I want a sequel! And in the meantime, I can’t wait to go see this one again!

Wolfen Moondaughter is on the editorial board for the comics industry webzine Sequential Tart, for which she has written since late 2001. She’s an artist, too, having done spot illustrations for Dragonlance, among other things. In her spare time, she’s a rabid fanficcer/fanartist. See more of her work at her site, Wolfen’s Webworld.

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