4. The Little Mermaid (1989)
The Little Mermaid is a 1989 animated film by Walt Disney. It is based on the fairy tale of the same name by Hans Christian Andersen. In the movie, Ariel is a sixteen-year-old mermaid princess (what is it with Disney and under-age girls?) who is dissatisfied with her life and wants to visit the human world. Naturally she falls for a human prince. Overcoming a series of obstacles, including her father and some downright evil actions by the sea witch, Ariel wins the heart of the prince and they live happily ever after.
Dark Inspirations? "The Little Mermaid" was originally written as a love letter by Hans Christian Andersen and sent to Edvard Collin. Andersen became upset upon the engagement of Collin to a young woman and after Collin spurned his love, he wrote the fairy tale as a symbol of his inability to possess Collin.
In Andersen's story, the Little Mermaid saves a drowning prince and carries him to shore. She leaves when a girl from a nearby temple arrives. Hopelessly in love with the prince, the Little Mermaid consults the Sea Witch who makes her give up her tongue in exchange for a chance to win the heart of the prince and acquire a soul. The Sea Witch sells the Little Mermaid a potion that causes incredible pain as it creates a pair of legs for the mermaid. The legs make her the best dancer in the world, but she will always feel as if she's walking on sharp swords while dancing. As an added caveat to the Sea Witch's deal, if the Little Mermaid fails to win the heart of the prince, she will die and turn to sea foam. The Little Mermaid drinks the potion and proceeds to intoxicate the prince with her beauty and dancing. The prince often has her dance while she remains quiet about the incredible pain she endures during her performances. One day the prince is ordered by his father to marry a neighbouring princess, which he refuses to do. However, when he meets the neighbouring princess and sees it is the girl from the temple who he believes saved his life, he falls in love and marries her. The Little Mermaid is crushed. Awaiting her death and subsequent transformation into sea foam, the Little Mermaid is surprised when her sisters come up from the sea and give her a knife sent by the Sea Witch. If the Little Mermaid slays the prince and lets his blood drip onto her feet, the spell will be broken and she will again be a mermaid. She refuses to kill the prince and throws herself into the sea and dissolves into foam. Oddly enough, the Little Mermaid, instead of dying, becomes a "daughter of the air" and is given a chance to eventually win a soul - but only if she can make children be good. If the kids are bad, time is added to her sentence without a soul. The inspiration for the movie The Little Mermaid? The story, written as the result of an unrequited love, includes under-age sex objects, implied bestiality of a sort, a girl who can only gain a soul if kids (presumably those reading the story) are good, incredible self-inflicted pain, mutilation of a girl's mouth to make her silent around her man, a girl who painfully dances at the whims of the man she loves, and a girl who feels "incomplete" unless she denies her race for the love of that man. It's no wonder feminists have defaced the Copenhagen statue of the Little Mermaid - the tale stands for everything they despise.