Mulan is a 1998 Disney film based on Chinese legend Hua Mulan. The work was a huge critical and box office success that, over the years, has become a classic.
Fa Mulan is the only child of Fa Zhou, a former soldier in poor health. Mulan must go to Casamentosira to honor her family, and everyone is concerned about what may happen during her visit, because the desire of all women in their social context is to find a good husband and therefore honor the family.
- The family values and role of women as good housewives were closely linked in society at the time.
- And Mulan would be under a lot of pressure; she doesn’t feel ready.
- She has other desires and dreams.
- The visit will be a disaster and Mulan will feel guilty for dishonoring his family and not being able to find a place in society.
At the same time, the Chinese army started a war against the Huns, so the emperor asks that a man of each family go to fight during the war, in Mulan’s family the only man is his father, so the rule is that he should serve in the Chinese army. Mulan goes against this decision because he knows that because of his health, his father will not survive. Mulan will then pretend to be a man, leave the house and join the army.
The values of the traditional family, of patriarchal society, where man is the hero and the woman is left in the background, limited to the home, are more than established, but Mulan does not seem to fit in with them.
During your visit to the Casamentera, we see young women concerned about their appearance, very excited to find a husband; Mulan, on the other hand, prepares at the last minute, makes a little glue to remember what he has to say and doesn’t really know what to do. Mulan knows he has to honor his family and really wants to honor his parents. ; However, he fails in his attempt with the Matchmaker and wonders what his true obligations are.
Finally, she breaks the rules, violates everything that is established by joining the army instead of her father, not only to save him, but also to herself, Mulan must find her place in society and prove that she serves more than being an exemplary. Spouse.
When Mulan decides to disguise himself as a man, something very symbolic happens: Mulan cuts his hair with his father’s sword, this detail could go unnoticed and one would understand it only as Mulan’s Transition, the change and the beginning of the whole adventure. , but there is something else, the hair and sword are full of symbolic connotations.
If we think of mythology or war books, we will realize that the sword is always linked to honor; the sword is part of the man who accompanies it, represents victories, personal growth and honor in battles. Every great knight has his sword and with it he has won battles.
Mulan’s sword is his father’s sword, the sword with which he honored the Fa family. Mulan takes the sword and cuts his hair with it. Hair also has a strong symbolic burden related to honor; if one thinks of Samson, the hair symbolizes his strength and honor. Large hair, in turn, is associated with female hair.
Like in? Singing from Mio Cid? The Cid’s beard reflected his honor, the more battles he won, the bigger his beard became; in the same way we see the emperor in Mulan with a huge white beard, symbol of the wisdom and great honor he has, and because he is the emperor, he is the character with the greatest beard.
Mulan failed, dishonored her family and herself, so she cuts her hair and does so with the element that once honored her father. Upon returning from the army and after saving China, Mulan returns to his father the sword and objects the emperor gave him. honoring his family in this way.
As we have already seen, the role of women in the society presented in the film is quite secondary. Mulan will be a totally atypical female character never seen at Disney. Mulan will be a rebel, a woman who defies the rules and shows us that each of us can do whatever he wants, because no man is taller than a woman.
When the emperor asks people for help, he asks only one man in each family for help, and cannot be replaced by a woman, even if his health is bad, which Mulan considers unfair because he is young and can serve China. in better condition than his father, who would probably not survive such a challenge.
Mulan must measure his words and act like a man to go unnoticed. There is a time when soldiers sing a song about women and everyone asks them to be “beautiful flowers”, “they know how to cook”, etc. Mulan calls a woman you can talk to, by intelligence and cunning, that the rest of the soldiers reject because they are not qualities one would expect to find in a woman.
Things are not easy for Mulan at first, however, she quickly managed to excel and earn the respect and recognition of the rest of the soldiers, when this first obstacle seems overcome, they discover that she is a woman and that some people do. don’t accept it, even after you’ve saved everyone and proven yourself to be a good warrior.
There are many occasions when you can have evidence of the difficulty of being a woman in a man’s world, where many people stop listening and even say “shut up in the presence of a man”. Or that she will never be appreciated because she is a woman. Despite adversity, Mulan will be a hero, breaking all paradigms and stereotypes and saving her country, proving that she is not a minor because she is a woman.
We see one before and after her, the carefree young woman who was first seen missing, showing herself a strong and courageous woman, like any man.
“Feminist is someone who recognizes the equality and full humanity of women and men. -Gloria Steinem-
Probably unakscious of the gravity of the war until he arrived at a camp where there were no survivors, there he will find a lost doll, symbolizing his feminine and childish part, this encounter with the doll represents an encounter with himself, with his true self and, at the same time, the end of innocence and a step towards maturity.
Mulan is not a princess and her beauty is barely mentioned, she is far from the disney princess prototype, she depicts the portrait of a woman like any other, with aspirations, dreams and a desire to outdo herself and prove she is not. inferior to men.
“A woman without a man is like a fish without a bicycle. “Gloria Steinem.