If you have seen Into the Woods, you probably entered the theater expecting a heartwarming Disney fairy tale full of wicked monsters, heroic princes, and of course a beautiful, kind-hearted ingenue. Or, if you saw the on-stage musical beforehand, you entered the theater watching your friends' faces to witness their reactions. You knew exactly what was coming and the ending didn't shock you.
Most people I have talked to have concluded that it was disappointing. However, I would beg to differ. I will compare this shocking tragedy with traditional Disney fairy tales and you can decide for yourself.
Let's consider some first-rate princess cartoons, such as Cinderella, Snow White, The Little Mermaid, and Sleeping Beauty. They all draw a clear line between right and wrong. The princess are kind and compassionate, even to their enemies. Conversely, the villains are wicked through and through. For little to no reason, they want to destroy the heroes and heroines. In the end, a heroic young prince fights bravely and saves the princess. Good wins!Then the little girls turn the television off and earnestly desire a beautiful dress and a castle like the princesses. They hope that maybe someday a handsome prince will save them and everybody will appreciate them for the beautiful heroines that they are and they'll live happily ever after. Then HIGH SCHOOL happens. Not everybody appreciates them for the beautiful princesses that they are! And there are not handsome boys falling all over them! The audacity!
I don't believe this happens all the time. Not everybody was hooked on the Disney fairy tales as a child like I was. But I think that children need to know that they are not perfect. They will make mistakes and hurt people and they need to recognize the bad choices that they have made rather than thinking that life is all about them.
This is where I believe Into the Woods has bested the fairy tales. The characters have weaknesses, some of them fatal. The baker believes his wife to be incapable. The princes are players. Jack is a thief. Little Red is naive and gullible. The baker's wife does anything necessary to break the curse on her family. And that's only in the first act.
They also make mistakes and hurt each other. Jack kills a giant after stealing his most prized possessions. The prince's steward accidentally kills Jack's mother in an effort to keep her quiet. The baker's wife cheats on her husband with Cinderella's prince.
They have conflicts of interest. The baker's wife has several different wishes. On one hand she wishes to have a baby more than anything else. Once she's had the baby, she desires to keep it safe and save the kingdom from the giant. Then the prince kisses her and she wishes she could be royalty. Even though some of her desires are wrong, her character is an honest portrayal of human nature. Everyone wants the wrong things as well as the right things. People naturally have conflicting desires and that is why the baker's wife is the most rounded, real character.
Ultimately, the lesson is that our wishes lead to actions and those actions have consequences. In the traditional fairy tales, wishes coming true are seen as a happy ending. Into the Woods sheds a critical light on that concept. What if your wishes do come true? Are you willing to accept the results?However, I cannot wholly vouch for this movie. There are some very dark points to consider.
Adultery is accepted, if not justified. After the baker's wife and the prince kiss, she wishes that she could have both her husband and the prince, rather than her husband or the prince. She sings these words:
Just remembering you've had an 'and'/ When you're back to 'or'/ Makes the 'or' mean more/ Than it did before.
So, if you commit adultery you will end up treasuring your husband more. That was her conclusion anyway. Yeah, no.
The musical ends with another misconception. The last song occurs when Cinderella and the baker instruct Jack and Little Red on how to continue on when almost everyone they know are dead. They plan to slay the giant, but Red laments that she doesn't think that it's right to do so. She believes that it would be wrong. Older, wiser Cinderella reminds her that she can decide what's right and what's wrong:
Witches can be right/ Giants can be good/ You decide what's right/ You decide what's good
This lovely song is the perfect essence of postmodernism. Morality is relevant. YOU can decide.
However, this song is incoherent with the rest of the musical. The lesson was "Be careful of the wishes you make," because they can hurt other people and yield terrible results. But if I decide what right, than why does it matter if I hurt other people to get what I want? Can't I decide that what I want is the highest good?
The moral retracts on itself. But that's postmodernism in a nutshell.
Thank you for reading and I hope this was helpful for analyzing Into the Woods!
