Fictional Travel Movie: The Princess and the Frog

The premise: Tiana, a hard working African American woman living in New Orleans, kisses the frog version of Prince Naveen to change him back into a human; but instead is turned into a frog herself.

Travel Review: The entire story of The Princess and The Frog is focused on New Orleans but only a few of the places mentioned/seen are real.

Important Locations:
Charlotte’s Mansion
Streetcar 820, A113 (Background on NOLA’s streetcars)
Tiana’s Home
Duke’s Cafe
Sugar mill on the water front/Tiana’s Palace
French Quarter
Dr. Facilier’s Voodoo Emporium (real world, non-demonic equivalent Rev. Zombie’s Voodoo Shop)
Bayous near New Orleans
Mama Odie’s “beached” riverboat
Riverboat docking, DeLuca Wholesale
Mardi Gras night parade, intersection of Orleans Ave. and Royal St.
New Orleans cemetery (Check out NOLAcemeteries.com for more info on NOLA’s awesome cemeteries)

Watching the movie makes me long to visit New Orleans but in a general way. It hits main culture points like jazz music and cajun cuisine, but misses cajun music, demonizes voodoo culture and represents cajuns as morons. As a huge fan of Remy LeBeau (Gambit from X-Men for all you non-geeks) and a general disliker of misrepresentation in media this irked me.

Story Review: The message of hard work pays off but make sure to have love in your life is good, but it’s quite a muddled message. No matter how hard Tiana works, it’s made clear that she/her work isn’t worth much if she doesn’t have a man in her life. Perhaps asking for a story where the female’s worth isn’t tied to who she loves, if she choose to love anyone is a bit much– but the idea of a girl growing up believing her life can only be validated by an outside source, like a boyfriend or husband (or Heaven forbid a girlfriend or wife) spells trouble in the form of low self esteem and confidence.

The arguments that it’s a kid’s story and it’s from Disney are invalid because Bambi, The Lion King and Lilo + Stitch are Disney stories that resonate with everyone. Granted none of these examples are princess movies, but Lilo + Stitch does focus on a female character. I’d also like to mention that I don’t have a vendetta against princesses as this blog gets part of it’s name from a princess. However Princess Thorn (from Bone) is in the minority of princesses since she farms, fights and wears a normal clothing.

Travel Score:

Have you seen this movie or other Disney princess movies? What’s your opinion on them?