Part One- Whoops, I summoned the
Inciting Incident
Ah, Labyrinth, how I love thee. Way
back when in 1986 when you first came out, you were a flop, but now you have
grown into a cult film beloved by many. I was far more cynical upon my first
viewing of you, but my heart has softened as time went by and I gave you a few
more viewings. My love for you has blossomed past your many sins. It has
blossomed past the sometimes awkward acting. It has blossomed past the cheesy
dialogue. It has blossomed past the insanely tight tights of the Bowie Bulge
that caused many people to either gasp, snicker, or stare. It has grown past
the fact that the songs were probably pointless. Now people can see you at your
heart- and you are a fun, insanely creative, and exciting fantasy adventure
with everything from humor to characters to heart to fear to great music.
Since
the film was marketed more towards kids and teenagers, there are some messages
that are very explicit to the point where the characters say them- such as life
is not fair, stick with your friends, etc. But this is a film that can have a
wide variety of meanings and messages depending on one’s interpretation. Now if
you disagree with anything I say from this point onward (and some things I am
going to say, especially about a certain popular goblin king), I am not saying
that you are stupid or you are wrong, or that you should feel any sort of
guilt. Labyrinth, like many other
films, is a different experience for
every person who views it. I would just like to express what my interpretation
of the film (using more than one literary theory) was beyond the seemingly
simple messages. Also, I will assume that you, the reader, have watched all of
Labyrinth, and know everything that happens. Unless you have not, and want to
watch the movie without knowing anything, then you might not want to read this.
Without
further ado, let’s start at the beginning of the film and take a look at our
films protagonist, Sarah Williams (played by Jennifer Connelly).
Now
Sarah is an ordinary 15 year old girl who lives in suburbia. What makes her
unique is that she has a huge passion for fantasy and fairy tales. She reads
books like The Wonderful Wizard of Oz and
acts out her favorite stories- one of them being from a book titled
“Labyrinth”- outside wearing costumes and make-up. Her room is filled with fantasy
books, games, dolls, and stuffed animals. But since she is a teenager, she is
often criticized for having interests that are considered too juvenile for her
age. She is probably not very popular at school, and although she wishes she
could receive romantic attention from most likely boys, she is still hesitant about
plunging into the world of romance, dating, and sexuality, especially if it
means giving up herself.
Sarah has a rough relationship with her family. Her
father, Robert, divorced her biological mother, Linda, some time ago. Now he
has remarried another woman, named Irene, and has had a baby boy, named Toby, with
her. Although Irene loves Sarah and wants what is best for her, she can be a
little harsh and pushy. Although she
acts out of love and concern, she criticizes Sarah for not being like “other girls”
and often tells her what she should do, which often concerns doing things
teenage girls are traditionally expected to do (“Girls your age should have
dates, I’d like it if you’d have dates.”). It grows to the extent that Sarah
feels trapped and pressured (“I can’t do anything right, can I?”).
The
other female role model Sarah has is her biological mother, who she does not
see often. In the films script, not much is said out loud about Linda Williams
and Sarah’s relationship with her, but there is a lot that can be implied
through looking at her room and reading the novelization of the film. Sarah
keeps a scrapbook full of pictures and newspaper clippings of her mother. From
the titles of the clippings we can tell that she is an accomplished actress (looks
like Sarah is clearly her mother’s daughter!). The posters of various musicals hanging
up in Sarah’s room, such as Cats and Evita, are various shows that starred her mother. Linda has not only
achieved fame, and fortune, but beauty and romance as well. A couple pictures
from an article taking about the couples onstage and offstage romance, show her
mother beside a (familiar looking) handsome, blond man with high cheekbones
(according to the novelization, his name is “Jeremy”). Sarah idolizes her mother.
Linda has everything Sarah wants but feels that she does not have; fame,
beauty, fortune, an extraordinary career of playing pretend, and a glamorous,
exciting romance with a dream prince along with being praised and desired. But
the pressures to grow up, including taking on responsibility and accepting the
strict standards her stepmother wants her to achieve sounds demanding and
contradictory to the glamorous world she wants to attain when she reaches
adulthood…or at least dream about from a safe distance. This is something many
teenage girls can relate to; they have many things they want for themselves
when they grow up. But when they reach adolescence, everyone around them, whether
it be family members or the media, tries to tell them many mixed messages about
who they are or what they should be or want (for example; “You don’t want to
marry or have kids? Oh, you’ll change your mind once you find the right guy”, “Don’t
wear so much make-up all the time, people won’t take you seriously,” and they
range from “Having dates and lots of sex is the only way you will be considered
a woman”, versus “You’re just a child, you don’t know what you want”, and
that’s to name a few!). This leaves Sarah confused about what she wants out of
life. She wants the glamour of adulthood and the light-hearted fun of childhood
at the same time.
Her
frustration climaxes when she is left alone at home to babysit little Toby while
her parents go out on a date. There are a few ways we can interpret Toby, but
the one we will touch on for now is that he is the physical embodiment of
Sarah’s adult responsibility. Adult responsibilities include looking after
other people other than yourself, according to Piaget’s developmental stages of
childhood to adolescence, one vital quality of
preoperational staged children is egocentrism (only thinking about
oneself), and playing make believe. As you grow older, you begin to think of
people other than yourself and not be as grounded in fantasy as opposed to
reality. These are two qualities Sarah, despite being past the preoperational
stage (which according to Piaget occurs in children from ages two to seven),
has yet to possess. She does not want to be a role model and take time doing
something she doesn’t want to do, or think about looking after another human
being other than herself. Toby has even been given Sarah’s stuffed bear,
Lancelot and when she discovers that, she is furious! It is Toby is physical
evidence that her mother is now out of her reach and that she has to face the
bland reality of adulthood rather than the wide-eyed dreams of childhood. Considering
that Sarah was an only child until he was born, he is a rude wakeup call out of
her bubble. Not only does she now have to look after another human being, he is
also a baby. He has more of a childhood to go than she has left. He can play
with toys and pretend if he wants to, while she is no longer allowed to do what
she loves.
Her
jealousy boils into outright hatred. She yells at Toby “I hate you!” When Toby
won’t stop crying, she tells him a story; clearly it is a similar but not exact
re-telling of the story from her book, “Labyrinth.” In the story, Sarah is the
beautiful heroine she wants to be, and she makes her stepmother an evil
stepmother who forces her to be a “slave” to the “spoiled child.” In the story,
she is so beautiful that the king of the goblins falls in love with her, giving
Sarah her desired male attention- she has a beauty so strong that even adult
men are drawn to her! But the goblin king in the story offers to take the baby
away to his kingdom so she could be “free.” The only issue is that the baby
will eventually turn into a goblin once brought there. Despite this, Sarah, now
acting it out, summons the goblin king to take the baby away. But it is when
she accidentally uses the correct summoning words “I wish” (“I wish the goblins would come
and take you away…right now”) does it come true.
And BAM! Goodbye Toby! Clutter, clutter, dramatic music, noise, scuttering, evil cackling and POW! Magic, magic, magic, window breaks through, dramatic wind and shadows!
One
theme that pops up throughout the film is the importance of choice. Sarah must
now deal with the consequences of her wish being fulfilled, since she chose to
say the words (granted, she did not know they would really come true). Her wish
is for the goblin king to fall in love with her so that he and the goblins
could take the baby away. Now that the baby is gone, Sarah realizes how selfish
her wish was; she has sent a defenseless infant out into an unknown environment
to eventually turn into a monster. The goblin king, named Jareth, played by
famed British rock singer David Bowie, appears before her and refuses to give
the baby back despite her pleading. What is remarkable is that he is the exact same man in the photos with
Sarah’s mother (Hello Elektra complex!). He is made to appear “completely
alluring, completely a character that draws people in and that people are
infatuated with,” like “a romantic hero” and “a young girl’s dream of a pop
star”, glitter, leather, and all. He is the fulfillment of her wish for male
attention similar to her mother.
But what kind of love does he have
to offer her? Well, not only does he refuse to return the baby at the request
of his beloved, but he demeans her as a child, telling her to go back and “play
with your toys and costumes.” He offers her a magic crystal ball “that will
show you your dreams” instead of returning Toby, but Sarah turns down the gift.
We will see later what those dreams are, but for now, I can say that they
consist of pretty dresses and fairy tale balls and romance. When Sarah rejects
it, he turns it into a snake and throws it at her, with a warning of “Don’t
defy me.” Already, we know that although he gives her romantic male attention,
he sees her as a helpless child who needs to be taught submission and punished
for doing otherwise.
The magic crystal ball he holds
(insert masturbation joke) upholds traditional gender roles in the form of what
he claims to be her “dreams.” When Sarah says no to that, he turns it into a snake in order to scare her into doing
what he wants. Immediately, we get two images from that animal. One is a
phallic symbol- and since he throws it at Sarah, he is using the fact that he
is male and therefore more powerful than her, the “power –less” female, to
threaten and attacks her into obedience. He has twisted her dreams into a form
of suppression; something that will harm her into doing what he wants her to
do- to stay childlike and helpless instead of accept the simultaneous power and
responsibility of adulthood.
Secondly, the snake quotes the serpent from The
Genesis story of the fall of mankind. The devil in the form of a serpent also
offered a supposedly round object to a woman claiming that it would give her
what she wanted despite her protests that it was not the right thing to do. He
is not only connected to masculinity and the superficial glamour of romance,
but also the devil, the embodiment of
evil.
The last offer he makes Sarah is
that if she can solve the Labyrinth in his alternate fantasy world, and reach
the castle in goblin city in 13 hours or fewer, than he will give back the baby
or else “he will be one of us.”
Sarah hesitantly accepts his
challenge, and moves forward with her rescue mission.
But the adventure has only begun.
Sources Cited:
Labyrinth. Dir. Jim Henson. Jim
Henson, 1986. DVD.
Smith, A. C. H., Brian Froud, and
Jim Henson. Jim Henson's The Labyrinth: The Novelization. N.p.: n.p., n.d.
Print.
"Labyrinth (film)."
Wikipedia. Wikimedia Foundation, 2006. Web. 21 Jan. 2015.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Labyrinth_(film)>.
Cherry, Kendra. "Piaget's
Stages of Cognitive Development: The 4 Stages." Psychology.about.com.
About.com, n.d. Web. 20 Jan. 2015.
<http://psychology.about.com/od/piagetstheory/a/keyconcepts.htm>.
