Sleeping Beauty-Representation

The Sleeping Beauty poster features a main image of Aurora asleep and Prince Philip leaning in to kiss her. At first glance this image may seem normal, as it acts as a semantic code considering that we all know the main premise of the story. However, when you take the context out of the image it can be seen as downright creepy. All we see is an image of a man kissing a woman who is unconscious and unable to give her consent. This may not have been the intended meaning for the image, and although it is simply part of the narrative, it's still a little odd.

Aurora conforms to the beauty standard of the late 50s: long blonde hair, small waist etc. In the film she is portrayed as a helpless victim throughout her life who falls in love instantly with Prince Philip and ends up needing his help to save her and defeat the villain. Aurora can be seen as symbolic of beauty, she wears red lipstick in the poster, a colour connoting seduction and endearment and she additionally holds a rose, typically known as a flower representative of love and romance.

The 50s were a decade of recovery for America, after World War Two and holds great significance for women. During the war, women were assigned more industrial and typically masculine jobs, they were encouraged through propaganda depicting women in more powerful positions. However, once the war was over, women were treated worse than before, as their role in the war resulted in a loss of status for the men, which needed to be resolved by any means necessary for them. The 60s included something called 'second wave feminism', which meant that more women were fighting for their rights and an equal society. 1959 also brought the first steps towards a birth control pill, and women were advancing more professionally during this time.

Liesbet Van Zoonen's Feminist theory can be applied to this poster. Van Zoonen states that gender is constructed through discourse, and it's meaning can vary due to historical or cultural context. She explains that the male body is usually constructed in media as a spectacle, which is shown in the Sleeping Beauty poster through the image at the bottom of Prince Philip fighting the dragon.

Here Prince Philip is fighting the dragon on his horse whilst holding a sword. His body is placed in a powerful position and he is depicted as a hero through this image alone. It could be argued that by placing Philip next to the dragon, he is depicted as the weaker being of the two, so this could challenge Van Zoonen's theory as the dragon could be argued to be the spectacle of the poster instead of the Prince; however in comparison to Aurora, it is obvious that Philip is positioned as the stronger, more powerful character.