Line Pocahontas And John Smith example essay topic

490 words
While popular and widely watched the movie Pocahontas is an inn accurate portrait of historical event. The Disney Corporation is not known for it's of historical events and when producing the animated film Pocahontas, Disney did not fail in it's nonchalant attitude concerning historic fact. Cartoonists at disney must have been watching adult films when they first penciled out the figures of Pocahontas and John Smith. The young Indian princess was only twelve years old at the time of her first encounter with John Smith, yet she is portrayed as a hard body honey in her twenties. In order to match the beauty of their female character, cartoonists depicted John Smith as a perfectly sculpted young man with locks of bright blonde hair; however, he was merely a foul English seaman in his early thirties with dark dingy hair.

Pocahontas did not look like Tia Carrera and John Smith was certainly no Fabio. At the beginning of the movie John Smith is portrayed as an Indian hater and proclaimed to be the best Indian killer ever. In all actuality he was the greatest link that the English had between the Indians and themselves. His strict military discipline and negotiation proved to be very valuable tools. The Indians respected him and while he was in charge of Jamestown was melting pot that brought the knowledge of two very different civilizations together. As in every great love story there has to be a dramatic display of love between the two main characters; therefore, at the end of the movie Pocahontas saves John Smith from the wrath of her vengeful father.

Sorry Disney but it didn't quite happen that way. John Smith was taken captive by the Indians but Powhatan, the leader of the Powhatan Confederacy, was so impressed by John Smith's courage that he arranged a reconciliation ceremony in which Pocahontas saved John's life during a mock execution. This would have been a great ending to a story that was totally fiction, but when representing a historical event there must be a limit as to how much you stretch the truth. One would think that with as much money and power that the Disney Corporationposseses it could at least present a halfway accurate historical representation of an event. The only real historical fact that was ever used was that somewhere along the line Pocahontas and John Smith met each other and every other piece of historical information that pertains to the story of the establishing of Jamestown was thrown out the window. In order to teach children the value of their heritage they must learn it correctly the first time that they are introduced to it.

If children are exposed to inn accurate port rails of history then they are going to grow up to be either disinterested in their heritage or simpleminded towards it.