All Hail Halley Mills

Let’s start off with a quote by the great author and mediocre script author Reynold Fleece in his book Hollywood ‘30-’69: Hays Is For Pigs And The Movies Too!,

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Never mind, people don’t read long winded quotes anymore. Anyway, this blog will be a respectful attempt to appreciate, editorialize, eulogize, or otherwise comment on the 1961 Hayley Mills vehicle, The Parent Trap. Now that’s out of the way, let’s get to the blog post.

The Parent Trap may seemingly to most eyes be another Disney “gimmick picture” as Leonard Maltin later described it, coming off the heels of the Shaggy Dog, an insanely cheap movie especially compared to the very expensive Sleeping Beauty that released the same year. And yet the Shaggy Dog turned a large profit for Walt Disney Productions. Sleeping Beauty on the other hand became a huge dud and cause the animation department to become second banana to the theme parks, TV productions, and of course the very cheap but very profitable live action department.

But, Parent Trap is much more than that. Ignoring its various themes of love or the special effects work that created the illusion of identical twins that look just like Hayley Mills that earned it a nomination for Best Editing by the Academy, today we shall talk about the hidden symbolism inside the Parent Trap.

The number two is obviously very important in this film with the TWO kids having come from TWO different parts and eventually both of the twins come to their Father’s House which has TWO house hands on site where their Father is internally fighting his inner feeling for TWO people: Vicky and His Ex Wife, Margrent.

But, two is not just an important number in The Parent Trap. As the common saying goes, “Good things come in pairs” and this has bled into common culture as well with the US Government for instance having two representatives per state in the Senate.

But I feel like it’s more important to discuss when discussing the Parent Trap, the importance of the number two when it comes to the Walt Disney Company both in the past and in the present. First and foremost, the only year that Walt Disney Productions released two fully animated pictures for over 30 years was in 1940 with the release of Pinnocchio and Fantasia. Coincidentally enough, Pinnoccio, Walt Disney Productions second feature came out. Later a ride based on the film was built at Tokyo Disneyland and Disneyland in 1983.

The last new attraction at Disneyland based on a movie was previously Swiss Family Robinson Treehouse in 1962 based on the Walt Disney Productions’s 1960 film Swiss Family Robinson staring Thomas Kirk that opened 21 years earlier. 21 years after Pinnocchio’s Daring Journey was 2004 when Stitch’s Great Escape opened at the Magic Kingdom.

Stitch’s Great Escape was attempted to “fix” to Alien Encounter, an attraction that was a hit among older guests, but scared kids away with it’s slasher movie inspired tone. In the end Stitch’s Great Escape became a mess that appealed to no one. The main(literal) centerpiece of the ride is Stitch, a blue creature that likes eating chili dogs. That sounds familiar.

Sonic the Hedgehog was created by Sega to rival Mario and Nintendo in the video game console market. Sonic the Hedgehog created a “Genesis” for Sega’s success in the US video game market and was really Nintendo first threat to their dominance. Sonic is a blue hedgehog that enjoys going fast and protecting the environment from the devious Dr. “Baldy McNoseHair”. American media also added a trait that was not present in the Jpanese version of Sonic: a love for chili dogs. Another title that Sega published in 1991 was 688 Attack Sub, a submarine simulator that never became one of the Genesis’s treasured titles. What does this have to do with the Walt Disney Company?

The Walt Disney Company has opened two rides with a submarine ride system one in California and one in Walt Disney World within the Magic Kingdom. While the first one in California was originally tied with no outright movie connection, the one inside the Magic Kingdom was based on the 1954 movie 20,000 Leagues Under The Sea.

Ub Iwerks a special effects master worked on both 20,000 leagues under the sea and Parent Trap. Parent Trap also uses the term “submerined” to mean to decimate/destroy. One man from 20,000 leagues under the sea had his entire life destroyed when his civilization and family went bottom up and became a nobody or “Nemo”.

Nemo is also the name of a fish in the 2003 film Finding Nemo. Which the original submarine ride at Disneyland was later rethemed to in 2008. Technically the submarines went from one attraction to two that day when a handicap accessible version of the ride opened along with it that functions similarly to a similar room in the Sleeping Beauty walkthrough showing a film version of the actual attraction. So really in the end Parent Trap was really a warning that the submarine ride would be rethemed to Finding Neo and be split in two.

I don’t think I’m writing about the Parent Trap again for a while.