Disney Annie’s first Southeast Asian princess character’unidentified’ controversy

(Seoul = Yonhap News) Reporter Lee Young-seop = There is a controversy over the identity of Disney’s new animation, Raya and the Last Dragon, featuring Southeast Asian characters.

When trying to represent the Southeast Asian sentiment in which various cultural groups coexist with one film, an ambiguous situation was created in which various elements were woven together.

On the 7th (local time), the British public broadcaster BBC introduced, “Online, there are complaints that the film has selected specific parts from different cultures in the region and put them together into one.”

‘Raya and the Last Dragon’, released on the 4th of this month, is Disney’s first work inspired by Southeast Asian culture.

The main plot is that Raya, who has been reborn as a warrior, goes on a great adventure in search of the legendary last dragon’Sisu’ to save the kingdom of Kumandra divided by the forces of darkness.

It is noteworthy that Raya is Disney’s 13th princess and the first Southeast Asian princess.

Disney struggled to create a figure representing the 673 million people in Southeast Asia, spanning 11 countries.

Accordingly, cultural elements unique to Southeast Asia are incorporated throughout the movie.

The hat worn by the protagonist Raya is reminiscent of the traditional Filipino hat’Salakot’, and the name of the animal he rides’Tuk Tuk’ means a three-wheeled vehicle commonly found in the Philippines, Thailand, and Cambodia.

Raya’s fighting style was inspired by traditional martial arts such as Indonesia,’Silat’.

It is meaningful in that it puts the culture of Southeast Asia, which has been relatively alienated from Hollywood movies, to the fore, but it is pointed out that it is an unreasonable attempt to capture the heterogeneous cultures of different groups in one work.

This means that it is difficult to group the culture of this region, which is clearly different by country and region, into a single concept of’Southeast Asia’.

This phenomenon is also a result of past colonial experience, explained David Lim, associate professor at Malaysian Open University.

For example, he explained that the cultures of Vietnam, which was a French colony, and Indonesia, which was a Dutch colony, are inevitably different.

He said, unlike Europeans who perceive themselves as’European’, Southeast Asian residents do not view them as’Southeast Asians’.

The film production company stated that the work was only inspired by Southeast Asia and did not intend to focus on a culture or country.

“I think the legend of King Arthur is similar to that from stories in Europe,” said co-writer Qui Nguyen.

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2021/03/08 11:10 sent