This post will be sort of like part movie review, part summary, part commentary – it's me going through Aladdin, describing the plot so no one is lost wondering what I'm talking about, and sharing lots of the thoughts I've had while watching and thinking about it. Basically it's a love letter to my favourite Disney movie, which I've wanted to do for a while and felt the 30th anniversary would be the perfect time. Enjoy.
The movie, of course, opens with its striking, fiery red background – the colours in this film are simply gorgeous – and whisks us away through the desert and into the city of Agrabah, all to what really does feel like just the first verse and chorus of Arabian Nights. I kind of want Disney to adapt more Arabian Nights stories and do them in the same style as Aladdin; same type of animation, same worldbuilding so that all the stories could seem to take place in the same world as Agrabah, and all of them opening with Arabian Nights.
The song leads right into our meeting the funny merchant who shows us his wares before introducing us to the lamp and offering to tell us its story. I've noticed a lot of Disney movies open with a framing device, and this one is one of their most involving and certainly the funniest. I want to be in Agrabah considering wares from that merchant. I am glad they decided not to circle back to the framing device at the end of the movie, because while that was a perfect choice for Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, Cinderella, and Sleeping Beauty, or for Tangled, I feel like in Aladdin's case that would have taken us out of the story.
The very first part of the actual story we see introduces us to our main villain, Jafar, and he's just the perfect villain in every way. He's tall and imposing and everything about him just screams “evil”. From the way he's first introduced to us in shadow and his eyes glint red in the nighttime to the way he is so merciless to Gazeem, there can be no doubt in our minds we've just met our bad guy. Jafar has just managed to locate the Cave of Wonders, which he's been trying to find for years, and we know he wants to find some “lamp” inside but don't know exactly what for. (Well, I'm sure we do know because that part of Aladdin's story is iconic, but you know what I mean.) The sentient Cave refuses to let Jafar's minion Gazeem inside and demands that only a “Diamond in the Rough” may enter, and when Jafar insists Gazeem enter anyway, the Cave kills him. From the way Jafar was speaking to Gazeem it's pretty clear he would have done that job himself in the end if the Cave hadn't. We also get to see Jafar's absolutely fantastic dynamic with his sidekick Iago the angry parrot. The way they play off each other is – well, it's like your typical comedy duo if the duo was evil and the “straight man” was seriously creepy. Jafar is tall and still and dignified, and usually calm if you can call a constant simmering anger calm, while Iago is short and round, perpetually angry, and forever has some wisecrack about whatever's going on. They are an absolute delight to have onscreen – not to mention, without their dynamic, we wouldn't have nearly as many chances to watch Jafar being evil! Who would he talk to about his plans? We wouldn't get to see Jafar's delightful villainy until Aladdin exposes him, which is far too long to have to wait.
It is an interesting choice Aladdin makes, to wait a full two scenes before finally introducing us to our protagonist. The main reason I can think of is so that Jafar's line “I must find this one, this... diamond in the rough” would lead right into Aladdin's introduction. In any case the first two scenes are definitely engaging enough to keep you watching until Aladdin comes in – although I will admit, the first couple times I watched the film I did only get to that “completely hooked” stage at the third scene when we get to start following Aladdin.
And you will get hooked once you start following Aladdin. Everything about his introduction scene is carefully crafted to make you fall in love with him. His charm and his cleverness evading the guards – and the way we can tell he's in a very unfair situation here; he's just trying not to starve and a bunch of angry armed men are chasing him around with swords! He's obviously almost enjoying outsmarting the guards, and never underestimate the power of a protagonist who can keep his spirits up in any situation. (A negative protagonist turned me off many a book in my teens, let me tell you.) He's streetsmart, but without being jaded or cynical, and seamlessly blends being a “bad boy” with genuine kindness and concern for the wellbeing of others. (We need more “bad boy” characters who are also genuinely good guys!) The movie actually lets us see why Aladdin is the one we're meant to be rooting for. And it doesn't hurt that he's super handsome, too... When Aladdin gives up his loaf of bread to a pair of starving street children who need it even more than he does, well, that was just the cherry on the loveable-protagonist cupcake. (Although I hope Aladdin doesn't have too many days like this, where he never gets to eat any of the food he just spent all that time and energy getting for himself. The guy does need to eat!)
We also meet Aladdin's adorable monkey sidekick Abu, who is funny and fiercely loyal to Aladdin and also easily offended, which all makes for a very appealing personality. He's tempted by food but even more tempted by precious gems (which will come back later). Aladdin seems able to understand Abu perfectly even though Abu doesn't talk – but of course he does. Abu is his pet. It's a special human-animal bond.
Our next scene unfolds, and Aladdin has his fight with Prince Achmed, who calls him a worthless street rat and exposes the misbelief our protagonist will need to overcome on his story journey. Prince Achmed, I believe, is almost a mirror of Aladdin. He's everything Aladdin isn't on the outside – rich and with status – but he's also the complete opposite on the inside, revealing himself in only one-and-a-bit scenes as a self-entitled jerk who thinks other people are scum. He's an ideal character type to expose the worst flaw in our hero. And by the time he does, we're more than ready to sympathize with Aladdin and follow him on his journey. I was behind him one hundred percent. This scene is absolutely essential for character development in more ways than one: without it, we would probably never understand why Aladdin is so hesitant later on in the film to tell Jasmine the truth about who he really is, and it might just look like a simple bad decision that makes us less able to root for our protagonist. I cannot overstate the importance of proper character development....
Aladdin's misbelief being exposed also leads to us finding out his greatest wish. He goes back to his little rundown hideout/home, sad and forlorn, and tells Abu that one day they will live in a palace. Now, apart from the simply heartbreaking reprise song Aladdin sings here, and that I'm one-hundred-percent on board with him getting anything he might possibly desire at this point, I do have to say here that I love how far from resentful Aladdin is. He's not looking at the palace and thinking “Oh, sure, they get to live in this big fancy palace while I'm stuck out here,” or anything unhelpful like that. That's a major difference between Aladdin and Jafar, because Jafar clearly is very resentful that the Sultan gets to sit on the throne and rule Agrabah while he doesn't, and that leads to his punishing both the Sultan and Jasmine simply for being royalty later. Aladdin simply keeps believing that he too can live this life one day.
Jafar and Aladdin are like mirrors of each other, in a way. They're both ambitious, but Jafar is resentful of everyone who is above him and feels the need to punish them, while Aladdin simply believes this life is available for him too. Jafar is not satisfied even when he does get the throne, always looking for the next thing he can possess or the next level of power he can get to, which of course eventually causes his downfall. Aladdin has the remarkable ability to remain optimistic and even enjoy himself as he lives in pretty much the worst conditions you could imagine, giving us a good indication that when he does finally get his better life, he will actually be able to enjoy it. Jafar and Aladdin are both skilled at getting other people to do what they want – though I always maintain Aladdin is better at it because he doesn't need any magic staff! But what does that say about their characters? If Aladdin can charm people into doing what he wants all on his own while Jafar needs a spell to do it – that implies Aladdin naturally gives off a more trustworthy vibe than Jafar, that people are instinctively more willing to listen to him, which is a pretty good indicator that Aladdin is the more trustworthy of the two! And when both Jafar and Aladdin want to marry Jasmine, Jafar's method is to treat her like a possession and force her into the marriage if she won't agree to it on her own, while Aladdin is constantly there to provide Jasmine with whatever she needs and genuinely cares about what will make her happy. And that treatment of people extends way beyond just Jasmine – Aladdin is kind and generous and helps everyone he finds in need, while Jafar sees people only as tools to be exploited or obstacles to be punished once he has gotten them out of the way. Aladdin and Jafar have many parallel traits, and yet, Aladdin will never respond to any situation the way Jafar does, because he has a deep love and a caring for others at the very core of his nature that Jafar could never conceive of. The same traits and life goals will always be approached in two completely opposite ways, because Aladdin could never find it in himself to hurt people (we know he wouldn't, because he's already in pretty much the worst life circumstance you could imagine and that hasn't done it yet!) and Jafar could never find it in himself to feel any caring or compassion (I think he's too far gone to even want to try). And that, I think, is truly what makes a perfect hero/villain combination.
Back at the palace, Prince Achmed storms out with a hole torn in his pants by Rajah, and his parting words to the Sultan are very telling: “Good luck marrying her off!” Of course, Prince Achmed. I'm sure that given what we see of your personality, the match not working out was entirely Jasmine's fault... I'm sure there's no one out there who could possibly suit her, now that we know a self-centred jerk like you didn't manage it.... I bet he didn't even try to make himself appealing to her, beyond perhaps bragging about how great he is. Honestly, when you think about it, while Jasmine is quite understandably upset with the men in her life for treating her like a prize, as in “an inanimate object with no free will or say in which person it ultimately ends up with”, it's quite interesting how none of her suitors seem to be treating her as much of a prize, as in “someone worth enough to put in the effort required to be with her” at all.
At this point we're introduced to the Sultan and Jasmine, arguing about Jasmine's suitors and Jasmine's not choosing one, and I absolutely love the father-daughter dynamic we see between them as the story unfolds. Even while they're clashing, we can see the Sultan really does love Jasmine and wants to do what's best for her – but he's fallen into that trap of believing being a parent means telling Jasmine what to do and how to live her life all the time. He never questions the rules that are already in place, just assuming this is the way things must be done. The Sultan's whole arc is being set up here as wanting to uphold his authority and the laws, but also genuinely wanting Jasmine to be happy, and he's going to have to decide which one he wants more. I absolutely love the way the Sultan has this whole character conflict and arc, making sure that as round and exaggerated and funny and bouncy as he is, he still feels like a person. Now that's the way to write a comical supporting character!
And then there's Jasmine, and if you've seen pretty much any of my content before, you know how much I love her. She's this incredible blend of sweet, innocent, and romantic, and tough, determined, and fiery, with of course a dash of sultry for good measure, and all of it blends together into one beautiful character. She stands up for herself and what she knows is right for her, but not in any way that makes her come across as unpleasant or negative, and the way she and her pet tiger Rajah are laughing together about chasing Prince Achmed off adds yet another, mischievous, element to her character, which would be very boring if she were either all sweet or all tough. I was entirely “with” Jasmine from the moment she says the line: “I've never done a thing on my own. I've never even been outside the palace walls. I've never even had any real friends –” It was all just so relatable, even for those of us who did not grow up inside a palace with strict laws forbidding us from ever leaving. Jasmine is my Disney Princess soul sister. And, I do feel the need to add, I think this line proves to us that Jasmine's character motivation is something more than just “I want to marry for love”. First off, what she really says is “If I do marry, I want it to be for love”, which sounds less like marriage is her main life goal and more like she wants any marriage to only happen for the right reasons and on her own terms. That's really what she's saying the entire conversation: life has never happened to her on her own terms, she's never gotten to decide anything about how she wants to live or what's right for her. It really is no wonder poor Jasmine decides to just run away.
The movie does not have a Princess song for Jasmine, which is incredibly disappointing, especially as even other non-protagonist Disney heroines, like Esmeralda and Megara, get their own songs! I know the perfect place for her song, too – at the end of this scene, right when she's just released the little white birds from their cage and is clearly thinking about how she wishes she could fly away to freedom with them. She's already thinking about how she wishes her life were different – why not let her sing about it???
Alone in what I assume are his quarters, the Sultan laments over Jasmine's inability to do what he wants – and here we have the only mention in the movie of Jasmine's mother, which is a little bit more than the last two Princesses whose movies didn't mention their mothers at all. But then unlike Belle and Ariel, Jasmine's mother does make a brief appearance in her original story, so it makes sense she should be at least mentioned here. The Sultan tells us she “wasn't nearly so picky” as Jasmine, which doesn't tell us much, especially as we can't be sure there was no selective memory or biased opinions going on there. But it does make me think Jasmine's mother was probably someone docile and proper and obedient – in other words about as different from Jasmine as you can get. I also figure they would have been very different, and maybe didn't understand each other very well, because Jasmine gives us no sign of ever wishing for her mother's guidance, and from the way she describes her life I don't get the sense she ever connected with any of the women in the Sultan's harem, or got much support from them. (No, the movie never actually mentions the Sultan having a harem. But seriously – there is no way a man who is so insistent on his daughter following the old established marriage traditions didn't do the same thing himself.)
And now we're introduced to a rather startling fact: the man we have just spent a whole scene establishing as our undisputed evil villain is also the Sultan's most trusted advisor. Our heroine and her father are living right under the same roof as our villain without knowing anything about his true nature – that feels safe, right! Jafar also reveals to us that he can hypnotize the Sultan, and uses this power to make the Sultan give him a special ring which Jafar needs for a spell to find the Diamond in the Rough. We also find out Iago has his own personal vendetta against the Sultan: the Sultan thinks it's nice to feed the parrot crackers, which Iago absolutely hates. Now, read between the lines a minute here. Iago hates crackers with a passion, and he can talk perfect English (well, I guess he'd really be talking Arabic, but you get what I'm saying), and yet the Sultan has no idea Iago doesn't like the treat he keeps feeding him. Of course Iago never talks like a human in front of anyone except Jafar, so presumably Jafar didn't want Iago to reveal that power before it was time for his takeover. But couldn't Jafar have told the Sultan about Iago's preference? There's nothing strange at all about knowing what foods your pet prefers – the Sultan certainly wouldn't be suspicious of anything just from that. And he's pretty good-natured, I don't think Jafar would have to worry about being beheaded just for asking his ruler not to feed his bird crackers anymore... So why is Jafar letting his parrot suffer like this? I think it's because Jafar doesn't want Iago to have more positive interactions with the Sultan. The more resentful of the Sultan Iago is, the more willing he will be to help Jafar with his evil takeover plan. Jafar is willing to let his own parrot suffer, even while it would be the easiest thing in the world to help him, just so that Iago will keep plotting his own special revenge for the Sultan when the day finally comes.
With only three days left to go before she will have to, according to the law, marry some prince, Jasmine finally runs away. I say finally because, even though it's not expressly stated, there's no way Jasmine never thought about this course of action before now. She probably thought about it lots of times, at first dismissing the notion entirely maybe, and then beginning to consider it more seriously, but still too scared to actually take that step, because – well, it's scary. Jasmine knows absolutely nothing about what's waiting for her out there. She'd be leaving behind a place where she knows she'll be comfortable and looked after and have all her physical needs met, for – she doesn't even know what. No matter how much she needs to go, to make some change in her unfulfilling life before she goes crazy, she must have been held back by fear and uncertainty until the very last, desperate minute. But then, even while she's clearly still scared, she goes ahead and does it.
Jasmine says a sad goodbye to Rajah, who is obviously too big to come with her, and he helps her over the wall so she can leave. Unlike Abu and Iago, who are the perfect size to sit on their humans' shoulders and go pretty much everywhere with them, allowing for quite a lot of funny interactions with the humans and many opportunities to affect the plot, Rajah cannot follow Jasmine around wherever she goes, and is very often just not there. Honestly it's a little disappointing. It's the coolest thing ever that Jasmine has a pet tiger, I'm so looking forward to seeing their dynamic and what Jasmine and her pet tiger will do in this movie, and then he does – well – nothing. Rajah is hardly ever even on screen, and much as I hate to say it, the movie would probably have unfolded exactly the same if Jasmine didn't have a pet tiger.
Jasmine makes it to the marketplace next morning, and we see her complete lack of any knowledge or experience about this place contrasted with Aladdin's expert knowledge of how to get around out here – he and Abu successfully steal their breakfast from an unsuspecting merchant while Jasmine walks past merchants trying to get her to buy from them with obvious nervousness. And then Jasmine bumps into someone and her headscarf falls down... and Aladdin sees Jasmine. Oh, my. This is without question one of the most beautiful moments in the entire movie. The way Aladdin just lights right up when he looks at her... that dreamy gaze... sighh. Find yourself someone who looks at you the way Aladdin looks at Jasmine, that's all I can say.
I wonder whether there was some deliberate contrast to the original story on Disney's part here, because in the original Arabian Nights tale, Aladdin first looks at the Princess on her way into a bathhouse. Even though I don't think he actually watched her getting undressed and bathing, it wasn't made entirely clear, and either way the setting choice leads to some implications which are not really necessary or helpful when you're trying to establish a sweet and genuine romance. So having Aladdin first see Jasmine, as the Disney movie does, at a time when he has no idea she's the Princess and when she's wearing an unusually modest outfit by Jasmine standards – not to mention in a colour which is far from her most flattering, though our Jasmine can look pretty in anything – there's nothing left for Aladdin to be attracted to, except for the parts we really want him to see: her beautiful face and the soul inside. On that note I also think it was extremely important to introduce us to Jasmine before Aladdin first sees her. That can make all the difference in whether she comes across to us as a real character or as Aladdin's female fantasy.
Jasmine pulls her headscarf back up very quickly as though she's afraid someone around her will see the royal gem on her head and start wondering. It does make me wonder why she wore her jewellery in the first place when she was running away and trying not to be a princess anymore! My fan theory is that she just doesn't feel comfortable without her large, heavy gold and jewels, maybe they give her a feeling of security and power. Which further gives me the theory that when Jafar enslaves her much later on in the film, that was a large part of the reason why he gave her no necklace, no head gem, and very thin earrings. Perhaps he somehow knew or sensed that Jasmine felt more powerful and comfortable with the jewellery on, and wanted to take that feeling away from her.
I love how the very next thing Aladdin sees Jasmine do after he first sees her is give some food to a hungry child, same as he himself did earlier. Even though Aladdin probably wasn't thinking about it at all, we've just established with that one moment that Jasmine and Aladdin have similar moral codes, similar values and similar ideas of right and wrong. It's a good sign for future compatibility.
Aladdin soon has an opportunity to not only talk to Jasmine, but to make a great first impression on her: he has to rescue her from the angry apple merchant, who found out Jasmine couldn't pay for the apple she took and tries to chop her hand off. Aladdin gets another chance to demonstrate his cleverness and quick wits, and this is the first time we see his silver tongue in action, a trait we need to establish as it will become very important later. And Jasmine, that wonderful heroine Jasmine – apart from a tiny moment where she looks affronted when Aladdin tells the merchant she's crazy, Jasmine's feelings towards Aladdin are entirely positive. She never gets mad at Aladdin for trying to help her, or tries to pretend like she doesn't need his help in order to appear “stronger”; she responds to all his advances with perfect openness. Which is such an important message to send to our audiences, if you ask me: that yes, being a strong female also means you can be open and trusting. Why does “strong female character” so often translate to tough-talking and closed off from everyone?? That's not strength; that's having trust issues.
As for Aladdin – when he's in love, he's the sweetest ever, brimming with appealing masculinity. His every move is to help Jasmine. She's new in the city, she doesn't know her way around – no problem, he can show her. He'll let her share his hideout, he'll help her through the harder parts of the journey to get there, he'll give her food and show genuine interest in her past and her problems, and share his heart's deepest desire with her – not realizing that his heart's deepest desire will be triggering to her because it's the very palace she just escaped from. The first time I watched the movie, that was the only time I was a little concerned about how their relationship could possibly play out – Aladdin won't be happy if he doesn't get his palace, Jasmine won't be happy if she has to keep living in one, what to do? But by the end of the movie they had worked it out so there was no doubt they would both be happy.
That part where Aladdin and Jasmine are both talking about their lives and end up saying “trapped” in unison because that's how they both feel... it's such a nice moment, and honestly is the only time I have ever seen a couple bonding while at the same time making it clear that neither one is listening to a word the other one is saying! I have no doubts about these two going on to have a happy, lasting relationship – but they might want to work on that communication issue... Another thing I love here is that the movie really emphasizes how Jasmine's issues and Aladdin's are on an equal level. Jasmine doesn't come into Aladdin's apartment and think: “Oh, what right do I have to be unhappy with my life when he's living like this?” Aladdin, after he finds out Jasmine is the princess, also never resents Jasmine for telling him how difficult her life is when she could see he was living on the streets. Trying to compete to see whose problems are the most valid is pointless and only takes attention and energy away from finding the answers. Aladdin feels trapped because without any money he can't move ahead to better things and is stuck living as a thief; there are no options available to him. Jasmine feels trapped because of all the royal rules dictating how she should live her life; there are no options available to her. Both are feeling restricted and unhappy, and both of their lives need to change.
Meanwhile Jafar has cast a spell to find out who his Diamond in the Rough is, and discovered it's Aladdin. We can see here that while Jafar is already a sorcerer and can already do magic, he needs time and the right tools and just the right set-up before his spells can work – it's implied Jafar had to create a storm inside his lair because finding the Diamond in the Rough required one! For someone like Jafar especially, he would not be happy with these kinds of limitations on his power.
And so the guards come to capture Aladdin on Jafar's orders. I'm guessing Jafar told them where to find him, because the guards obviously couldn't have known where Aladdin lives or Aladdin would have been in big trouble long ago! And so Aladdin and Jasmine join the ranks of the agonizing Disney almost-kiss. You know the couple is working when it's this painful to watch them come so close to kissing and not doing it. Aladdin and Jasmine almost escape from the guards – and have their first “Do you trust me?” “What?” “Do you trust me?” “Yes” exchange – but Aladdin is still caught, which must have him in some agony. Aladdin never gets caught, and he knows what's in store for him if he ever is. One way or another, his life will be quite literally over. Jasmine jumps up to defend Aladdin, and even reveals her identity and thus gives up her freedom in order to keep him safe. But the guards will not take Jasmine's orders over Jafar's, which is a pretty unfair slant to the system if you ask me. I suspect it's because she's a woman. So all that happens is that Aladdin freaks out over finding out the girl of his dreams is the Princess. His misbelief we ran into earlier is triggered. Aladdin is hopelessly in love with a girl he thinks couldn't possibly have any interest in him – even though from our point of view she obviously does. (Of course the law was a factor too, but it's pretty clear Aladdin's belief that the princess would never want him is the real issue here.)
Jasmine meanwhile has her first onscreen interaction with Jafar, though of course she must have known him well already, what with them living in the same palace and all. And from their interaction, I think we can safely assume that Jasmine never liked Jafar, even before today. When the guards tell her Jafar ordered Aladdin's arrest, she doesn't seem at all surprised Jafar would do such a thing, but she is automatically angry with him. She comes storming into Jafar's quarters demanding he put things right, and when Jafar tells her he's had Aladdin executed, it seems to only deepen a strong dislike that was already there. Their dynamic raises all sorts of new ideas for us Aladdin fans. How did they usually interact before Jasmine knew Jafar was evil? Did Jasmine get a bad vibe off of Jafar her whole life, but was so used to his being there that she never really questioned it? How much of those feelings did she ever act on? Was Jafar lusting after Jasmine ever since she started growing into a young woman, even before Iago suggested marrying her? (He does seem to like touching her a lot more than is strictly comfortable.) What were his plans for Jasmine before she hit puberty and became sexy? Was he still going to enslave her, but in a less sexualized way? I have my suspicions that if Jafar had managed to take over while Jasmine was still too young to be of any use to him, like when she was a baby, he would have just killed her. And he probably would have held the possibility of her death over the Sultan's head for a while first.
Jafar lies to Jasmine and pretends he's had Aladdin executed, presumably so that she won't try and rescue him before Jafar can use Aladdin for his own purposes. But I'm pretty sure his lie had the added benefit for him of making Jasmine cry. I mean, look at him in that scene after Jasmine runs off crying, and you tell me he wasn't taking some warped pleasure in upsetting her! Jasmine meanwhile – her feelings for Aladdin are so strong by this point, I'm pretty sure the shock of almost losing him was part of what eventually pushed her over the edge of “I really like him” into “I love him and I want to marry him”, once she found out he was alive.
But Aladdin isn't to know that. He's sitting in the dungeon, talking to himself about how Jasmine couldn't possibly ever like him, and continues to talk about this to Abu when he shows up to rescue him. I love it. Here Aladdin is, locked up in a dungeon and chained to the wall unable to even move, not knowing if he's going to be killed soon or if he'll ever see the light of day again... and all he can think about is whether the pretty girl he just met likes likes him back. It's like instead of being chained up in a dungeon he's standing in the high school hallway reliving every word of his last conversation with his crush and thinking about how much of a complete idiot he must have sounded. Aladdin is a Disney Prince and an adventure hero, but every now and then he slips into your typical modern teenager (or at least early nineties teenager) and I am here for it.
At this point Jafar shows up, disguised as a creepy old man, I guess because his normal regal appearance would look way too out of place in a dungeon and that would make it pretty tough to explain to Aladin what he's doing there and why he's helping him. Jafar gives Aladdin the option of going into the Cave of Wonders, and coming away with enough treasure to impress Jasmine and possibly win her hand. Jafar is quite clever, wording his deal so that it sounds like going into the Cave and getting the lamp for Jafar will lead to Aladdin getting this treasure, but all he really says is that there is enough treasure inside the Cave to impress Jasmine, not that Aladdin will actually get any of it. Aladdin accepts this proposal almost immediately. I love the way he just never gives up, and even when he has given up he'll change his mind about it again within minutes. Here he was convinced he would never see Jasmine again and that she would never have had him anyway, and already he's taking some action towards possibly being able to win her love and marry her after all. Mind you, I do think Aladdin trusted creepy-old-man-Jafar entirely too quickly. There's the part where he says there's “one problem – (the treasure's) out there... we're in here...” and I'm thinking, “I can see way more problems here than that, Aladdin!” Like for instance, how is he supposed to get enough treasure out of the Cave to win Jasmine's heart and hand if the Cave won't allow him to touch anything? If Jafar is supposed to be a prisoner, why wasn't he chained up like Aladdin? How did he know about the Cave in the first place, or how to escape from the dungeon, and if he knew how to escape from the dungeon, why hadn't he done it before now?? But then Aladdin's other option here was to stay in the dungeon and wait for whatever punishment he was about to be given, and when you think about it even if he did escape he could never go home, not now that the guards know where he lives. At this point trusting an extremely untrustworthy creepy old man may have been his best option. Although I'm thinking Aladdin's thought process was more “try anything that could help him live a better life and be with Jasmine” more than “I don't have any better options right now”. And one thing I notice about Aladdin's nature – one of the many things I love about him – is that he never shies away from danger, like ever. He acknowledges when things are dangerous and acts accordingly, but he never once considers not going into a dangerous situation for the sake of his own safety. And I believe this is a result of his backstory, because hard and horrible as it was, Aladdin's lifestyle would never have given him the chance to develop the belief that anything potentially risky was to be avoided. Growing up on the streets, he had to face danger and take risks every single day just to survive. Avoiding risk would mean certain death.
From what we see of Jafar and Aladdin's silhouettes travelling to the Cave, it looks very much like Jafar made Aladdin walk all that way while he rode on a camel, and when they arrive the Cave lets Aladdin in without any trouble. By this point the movie has done more than enough to show us why he is Diamond in the Rough material, which is great because a concept like that does have to be handled believably. Jafar, with some great villainous double-talk, tells Aladdin to fetch him the lamp first and then he will “have his reward” – never actually specifying what this reward is going to be, or explaining how he is going to give Aladdin any reward when the Cave just told Aladdin that he wasn't allowed to touch any of its treasure other than the lamp. Aladdin once again doesn't question this and goes on in. The Cave is full of precious gold, and I'm not sure how I feel about its rule that Aladdin isn't allowed to touch or take anything. On the one hand, the Cave is like a sentient being and so the treasure kind of belongs to it, and so it's the Cave's right to decide what happens to its treasure and whether anyone gets some of it. But on the other hand, all these beautiful objects aren't bringing anyone joy or doing anyone any good just hoarded away down here. In any case, I'm sure there's some symbolism in Aladdin's being in a room surrounded by priceless treasures but not being allowed to have any of it. One thing is for sure, Abu has already been established as unable to resist precious gems, and in a place like this that's sure to spell trouble....
Around this time we meet our friendly Magic Carpet. Carpet is clearly a mischievous sort, introduced to us through playing pranks on Abu, and he's an endearing character. It's so amazing the way the animators get him to show so much expression and character when he never speaks and doesn't have a face. Such beauty and magic in animation that doesn't exist in any other medium... Anyway, Aladdin asks Carpet to help him find the lamp and Carpet is happy to show him, but Abu of course touches a particularly tempting gemstone and they have to flee the Cave, which collapses around them into lava in a thrilling scene. There's one part where Abu is almost caught in the lava and Aladdin scoops him to safety at literally the last second, and another part where the burning lava actually looks like hands reaching up to catch Aladdin as he flees... This is the first of many times throughout this movie where Aladdin owes his life to the Magic Carpet. The movie doesn't have too many action scenes, just the right amount to ensure an exciting story. But the ones it does have are so good.
When Aladdin makes it back to the surface, he finds he hasn't made it to safety at all. Jafar demands Aladdin give him the lamp before he will help him up (which Aladdin does, I suppose in the tense situation it didn't occur to him that it might be safer to keep the lamp as leverage), and then tries to stab Aladdin in a really thrilling moment which shows us just how ruthless our villain is. I mean, if he hadn't betrayed Aladdin and had given him some reward once he had taken over Agrabah, he might have been able to turn Aladdin into an ally of sorts out of gratitude... But a villain like Jafar could never think like this; how could he trust Aladdin not to turn on him when he turns on everyone he's ever asked for help??
So Abu saves Aladdin by biting Jafar (now there's something to be proud of; let it be remembered that Abu bit Jafar!) and he steals the lamp back, too, I guess making up for what he did with that gem back in the Cave. (Not that I blame him at all for that; seeing something you want on display and not being able to get it is an agonizing experience and not one that anybody should ever have to go through. And I hope after the end of the movie Jasmine will provide Abu with all the gems he could ever want.) Anyway, Aladdin falls down into the Cave and we later find out it's only Carpet who stopped him from dying; meanwhile Jafar gets his comeuppance by searching his old rags for the lamp and finding it gone. Kind of serves him right for what he did to Aladdin just then. This is also the only time in the movie we see Jafar without his turban on and he's almost completely bald. Not really an important plot point, I suppose, but I find it interesting. And it definitely adds to the creepy factor that a guy who's already balding will try to marry Jasmine!
Back at the palace, the Sultan comes into Jasmine's room to find her still upset, and with a little gentle prompting from him she tells him everything that happened with her and Aladdin and Jafar (as far as she knows; she still thinks Jafar had Aladdin executed). This is one of my favourite Sultan moments as he really shows himself as the loving, caring father, and it's the point in the movie where we have our first hint of where the Sultan's character arc will end up. Another reading between the lines here: Jasmine must have told the Sultan everything in order for him to understand about Aladdin and Jafar apparently executing him, which means she must have told him both that she ran away from home and that she was alone with, and seen by, a commoner. Jasmine could have been in big trouble for that. The Sultan could have said Aladdin was a criminal and did deserve to be executed; he could have taken Jafar's side. But he doesn't. The next time we see Jasmine and the Sultan, he's telling off Jafar for daring to execute a prisoner without his approval. As for Jasmine getting in trouble for running away – no indication of it whatsoever, and we can probably safely assume it didn't happen. So now the Sultan seems far more concerned about his daughter's feelings than about upholding the law... He's also started to take his power back, telling off Jafar for carrying out the law without his knowledge or permission.
But before some of this happens, we cut back to Aladdin and, as most of us know this particular detail about his story already, it's not so much a surprise when he finds out the secret of the lamp and why Jafar wanted it so badly – it's more the “moment you've all been waiting for”. Genie comes out of his lamp and launches into this rapid-fire comedy routine while hardly letting Aladdin get a word in, which – I mean, I don't blame him, can you imagine being entirely by yourself for ten thousand years before you finally get to talk to someone?? Genie is our last major character to be introduced, and he's absolutely worth the wait. He proceeds to throw all manner of randomness at Aladdin (and at us!) and to shift shape about once every second – I swear my head was spinning trying to figure out what Genie actually looks like! And of course, he sings Friend Like Me with all its accompanying wonderful weirdness. I must say Aladdin has remarkable self-control, someone with his lifestyle finds a Genie willing to grant him any three wishes he wants, and he doesn't just go crazy firing off wishes without giving it a moment's thought! Aladdin would pass the Marshmallow Test for sure. (Although I suppose some of his self-control here might really just be not knowing what Genie was talking about!)
So Aladdin tricks Genie into letting him out of the Cave without a wish, which is incredibly clever of him and also Time Number Two that we see him use that silver tongue of his. Meanwhile, back at the palace, we've come to the scene I was talking about earlier, where we see the Sultan telling off his most trusted advisor whom we know has been controlling him. So, go Sultan, and go Jasmine too, because she refuses to forgive Jafar and tells him that “when I am Queen, I will have the power to get rid of you!” She is so powerful. And Jafar knows it; for this one brief scene, we can tell he's actually scared of her. Jafar finds all his life's ambitions falling down around him, losing favour in the royal family just as the lamp appears lost to him forever... And then Iago suggests a scheme which I'm sure would make Jasmine forever furious at him if she ever knew where it came from. He suggests Jafar marry Jasmine himself in order to take the throne, and Jafar seems only too happy to do it. Again I strongly suspect there was some physical attraction and lust on his end well before this... The scene ends with Jafar and Iago in a chorus of evil laughter, which is the first time we've heard Jafar laugh and it's wonderfully chilling, and Jafar is sitting on the Sultan's throne, which is some great symbolism and is also the only time we see Jafar sit, when he's on the Sultan's throne or riding on his horse. Does Jafar ever actually relax??
Aladdin and Genie make it to an oasis along with Carpet and Abu (with Genie in the role of a flight attendant), and Aladdin lets Genie know that he had tricked him into letting him out of the Cave without a wish. They're already establishing a friendship dynamic where Genie can fire all these weird spells and scenarios at Aladdin, and Aladdin can trick Genie, without it damaging anything. Aladdin is still being impressively careful with his wishes, and asks Genie's advice about them, which is how we find out that just like our main hero and heroine, Genie too feels trapped and wants to be free. I'm quite glad somebody brought that up, because – what kind of an existence is it, to never be allowed to make a single move based on your own beliefs and desires, forced to be entirely subservient to someone else, and to spend millennia in total isolation?! There's probably something in the fact that Aladdin has now met two other characters who have vastly different lives than he does, lives that might appear better than his, but both feel just as trapped.
Aladdin promises to set Genie free with his third wish, and then we've had about as long as Aladdin can possibly go before thinking about Jasmine again. He's so cute talking about her hair and her eyes and her smile, calling her smart and fun and beautiful, and he's so pure too. All of the features he mentions are just so innocent, and he actually doesn't bring up her looks at all until Genie mentions it. That, combined with the way Jasmine was dressed when Aladdin first met her, really seals the impression that it's Jasmine Aladdin's fallen for, not her appearance or sexiness.
Aladdin then decides the only way he can be with Jasmine is if he were a prince himself, and so wishes for Genie to make him one. I wonder what would have happened if Aladdin hadn't worried about how he could possibly be allowed to marry Jasmine, but only wished to be allowed to marry her (assuming of course she agreed)? That's a more abstract wish, and we never see what Genie would do with one of those – would Genie be able to tweak circumstances so that the Sultan would just end up changing his mind about the law? We'll never know. Genie delights in getting to dress up Aladdin in princely finery and give him all the trappings of a royal parade. He turns Abu into an elephant for Aladdin to ride on to the palace, and I don't know if this was intentional or not, but to my eye Abu even looks wrong as an elephant, like something is “off” about him in a way I can't quite put my finger on. Which makes perfect sense, because he is supposed to be a monkey. Just imagine being a monkey in an elephant's body – talk about something hard to adjust to!
Jafar meanwhile approaches the Sultan to tell him that the law supposedly says the Princess must marry the Royal Vizier if no suitable prince can be found. It's pretty neat how in both scenes where Jafar approaches the Sultan, there's some visual element of fear: in the scene where we find out they know each other, his shadow looms over the Sultan so that the latter looks genuinely terrified until he realizes who it is (which should not have been comforting!); in this scene, his entrance upsets a tall tower of miniature wooden animals the Sultan had been building. Nice little symbolism there, Jafar is a destructive force in the Sultan's life... Also in both scenes, that sneaky Iago repeats some part of the conversation to become a biting jab aimed at the Sultan: “Wit's end!” “Problem with your daughter!” Bad guy or not, part of me does admire Iago's chutzpah, being able to go right up to the Sultan and insult him to his face, and get away with it. Although it's always these remarks that get Iago fed crackers, so maybe he really doesn't get away with it.
The Sultan is not happy with the idea of his daughter marrying Jafar, and I'm very glad to see there are limits both on how much he trusts Jafar and on how much he will order Jasmine to do when she's obviously unhappy about it. (Which we've already seen if you read between the lines – he could have picked out some prince of his choosing and insisted she marry him if he'd wanted to.) So Jafar tries to hypnotize the Sultan into allowing the match, and the Sultan – in another Big Moment for him – resists Jafar's hypnosis for what may have been the first time ever. In any case it's the first time we ever see him resist it, which has to be significant. And then before Jafar can break through the Sultan's unusually strong resistance, there is a fanfare and Prince Ali rides into town.
Genie has made Aladdin the largest, flashiest parade ever, and this must be the thrill of Aladdin's life, especially when I remember how he looked at Prince Achmed riding into town earlier in the film and seemed to be daydreaming about doing the same thing himself. (And he only came into town with one single solitary pony, so take that, Prince Achmed!) Actually I'm willing to bet Aladdin's was the biggest and most impressive parade out of any suitor Jasmine ever had. And the irony is – Jasmine, the one person in Agrabah Aladdin wanted to impress more than anyone, was one of only two people who didn't appreciate it! The other of course was Jafar. Another bit of comeuppance for him here, when no matter what he says or does he cannot stop Ali from riding in or the Sultan from being happy about the potential match.
Two things I particularly love about the Prince Ali sequence: that moment when Genie makes the mean guards bow to Aladdin, and that moment where Aladdin finds a large pile of gold coins beside him and starts throwing them into the crowd. The first is an excellent payback for some of our lesser antagonists, making them show reverence and respect to the same young man they had once swung swords at as if they didn't care if he got killed while they tried to arrest him, and the second is such an excellent callback to Aladdin's generosity. It's the same trait that made him give the bread to the hungry street children, but now he can give to so many more people and help them far beyond just getting them one meal, and all of it without any sacrifice to his own needs. That one moment shows me, right there – Aladdin is going to be the best Prince and later Sultan of Agrabah ever.
The Sultan likes Aladdin right away, which I really love because Aladdin is, after all, going to be his future son-in-law, and I like to think some part of the Sultan knew it even then (although of course he clearly doesn't always listen to his intuition – if he did he never would have hired Jafar!) Since the Sultan was big on following laws and traditions, I wonder if it was ultimately a good thing he first met Aladdin in the guise of a prince – that way, there wouldn't be any preconceived notions about commoners trying to marry his daughter getting in the way. In this scene we see some very satisfying instances of the Sultan listening to Aladdin over Jafar – for instance when he wants to take a ride on Aladdin's magic carpet, and refuses to hear a word of Jafar's advising him not to. (He tells Jafar to lighten up and learn to have a little fun, and I mean... he does have a point!) Aladdin is also good at standing up to Jafar, who is desperately trying to get him to leave so that there won't be any prince around to marry Jasmine. This is also the scene where we get our iconic “I am not a prize to be won!” speech from Jasmine. You go, Jasmine, you tell everyone how they can and can't treat you! I do think she misunderstood Aladdin's intentions if not the others' – partly because Aladdin was scared to let her know who he really was and so it seemed to her like some stranger she'd never met was coming to ask for her hand and already convinced Jasmine would like him. I also suspect this line was perhaps a response to the original story, where Aladdin, the Royal Vizier, and the Sultan all do determine the Princess's future and who she will marry without consulting her or even allowing her and Aladdin to meet before the wedding day – and the story never calls out any of them for this behaviour and acts like it's perfectly fine. The scene ends with Jafar and his ominous line: “I think it's time to say goodbye to Prince Abooboo,” and after this we don't see or hear anything more of Jafar until... but I'll be getting to that later.
The movie does not show us Aladdin's first day in a life of luxury, or the first time he got to eat at a palace and have as much food as he wanted without worrying about anyone chasing him or trying to chop his hands off just for being hungry. The next scene shows Aladdin presumably after all of this would have happened, and he's still too upset about Jasmine not wanting to talk to him to enjoy anything. Genie and Aladdin talk about whether Aladdin should tell Jasmine the truth about who he is, and Aladdin exposes his misbelief some more by saying Jasmine would laugh at him if she knew he were a street rat, to which Genie replies, “Any woman appreciates a man who can make her laugh!” which is one of my favourite Genie lines ever because even taken out of context, it's just so true. This is one of those scenes that explores the movie's theme rather than its plot or characters. Technically the plot would still work if we skipped right from “I am not a prize to be won!” to Aladdin coming to Jasmine's balcony to try and work things out with her, and we'd still know our characters as well as before, but without this conversation the film would definitely be missing something.
Aladdin does go up to talk to Jasmine, and his first attempts do not go well. I find it really interesting that both Aladdin and Jasmine got exactly what they expected from their second meeting – all in spite of their very promising first one. Aladdin had been assuming the whole time Jasmine wasn't going to like him, he'd told himself she wouldn't over and over again, and the next time he sees her – doesn't matter how well they got along the first time, suddenly she doesn't like him. Jasmine assumes all princes and suitors will be stuck-up and selfish, and no matter how appealing she found Aladdin the first time they met, everything he says and does now convinces her that he's exactly the same.
I really love the way Aladdin comes to the palace to ask for Jasmine's hand, and when she starts being less-than-pleasant his response is not “I didn't know this was what she was really like; I didn't want her anyway!” which is what it seems like most of her suitors' responses were, but “How can I fix this?” Aladdin probably had no idea Jasmine had a temper or a fiery nature at all from their first meeting. Jasmine was out of her element then; she was scared and vulnerable, and Aladdin might reasonably have assumed she was like this all the time. Now that he's pursuing his goal of marrying her, he's going to see all the sides of her which wouldn't have had a chance to come out after one meeting – and he's committed to loving all of them. Nothing Jasmine does is going to make Aladdin think she's too difficult or not worth it. In Aladdin, Jasmine finally has the suitor who treats her like she's worth it.
There is that one moment in this scene where Jasmine realizes Prince Ali looks familiar. I wonder if that was the first time since he came that she really looked at his face, since it's entirely possible in the “I am not a prize to be won!” scene that she barely even glanced at him. But it's also true that Aladdin does look very different with his Prince Ali turban on – it frames his face differently from how his hair does, giving the illusion of a different shape and almost making him look older. It's also possible that was why Jasmine recognized him as soon as the turban came off. And Aladdin gets nervous and lies to Jasmine, telling her they've definitely never met before. There is some debate I know as to whether he ever actually lied before now, because after all he did wish for Genie to make him a prince and not to disguise him as one, but I think the point is he was being misleading. If Aladdin had said he was a prince now because a Genie granted him a wish, there would have been nothing dishonest about it. But of course, if he doesn't say that, everybody is going to assume he was born to a Sultan (or another Prince) and raised as royalty, which means Aladdin would have had to deceive his new family about his past and backstory for the rest of his entire life.
So at last Aladdin gets on Jasmine's good side, and I think it's really sweet how he does that by apologizing for treating her like she was a prize to be won and saying she should be free to choose her own suitor. Probably Jasmine never had a suitor before who even understood how she felt about it, much less agreed. And to make it even better, Aladdin goes on to offer Jasmine the thing she wants most: the chance to get outside and see the world, and to be completely free and do it on her own terms – “no one to tell us no, or where to go, or say we're only dreaming....” And the final tipping point? Aladdin unwittingly repeats his exact “Do you trust me?” exchange he had with Jasmine back at his hideout/home, complete with the same body language, and Jasmine realizes beyond a doubt that Prince Ali is her boy from the market.
So Aladdin and Jasmine take off on their magic carpet ride, Jasmine holding on to Aladdin like she can't believe she's found him again and is never going to let him go, Aladdin a bit nervous about his turban shifting and possibly exposing his identity, unaware that he's a bit late for that now. The magic carpet ride... I have no words to describe the sheer beauty. Suffice to say this carpet ride is the best first date in the history of first dates everywhere. Oh, and the equal beauty of “A Whole New World” doesn't hurt either.
On the ride, Aladdin gives Jasmine a jasmine flower which is the sweetest thing, and he bounces her an apple the exact same way he did back in his home on the streets of Agrabah, and Jasmine gives him this knowing look like “Did you really think I wouldn't remember?” She doesn't say anything, though, until the song is over and they're resting on a rooftop in China watching fireworks (I could make a case for Aladdin and Jasmine flying through both Mulan and Hercules on this ride), where she uses her own brand of subtlety to trick Aladdin into admitting that he knows Abu, and thus that he was indeed the same boy she met in the market. Jasmine confronts Aladdin and demands to know why he lied to her, and for him to tell her the truth now. I must say I really love Jasmine's whole attitude here, how she knows she's mad at Aladdin but isn't using that as any kind of excuse to second-guess their relationship or her feelings for him.
Aladdin of course cannot bring himself (that misbelief again) to tell Jasmine that he is actually a street rat who made a wish to become a prince. Aladdin probably interpreted Jasmine's anger as not only being about his lying to her, but about the possibility that he might really be a street rat. So – we all know how this plays out. Aladdin makes the rather questionable decision to lie. He tells Jasmine he was always a prince and was just dressed up as a commoner when she first met him, and I noticed him deflecting further suspicion by pointing out the way she was apparently calling him out for doing something she had done herself, even as she felt uncomfortable at the reminder. I have to say here that the movie is absolutely brilliant in their writing of Aladdin, because done differently we could lose all our respect and liking for him here. The movie has taken care to ensure we can't help but like our protagonist, they've taken the time to make sure we know exactly what beliefs he is operating from and why, and we feel sympathy for Aladdin even as we are completely aware that he's made the wrong decision.
Aladdin takes Jasmine back home, and helps her down from the carpet, always the gentleman in this relationship, and he and Jasmine finally have their first kiss, I know it's not really so bad because most other Disney couples end up waiting until the very end of their movies, but still! (And by the way, I am not really complaining; you know you've done your main couple well when it's this agonizing waiting for them to kiss.) I must give major points to Carpet here, by the way, for being one of the few characters in the movie who never interrupts Aladdin and Jasmine from kissing, and in fact actively facilitates their kiss.
Aladdin's reaction to kissing Jasmine is to fall back on his Carpet with a happy cry of “Yes!”, which is the cutest thing ever – I tell you there is nothing quite so appealing as Aladdin In Love. And then we have my favourite part of the movie. Well, this whole sequence was my favourite part of the movie, but I will never get over the sheer brilliance of that transition. Aladdin has finally had a successful date with the girl of his dreams, he's just kissed her, and he can be reasonably sure that the next time the subject of marriage comes up, Jasmine's answer will be a resounding “yes!” He's blissfully happy, he finally (seems to) have everything he's ever wanted, and even tells Carpet on his way down that for the first time in his life things are starting to go right. And then. Out of nowhere, four big, mean guards come out and grab him, binding and gagging him and restraining Carpet before he can help, and we see they have already restrained Elephant Abu. We then find out Jafar was behind this ambush and that he wants Aladdin dead. It is perfect. We had no hint of this in the atmosphere before, no build-up apart from that one line of Jafar's back in the throne room which we're not even thinking about anymore because so much else was going on that didn't even involve Jafar. We go from total bliss to tension and fear in moments.
The guards throw Aladdin into this large body of water to drown, with a heavy weight attached to his ankles to make sure he sinks, and as he falls to his doom they laugh. And remember, the guards have no idea this is Aladdin the street rat they've been trying to catch for so long – as far as they know, this is an innocent visitor and guest of the Sultan's – and they think murdering him is funny. This is what tips the Agrabah guards over the edge from simple antagonists into out-and-out bad guys, and highly sadistic ones at that. I think these particular guards will always remain untrustworthy, whether Jafar is around to give them orders or not.
Aladdin just barely manages to rub the lamp with a little determination and a lot of luck, in a scene which is nearly as tense as the one where he actually gets captured. We get some great Genie monologue here, and find out he bathes with a rubber ducky, which is adorable and also a bit touching. It must get so lonely to be stuck in that lamp for millennia at a time... Oh, and when you stop and think about this scene, Genie's slavery to the lamp means he can't just go ahead and save his friend's life of his own free will, which is really sad. Anyway, Genie saves Aladdin and they have this really sweet friendship moment. I'm upset for Aladdin that he had to use up one of his wishes, though, and now that leaves him with only one wish he really got to use for his own personal growth and pleasure. Thanks a lot, Jafar....
Next morning, Jasmine is all happy-and-glowing-in-love, and we get to see what she looks like with her hair down because when the scene begins she's brushing it. The Sultan comes into her room and Jasmine makes as if to tell her father everything about the magic carpet ride the night before, which again is a good sign for their father-daughter relationship that she would willingly tell him she disobeyed his strict rules about leaving the palace. (And I'm pretty sure it would have been considered inappropriate for her to be alone with Aladdin at this stage, too, so she must have also trusted that he wouldn't get in trouble for that.) But the Sultan barely seems to hear her – he's been hypnotized by Jafar, we know the signs by now, but imagine how unnerving it must have been for Jasmine, to see your own father acting like a different person who hardly seems to know you. The Sultan tells Jasmine she will marry Jafar – clearly Jafar was able to get even that suggestion into the Sultan's mind with a little more effort! Jafar makes a very sexist comment to Jasmine and really, I'm not at all surprised this is his view on women. Not that he seems to have much more respect for fellow men.... Anyway, Jasmine says “I will never marry you!” and continues to solidify her position in my mind as Favourite Disney Princess Ever, and then Aladdin comes back and accuses Jafar in front of everyone of trying to kill him. Jafar doesn't have many options left to him here, but he does try to get out of it, and tries to hypnotize the Sultan into not believing Aladdin even though everyone is watching him do it. I really love these moments of desperation we get from Jafar because they allow us to see different sides of our villain without ever making him sympathetic or redeemable. (The trick is that no matter what he does or how he feels, his sole concern is always himself. He never even seems to care about Iago's well-being.) Of course, Jafar's last-ditch attempt to keep his good standing backfires when Aladdin figures out what's he's doing and in a cheer-worthy heroic move, smashes the staff. (And let us not forget Jasmine's role of standing between Jafar's staff and her father, blocking the hypnotic rays.)
The Sultan believes Aladdin the minute Aladdin accuses Jafar of controlling the Sultan with his snake-staff. Perhaps the evidence was just that overwhelmingly in Aladdin's favour – Aladdin has no reason to lie about Jafar, but Jafar had just revealed a very big reason for wanting to kill Prince Ali – but I think the Sultan probably had memories of any number of times where he saw Jafar's staff coming towards his face, didn't remember what he and Jafar said to each other after that, but somehow wound up doing whatever Jafar had been advising him to do right before he saw the staff coming. I think perhaps Aladdin's breaking Jafar's staff broke Jafar's entire hypnotic hold on the Sultan, allowing him to notice that when he never had before.
The Sultan calls the guards to come and arrest Jafar, and I noticed a little detail here – the guards the Sultan calls from inside the palace, who have no problem arresting Jafar, have a different uniform than the guards we're more familiar with, Aladdin's enemies from outside the palace, who are more than happy to do anything Jafar tells them. Are there more than one legion of guards in Agrabah? Perhaps the ones inside the palace are of the Sultan's choosing, and are genuinely loyal to him, while the guards hired to patrol the streets belong to an entirely different category. I remember Jafar tells Jasmine earlier in the movie that her father “charged him with keeping peace in Agrabah” – did the Sultan perhaps give Jafar free rein to do whatever he liked to keep order out in the city, including selecting which men he wanted in the guard patrol?? Are the guards Aladdin evades so nasty and sadistic because Jafar hired men like that on purpose??
At the same time, the Sultan, Aladdin, and Jasmine are all advancing on Jafar like they're not even going to wait for the guards to deal with him if they can catch him first, and might just take him apart with their bare hands. This is one of my favourite moments where the three good human characters all stand up to the villain who just did so much wrong to all three of them, and it's especially satisfying to see that Jafar is actually unnerved. Oh, and I refer anyone who says Disney Princesses never get angry to this moment.
Before the guards can arrest Jafar – the Sultan never says he's going to have Jafar beheaded, but that must be what's in store for him at this point – Jafar pulls out a vial of something and vanishes. I think it's pretty neat the way we only see snatches of Jafar's magical spells and objects – it gives us a good idea of what sort of things he can and can't do, but there's still that element of mystery, and we never know what other tricks he might have hidden in his robes, ready to pull out at any moment. And Jafar didn't just escape in order to flee – he saw the Genie lamp hidden in Aladdin's turban, which he had tucked into his waistband for safekeeping. (So the only scene where we see Jasmine with her hair down is also the only scene which Aladdin spends as Prince Ali with his hair exposed, giving both of them a neat “variant” look. I will now expect figurine sets to pick up on this.)
Jafar vanishes, and Aladdin and Jasmine's second attempted kiss is interrupted by the Sultan, who is greatly agitated both by Jafar's escape and at his true nature being exposed, suddenly leaving him without his most trusted advisor. Or, as I have come to suspect, without any advisor. Have you noticed how we never see or hear of any advisors the Sultan has besides Jafar? Have you noticed how empty the throne room always seems to look? Where is the Sultan's court; where are all the nobles and dignitaries and – advisors?? And wouldn't Jafar just love to make sure he was the only person in all of Agrabah with any sway over the Sultan, wouldn't he have no qualms at all over getting rid of anyone else who might sway him? Of course, that still doesn't explain where all the servants we never see any sign of have gone, or any member of the Sultan's harem....
The Sultan's agitation vanishes when he realizes Jasmine has actually fallen in love with her latest suitor. He says, and I quote: “You shall be married at once!” and I particularly emphasize that line because I feel like not everyone remembers that Aladdin and Jasmine spent the last quarter or so of the movie already engaged. Not only engaged, but with every intention of an immediate wedding. If you look at the timeline this was probably the exact day Jasmine was supposed to choose a suitor by (which means she got enslaved by Jafar on her birthday; great birthday present that) and it makes sense that what with Jasmine cutting it this close to her deadline, the Sultan would have had all the wedding preparations already set to go so that Jasmine could be married the moment she finally did choose someone. “You shall be married at once!” does not equal waiting around for years before you actually do it.
Anyway Aladdin is all happy and blissful as though he's living in a dream – until he's snapped back to reality in a horrifying wake-up call. The Sultan tells Aladdin that he will be Agrabah's next Sultan, and I absolutely love the animation here, where Aladdin's expression technically doesn't change, but we can tell the smile that was so genuine a moment ago has kind of frozen on his face. Clearly Aladdin didn't think of the consequences of marrying the Sultan's only child, but then I don't think he thought long-term about any of this, or he would have considered how long he could reasonably expect to live in the same home as other people while never telling them anything about his backstory. I actually think this fits in quite well with Aladdin's past, where every decision he made was a split-second one that directly affected what would happen to him the very next moment. If he turns the wrong way, the guards will catch him. If he sneaks a piece of fruit from this stall, the merchant will notice. I think perhaps Aladdin never had a lot of need for long-term planning, which is possibly why he didn't think through his plan of becoming Prince Ali beyond just getting in the door.
Back at Jafar's secret lair, Iago still thinks they will have to flee and is hastily packing, and there's this great anachronistic moment where he considers taking along a photograph of Jafar and himself, which he thinks he's making a weird face in! So random, yet somehow it fits, I love it. But Jafar is just standing there laughing maniacally (and nearly strangles Iago when he tries to snap him out of it; nice guy that Jafar). He now knows Prince Ali is Aladdin and the lamp is within his reach, and gives Iago the task of stealing it back. Aladdin meanwhile has reached his limits. His decisions throughout the rest of the story have taken him to a place where he just can't go on anymore. And in one of the movie's most heartbreaking moments, Aladdin goes back on his promise to free Genie. He's so overwhelmed by his choices and the place his lies have led him to that he feels like he can't go on without Genie. It's incredibly painful to watch both for Genie's sake and for Aladdin's, and I can't help but realize that without the emotional baggage involved it could have been very easy to find a solution here. For example, Aladdin could set Genie free but ask him to stick around for moral support while he explains the truth to Jasmine and the Sultan. But no one could have thought of that in a state like this.
Aladdin is on the verge of letting his life turn into a neverending spiral of more and more bad decisions, but catches himself just on time. Maybe it's because Genie is mad at him for breaking his promise and refuses to speak to him; maybe it's because even his loyal sidekicks thought he made the wrong decision and walk away from him. Anyway, Aladdin has reached the big Turning Point in his character arc, the moment where he realizes he can't go on like this. He resolves to tell Jasmine everything – just a little too late.
Aladdin thinks, and we do too, that he hears Jasmine calling for him the minute he makes the decision to tell her the truth. He has this very nervous air like he wasn't expecting to have to tell her so soon after making the decision, without any time to think about what to say even, but of course when Jasmine calls Aladdin listens. He leaves the room to go find her – probably not even remembering he'd left the lamp lying under a cushion instead of taking it with him, and definitely unaware that Iago can imitate other people's voices perfectly. Because what Aladdin thought was Jasmine calling him was actually Iago, hiding just outside the room in a flamingo garden, with just enough of a disguise that an Aladdin in a hurry to be with his True Love and not even looking at the flamingoes wouldn't notice anything.
Iago gets into Aladdin's room and steals the lamp, with a very funny monologue in which he imitates Jafar praising Iago for having gotten the lamp (with a high praise I couldn't see Jafar giving to anyone!) and he even manages to look like Jafar, complete with tail feather mimicking the feather in Jafar's turban. (Did I mention how much I love the animation in this movie??) The humour makes a great contrast to the seriousness of what has just happened – Jafar is now in possession of the Genie lamp.
Meanwhile the Sultan is announcing to his subjects the imminent wedding of Princess Jasmine and Prince Ali, and Jasmine is hiding behind a curtain to watch him, so excited she doesn't even seem to mind his telling the whole kingdom that she “finally” chose a husband. Or maybe that just wasn't the type of thing that would bother her anyway. She's wearing what might just be my favourite Jasmine outfit, a gorgeous lilac gown with floor-length mermaid skirt and off-the-shoulder sleeves, along with slight variants to her earrings and jewelled headband. This outfit also seems to be one of her least remembered ones, since I've come across multiple instances of people seeing Aladdin dolls and figurines in which Jasmine is wearing this dress, and don't remember ever seeing it in the movie. Well, she does wear it in the movie, and I call it her lilac wedding gown because it's obviously the gown she was going to get married in before Jafar came in and ruined things. (I'm doubly mad about that because it gave the people making the sequels the opportunity to decide Jasmine and Aladdin would somehow decide to hold off their wedding for years, and that Jasmine, our Disney Princess sexy queen, would decide to wear a wedding dress that covers everything.)
Jasmine finds Aladdin and tells him her father is announcing their engagement, and I'm pretty sure Aladdin never figured out it wasn't Jasmine's voice he was hearing back there because when he finally found her she was indeed looking for him. Aladdin tries to tell Jasmine the truth, but in an endearingly oblivious way Jasmine is so excited for the wedding she doesn't notice a thing he's trying to tell her. Like I said, beautiful couple, might want to work on communication skills...! Jasmine puts Aladdin's turban back on his head and gives him a kiss just like she's his wife already before pushing him out onto the balcony where her father is. Aladdin has another wonderfully animated nervous expression, and I can't help wondering if he's almost wishing for something to stop the wedding here, so he won't have to go any further with this deception. And of course, something does.
Jafar rubs Genie's lamp and begins treating Genie horribly, outright stepping on his face and addressing him as “slave”. We also get another of my favourite Genie lines, where he shifts into a casting director and says the role of Aladdin will now be played by a “tall, dark, sinister ugly man”. I like to think Genie's sassy attitude was some small payback to Jafar, who probably expected a fully subservient Genie with no personality like the ones in the original tale.
But unfortunately, it doesn't matter what Genie thinks of Jafar; he still has to grant his wishes. Jafar finally gets his longtime wish of becoming Sultan, and appears on the balcony where Aladdin and Jasmine's wedding was presumably about to happen, magically changing into the Sultan's clothes while the poor Sultan is reduced to his underwear. Jafar obviously needs magic to have any chance of being able to wear the Sultan's clothes, what with the two of them being such opposites in shape and size. And I have to say, creamy white is just not Jafar's colour... Iago even gets his own little turban, which is ridiculous and adorable. He looks like he's wearing an ice pack on his head. I would not change this little touch for anything.
I quite like how the change of clothes is the only noticeable effect of this wish. Genie isn't exactly putting on a whole parade for Sultan Jafar or writing him a song the way he did for Aladdin! Genie may not have a lot of free will allowed to him, but he definitely knows how to make the most of the free will he does have. Genie, I think, is a perfect example of how to write a character who has no choice but to be subservient to someone, while still giving him personality and strength that make him not only bearable to have around, but thoroughly enjoyable.
Jasmine is absolutely wonderful in this scene, standing up to Jafar and stating boldly: “We will never bow down to you!” (when I think maybe the Sultan was about to do it). The Sultan is quite good too, telling off this usurper of his throne. I do wonder if Jasmine was confused at all by Jafar and Aladdin's brief exchange where Jafar shows Aladdin that he now has the Genie lamp. Or was she too upset by everything else going on to notice? Iago has some of my favourite lines in this scene: “That's Sultan Vile Betrayer to you!” and responding to Jasmine's refusal to bow with “Why am I not surprised?” We go from a line that is just so Jasmine to a line that is just so Iago. I really like, too, the implication that Jafar's being Sultan in name only means nothing, that he still doesn't have anyone's respect and no one feels inclined to listen to him. Jafar, though, doesn't care about having respect and is quite happy to rule his subjects through fear. He promptly uses up his second wish, to become the most powerful sorcerer in the world. This wish gives him a variant of his old clothes back (which is a relief because white does not work for him), and a variant of his snake-staff which Aladdin broke, which now shoots magic through its mouth instead of its eyes and is more powerful than ever. Instead of merely being able to do select spells when he has the right tools and set-up, Jafar can now fire seemingly limitless spells at will through that staff. I think that was a pretty smart wish to make when he only has three of them, but I also think Jafar is powering through his wishes awfully quickly. I mean, he hasn't even had the lamp an hour yet and already he's used up two out of three. What if he remembers something else he's always wanted later on, something his sorcery can't give him? I think Jafar's power is going to his head.
So Jafar casts this really creepy spell which puts a red energy field around the Sultan and Jasmine, which means they can only move as Jafar chooses. He forces them both to bow, which says a lot about Jafar right there if he's fine with them bowing to him completely unwillingly, and living with the knowledge that they never would have done this if he hadn't forced them. And to add to that creepy desire for control, he is definitely using this new power of restricting Jasmine's movements to touch her even more than before. I suspect Jafar had been eager for a long time to take over Agrabah so he could touch Jasmine however he wants and not suffer any repercussions for it.
Aladdin is still being his wonderful brave hero self, trying vainly to stop Genie from granting Jafar's wishes, and determined to protect Jasmine even while he knows he's at a huge power disadvantage. “Jafar, get your hands off her!” he says... swoon. But Jafar just laughs and sings his Prince Ali reprise, exposing Aladdin, changing his prince finery back to his rags, and banishing him. Poor Aladdin never even has the chance to see how Jasmine takes the knowledge that he was really a street rat the entire time, and never told her about it. Actually Jasmine was probably too confused and scared by everything going on around her to think much of anything about Aladdin's true identity. In the long run, I sometimes wonder whether Jafar ended up doing Aladdin a favour. If Aladdin had told Jasmine the truth himself, without any other emotional stimulus around, Jasmine might simply have gotten mad at him for lying to her even after she asked for the truth, and then Aladdin would have interpreted that as her being mad that he was a street rat. This way, what with everything else going on, by the time Jasmine had a chance to feel anything at all about it she didn't even care.
So Aladdin has reached his darkest hour, stranded at the ends of the earth, a cold and snowy place that must be doubly bad when you've lived your whole life in a hot desert and aren't wearing any shirt or shoes! It's a dark, tense scene – Aladdin nearly loses Abu, and if we think the cold is bad for Aladdin, what must it be doing to an animal who's only adapted to live in one particular climate??? Alone in a place with no means of escape and where staying means certain death, Aladdin's head is clear. He knows he needs to go back and save everyone in Agrabah, and he knows hiding his identity and making all his decisions out of a fear of what Jasmine would say if she knew the truth wasn't worth it. Aladdin determines to go back, and I absolutely love his determination, because as far as we can see there isn't any way he possibly could go back, but our Aladdin never gives up, as in ever. We know that somehow, as impossible as it seems, Aladdin through his sheer determination will find a way of getting back to Agrabah. And of course, it's right after making this decision that he finds a way: Carpet had just managed to stow away with Aladdin when Jafar sent him flying to his banishment. Using his cleverness and an impressive level of strength, all skills Aladdin already had as himself and probably even developed by living on the streets, he manages to free Carpet from where he was trapped underneath the tower Jafar had sent him in, and avoid getting crushed by said tower when it starts rolling right at them. Then it's right back to Agrabah, with the sense that while Aladdin still does care what Jasmine thinks of him, he won't let that get in the way anymore of doing what has to be done.
Back in Agrabah, the throne room has been altered to reflect its new owner's personality – it's all red and dimly lit, the throne is shaped like a cobra rather than an elephant like it was when the Sultan occupied it, and heaps of treasure are scattered rather unceremoniously all over the floor, making me think Jafar is terrible at organization and home decor. Sure, he's showing off how many impressive things he has now – now how many of them are in a place where he can admire their full beauty or actually use them?? He really doesn't get the point of owning nice things at all, does he... But let's move on from there, as mistreating his things is far from the worst of what Jafar does once the kingdom and palace are under his control. The Sultan is now trapped in a little cage and wearing a jester's outfit, and as if being stripped of his human dignity wasn't bad enough, Iago is shoving crackers into his mouth with a twisted vengeful triumph, effectively torturing the poor guy – and Jafar is actively encouraging him. Rajah, who was transformed into a tiny tiger cub during Jafar's takeover scene, is trapped inside a tiny birdcage without any room to stretch or move, not to mention no food or water dish that I ever noticed. And Jasmine – well, now Jafar can openly admit that he sees her as a sexy possession and not as a valid human. This is the scene where she wears the red slave outfit (and please let's stop calling it “the red outfit” like we're denying what happened to her; let's call it what it is), and she's chained to Jafar's side while he forces her to serve him fruit and wine. I adore the way Jasmine is still resisting Jafar, even now, even while all her freedom and dignity have been taken away from her. Jasmine is also an excellent example of how to write a character in someone else's power without making them come across as weak.
You'll remember I said earlier, if Jafar isn't happy with the power he already has before becoming Sultan, he's never going to be happy even when he does reach that goal? We start to see evidence of that now. Jafar doesn't need to marry Jasmine anymore in order to become Sultan, and he's already taken her for his own like a trophy he gets to keep (it is probably very lucky for Jasmine that Aladdin came and defeated Jafar before nighttime when Jafar might start thinking about her sleeping arrangements...), and yet, he still wants more. He still wants to marry Jasmine. You probably have to be the most evil egomaniac to think your marriage proposal has a chance of working after everything he just did to Jasmine, to her fiancé, and to her father, but he makes the proposal, and Jasmine doesn't even let him finish before she responds with a “Never!” and by throwing his glass of wine in his face. Go, Jasmine!
Unfortunately, Jafar is too powerful to let Jasmine have much of a victory. He advances on her with such menace that even though we never find out what he was planning to do to her, I can only imagine the possible horrors he might have had in store... But then Jafar has an idea. He attempts to use his last wish to force Jasmine to fall in love with him. The way he looks at her when he says this, by the way, it's so creepy, he's even got his tongue touching his lips at one point, which is a body-language sign for lust... Much respect once again to those animators.
Of course, as we know, making people fall in love is one of the few things Genie's magic can't do – which now I think on it makes perfect sense; he's in a Disney magic system, where True Love is the most powerful force of all, so how could any magic create it? Genie tries to tell Jafar he can't grant his wish, and Jafar isn't listening and is yelling at and bullying poor Genie, who can't grant your wish, Jafar, nothing you do to him is going to change that.... And that's when Jasmine sees Aladdin has come back.
Jasmine knows what needs to happen here, Aladdin has to have some opportunity to sneak across the room to Jafar's throne and get the lamp back without Jafar noticing. So Jasmine, in a display of nerve that is as impressive as it is disconcerting, starts pretending like she really has fallen in love with Jafar, putting on her most sexy and seductive act (which we have seen before when she was trying to get rid of Prince Ali). I love how Jasmine's whole plan is almost a means of taking her power back – Jafar took away Jasmine's freedom as a human and turned her into little more than a sex object, and now Jasmine is using that very sexiness to help destroy him. And Jafar buys it, too – for almost the entire amount of time Aladdin would have needed, he's completely under Jasmine's spell.
Aladdin almost makes it to the lamp, and Abu deals with Iago who was about to shout a warning to Jafar. But then Aladdin trips over a peice of treasure (perhaps that was another reason Jafar threw it all over his floor instead of putting it on a nice display somewhere) and Jafar almost turns around and sees him, causing Jasmine to use the only distraction she has left that might work – kissing Jafar full on the lips. That's a level-up from the original story where she only kisses his cheek and the rim of his wine goblet – but I mean, if you're going to go there, why not go there? The sight of Jasmine kissing Jafar stops Aladdin in his tracks, and it's hard to read all the emotions going on in his face right then, but I would say he looks shocked, horrified, and – jealous? Jealous of Jasmine kissing Jafar of all people. Oh, Aladdin, we love you.
Abu's reaction is much simpler – he makes a very obviously disgusted face, and I can't say I blame him.
Jasmine's scheme distracts Jafar from the noise he heard, but as soon as they break apart, he notices Aladdin's reflection in the shiny crown he gave Jasmine as a sort of engagement present. I do have to wonder if Jasmine's plan would have worked if Aladdin had used her distraction to run up to the throne and take the lamp instead of standing there staring at her in shock, horror, and jealousy. Of course I can hardly blame Aladdin for being as distracted by Jasmine's methods as Jafar was! Besides if Jasmine's scheme had worked, that wouldn't make for a very exciting movie conclusion and also wouldn't have completed Aladdin's character arc: he now needs to prove to himself that he can do something impressive and heroic exactly as he is, without the help of any magical being or princely persona.
Jafar is furious to see Aladdin back again, and he says one of my favourite Jafar lines: “How many times do I have to kill you, boy?!” The first time I saw the movie my exact thoughts were: “Haven't you ever read Batman, Jafar?” If he didn't deal the final blow, and he didn't see Aladdin's dead body, Aladdin's not dead. Period. (I had been discovering and reading all the early 1940s Batman comics at the time, and loved how Jafar's tendency to use deathtraps reminded me of them.)
Jafar steadily takes out every ally Aladdin has until only he remains. Jasmine I think stopped some dangerous spell of Jafar's from hitting Aladdin and nearly managed to take the lamp back herself before Jafar seals her inside the Dreaded Hourglass of Doom. Abu almost gets the lamp too before Jafar turns him into a toy. The Magic Carpet is unravelled into a tangle of thread, and it's quite clear Aladdin has only until Jafar tires of taunting him and throwing similar spells in Aladdin's path to block his attempts to take the lamp back before he will meet an even worse fate. Jafar is enjoying himself entirely too much here – he has some great puns to go along with whatever spell he's casting at the time, and I enjoy his dialogue every bit as much as I am on the edge of my seat in this scene. Aladdin knows he has to do something to level the playing field, and so tries to goad Jafar into giving him more of a fair fight. It sort of works, except that Aladdin probably wasn't expecting Jafar to turn himself into a gigantic cobra and fight him in that form!
Genie is really great in this scene: he's actually able to turn himself into a cheerleader and cheer Aladdin on even while he's technically Jafar's. I love all the ways he finds to bend the Genie rules! You go, Genie, you don't deserve to have to follow all those rules anyway.
The battle becomes extra tense when Aladdin realizes that not only does he have to defeat Jafar, he also has to get Jasmine out of that hourglass before she is buried alive and killed. And Aladdin actually does make rescuing Jasmine his priority; I've read stories that would have told me he should have ignored her in the name of the greater good, and I do not appreciate this. He very nearly manages it, but Jafar catches Aladdin and traps him in his coils. Jafar won the battle. Of course he won; he's much more powerful than Aladdin ever was. It just wouldn't be believable to have Aladdin win. Everything looks as though Aladdin is completely out of options, and I honestly could not see any way Aladdin could get out of this.
And he might not have if Jafar hadn't stopped to gloat at him (such a delightfully villainous thing to do). Jafar mentions Aladdin being nothing without the Genie, and calls himself the most powerful being on Earth, and this is what gives Aladdin his last-ditch idea. He is pretty much in a situation where any plan he thinks of is worth trying, because he's unlikely to make things any worse.
And so Aladdin goads Jafar into wishing to become a genie himself. Genie is not at all happy about this wish, which I think was probably a good thing because if Genie hasn't figured out what Aladdin is up to, presumably Jafar won't either until it's too late. Jasmine doesn't seem to know what Aladdin's up to either, once Jafar drops him and Aladdin rescues her from the hourglass in the nick of time – she was fully buried and even seemed to have lost consciousness for a moment. No one figures out Aladdin's plan until the dark metal lamp appears and wristcuffs appear on the demon-like Genie Jafar's wrists, cutting off his gloating about all the power he has.
Jafar cannot face his fate alone, or perhaps he simply can't function without a sidekick to tell all his plans to, because he drags Iago into the lamp along with him. Iago does not sound quite so happy about having Jafar as his owner anymore... The last thing we hear from Jafar and Iago is the two of them fighting in the cramped space, and suddenly our menacing villain feels a lot less dangerous. Genie throws the lamp into the Cave of Wonders with a remark implying he believes Jafar will be there for the next ten thousand years, the same as he was – and it would definitely take a lot for Jafar to get out of there, since the Cave will only allow one person in the entire world to enter, and Aladdin certainly knows better than to go back in and retrieve Jafar's lamp!
The palace, Jasmine and the Sultan's outfits, and Rajah are all restored to normal with what must have been Genie's magic – no wish needed here, I guess he was more than happy to undo everything his ex-Master had forced him to grant him the power to do. But now comes another of the most touching, heartbreaking moments in the entire movie. Jasmine comes out to where Aladdin's standing and he apologizes for lying to her, and she tells him she understands and that she loves him, letting him know beyond a doubt that his rank doesn't matter to her and never did. I just love that line, where Jasmine looks right at Aladdin, Aladdin himself in his street rat clothes, exactly as he is, and says “I love you”. There's something so pure and unconditional about her saying that after everything Aladdin went through precisely because he thought she wouldn't love him unless he became something more impressive. Significantly, this is also the only scene in the movie where Jasmine and Aladdin are both wearing their classic, most recognizable outfits onscreen at the same time. Finally, they are facing each other without any secrets between them, and what they find is that they still love each other as much as ever.
But now that Aladdin's not a prince, he thinks he'll have to leave Jasmine forever, and the entire scene is so moving that I honestly wasn't sure, on first viewing, that they would let Aladdin and Jasmine be together. (Some stories would do that to make some kind of a point or whatever.) Genie offers to let Aladdin use his last wish to become a prince again instead of setting him free. This will not do. This movie must not end without every single one of these characters getting exactly what they wanted!
But no matter what the movie will do with this problem, Aladdin still has to make a choice. I firmly believe there are no situations where you can't find some way for everyone to get what they want, but for the moment it must appear as though there isn't one, so that Aladdin can complete his character arc. If Aladdin had chosen to become a prince again, the entire movie would have become pointless; Aladdin would have learned nothing, either about his own worth or the trouble he gets into when he pretends to be something he isn't. If a solution to make everyone happy had presented itself too quickly, Aladdin would not have been able to prove to us that he does understand all this, and his character arc would have felt incomplete and disappointing. Aladdin does make what we might call the right decision in this case: he chooses to set Genie free, in an incredibly joyful moment only dimmed by the two friends' tearful goodbye – Genie had better come back a lot and visit Aladdin! – and the thought that maybe this means Aladdin won't get to be with Jasmine after all.
But such is not to be. The Sultan has been going through his own character arc, and he would be the most unreasonable kind of person in the world if after seeing all this evidence that Aladdin and Jasmine belong together, that he's spent long enough listening to outside influence and not ruling the kingdom of his own free will, and that Aladdin is more than worthy of joining the Royal Family, he had still insisted on upholding an old law. The Sultan of course is a far more reasonable character than that, and he comes in to announce he is changing the law so that Jasmine can now marry whomever she deems worthy – and of course Jasmine chooses Aladdin, and he picks her up and gives her The Twirl, which is my favourite Disney Couple move ever. Ariel and Eric and Belle and Beast have one too, both of theirs ending in a kiss. Aladdin and Jasmine's Twirl does not get to end in a kiss because Genie is so enthusiastic about the happy ending he wants to give everyone a big group hug, which is joyful and fun but I hope this interruption of kisses will not continue to be a thing in Aladdin and Jasmine's lives. At least now if anyone interrupts their kisses they'll both know they'll have many opportunities to try again later. I swear Aladdin and Jasmine have the most almost-kisses of any Disney couple.
There are so many reasons I love the ending with the Sultan coming in to change the law the way he did. It makes a very good point about there being no point in upholding rules just for the sake of it once you can clearly see that said rule makes no sense here and following it would even be harmful. There are probably plenty of people who in the Sultan's place would have acknowledged everything he did about why it makes sense to let Aladdin and Jasmine be together, but still submit to the law anyway. I think there's an excellent point in there when the Sultan says “Am I Sultan or am I Sultan?” – he makes the rules, he doesn't need to answer to some old scroll with ancient laws written on. I'm willing to bet the Sultan himself didn't even make any of those up. And I'm also willing to bet that, with Aladdin's help in the Royal Court of Agrabah, he will now.
And I don't know that I should even have to mention this, but it feels so rare that I can find a good forbidden love story where the couple is actually allowed to be together in the end, and makes the point that the superficial obstacles that kept them apart throughout the story really didn't matter. I encountered a number of stories when I was younger where it looked as though a prince(ss) was in love with a commoner, and the whole time we were told how silly it is to let this rank difference keep them apart and what difference should it make... until the end where it turns out – surprise! – the commoner really was a prince(ss) the entire time. So... the message here is “Rank doesn't matter, but still don't marry someone below your station, and it's only because they were really the same rank as you all along that they were worthy”?? I cannot tell you how much I love the resolution of Aladdin where the Sultan simply comes in and destroys the only obstacle to Aladdin and Jasmine's happiness, actually following through on the point the forbidden love story set out to make.
The final scene of the movie shows Princess Jasmine and Prince Aladdin soaring off on the flying carpet towards new adventures in their new life together, and they finally get to have another kiss because no one can interrupt them up here in the air. Jasmine is wearing a purple crop top and pants which resembles a cross between her regular turquoise outfit and her lilac wedding gown (maybe it's her honeymoon travel outfit?), and Aladdin wears this lovely purple outfit with an open shirt and little fez hat just like he always wore in his true identity – but these are clearly a much higher quality, something befitting of a prince. I love the symbolism in this outfit: Aladdin is a prince now, but this time the prince is all him. On that note I would love to see this outfit get some more love. Especially as that's the only one of Aladdin's three movie outfits he's likely to ever wear again!
Of course, Genie has to come out one last time to thank the audience for being there, and I will always tell him it was my pleasure. I like to think his showing up at the end of the movie means he was still there watching Aladdin and Jasmine's wedding (which, I say again, definitely happened right away.)
There's a lot more I could say about Aladdin. The way the character designs are all so perfect, so you could probably look at a picture of them all without knowing anything about the story, and immediately know who each character was and what sort of role they were going to play. The beautiful soundtrack, with the songs all so catchy or touching, getting you swept up in the part of the story they're telling. The delightful, vivid animation, so colourful and beautiful, ensuring you're never at a loss as to what's going on or who is thinking what. The excellent voice acting, too, with each character's voice suiting them just as perfectly as their visual designs. Honestly, we could be here a while, but maybe I'll just leave it at this. Happy anniversary, Aladdin. I love you.
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