(Movie) Anna and the King: A Reaction Paper and Personal Analysis of the King’s Philosophy

I submitted this to my teacher as a partial fulfillment of the course Philosophical – Social Foundation of Education:

     King Mongkut in the film Anna and the King was a humanist. Humanists believed that “an individual human being had within him or her all that was necessary to grow and develop that person’s unique capacities”.  That was basically how he educated his children, especially his eldest son and heir to the throne, Prince Chulalongkorn. He gave the prince the opportunity to learn, in his own pace, the values and character needed of a king. As a father to 48 children, he wanted them to learn values, developed their own capacities and worth as members of the royal family. He recognized their talents, as on the scene with him happily observing his daughter dancing. He let them learn the arts, theater and music and then watched their plays. Not only did he make sure that the conditions of learning were humane but also that they were educated with Science, English, and Literature. He did not deprive them of these subjects no matter how strong the influence of religion and conservationism were in their culture. This implied that he wanted them to open their minds to the realities of the world, not just within the boundaries of the Siamese kingdom. Hiring a foreign teacher was also a proof to that. This character of him was humanistic in nature, that “even as science pushed back the boundaries of the known, man’s sense of wonder was continually renewed, and art, poetry, and music found their places along with religion and ethics”.

     The greatest evidence of King Mungkut’s humanistic nature as king was the trial of Tuptim, his latest wife. He let her get punished, though he was not sold out to the idea of death and humiliation as punishment, for the sake of morality and ethics, so that his other wives would always remember that it was unethical and immoral and should not be repeated. It also discouraged his subjects/citizens to do immoral and unethical actions. He placed the end of moral action in the welfare of humanity rather than in fulfilling the will of God, or in his case, Buddha. Anna even reasoned out to him that death was not the way of Buddha. Still, he did not do something to save Tuptim. I thought of it as because he placed morality in the welfare of his people than let religious convictions overpower him and his people.

Note: I enclosed in a double opening-closing quote the definition of humanism because I copied that from an online encyclopedia I can’t place which.

 

50 Shades of Grey: What Christian & Ana Taught Me

In all its steaminess and hotness, 50 Shades of Grey taught me things about relationships. But before I delve into that, I think it's worth noting that this story has a lot of similarities with the Twilight Saga. After reading the first few chapters, I realized that the spatial setting, characters and the plot  had striking similarities with the S Meyer's Twilight series. Here are some of them: 

1. Seattle, Washington and Portland as spatial setting 

2. Ana Steele was as clumsy as Bella Swan, not to mention they were both brunettes, born in September, (and had middle-aged minds)

3. Christian Grey was as rich, powerful, perfect, lovable  and panty- combusting as Edward Cullen, though Christian was, in every way, very human (unlike Edward who was a vampire and very mythical). Both had unruly copper- colored hair and had similar face features, were musical and not to mention they love cars (boys & their toys)

4. Ana and Bella got pregnant unintentionally

Those are a few of the similarities I noticed.  It crossed my mind several times that EL James read and loved S Meyer's Twilight series. But 50 Shades was a lot steamier and sexier than Twilight that when I saw it displayed in bookstores, it made me wonder if there's a governing body that controlled or rated books if they're for adult readers only or not, like how MTRCB rated every movie that came out in Philippine cinemas. 

Now, are you wondering I mentioned those similarities? It's because it made me think that stories/themes like Twilight & 50 Shades, with their clumsy female leading characters with self-esteem issues falling for an impossibly perfect man, will definitely be loved by readers. Especially female readers (like me). Love stories as such are ideal love stories. What woman wouldn't fall for a guy like Christian Grey and Edward Cullen? It occurred to me that if I were to make my own novel, I'd more likely go after the footsteps of Twilight and 50 Shades.

Well, back to what I learned from 50 Shades. The saying that went "behind a man's success or failure is a woman" was very applicable here. I said so because Christian Grey, the leading male character  became as "fucked up and dark" as he was, was mainly because of his trauma with his mother as a young boy. And Ana Steele was the "savior who brought him to the lighter side from his darkness", the opposite of his mother. 

Aside from that, Ana reiterated to me what I learned from the previous love stories I had read: that how a woman controls, deals and handles her man is the key ingredient to a relationship's success or failure.This might sound very feminist, but that's what I gathered as one conclusion to the many stories I have read, 50 Shades included. Although Christian was the dominant in their set up, that was, in actuality, superficial. If you were to analyze it deeper, Ana was the dominant in the story, and Christian even said it.

Another thing is that communication is the best therapy to any problem, and even the most difficult and most problematic man can be made to talk what he thinks and how he feels, as long as his woman knows how to make him do it. In every relationship, there has to be a dominant and a submissive. How dominant and how submissive each partner is balances the relationship. If one is too dominant, the other might feel choked. And if the other is too submissive, one might think of him/her as lacking or no care at all.

In the end, Ana was able to bring Christian back into the lighter side of life. They had their "happily ever after" ending. But that's easier read than done in real life. In real life love stories, most women dwell on the pain and the hardships and forget the happiness they have shared. A lot of women are too dominant that their men are choked and then slowly lose their self-esteem. 50 Shades reminds me to deal with my man cautiously, to be rightly dominant and rightly submissive. For at certain points in our relationship, we have to be a dominant and be a submissive at some points. How and when to be a dominant or submissive is the key point there. Ana Steele excelled at that. Some of us don't. And I hope to share Ana's talent when it comes to that. That is definitely her forte. While reading 50 Shades, I was able to escape to another woman's reality and learned tips from her on how to deal with my man.