(fig.: Pixar Animation Studios, „Finding Nemo“, 2003)
Can overly accentuated (facial) features of a character, which stereotypically make out a villain in animation movies, or the lack thereof, support the narrative of a movie or maybe create surprise effects?
Normally those stereotypical features are used because it very quickly establishes who is the villain and it does not need to be explicitly said or shown. Through this anything the character says or does already might be perceived as shady. We often expect it to be this way, therefore when for example in Frozen the villain looks like the typical nice guy it really takes some time to identify his bad intentions. On the contrary for example in Finding Nemo the sharks, who in the beginning of their appearance with their sharp teeth and scars, play into the villain stereotype and then surprise the audience by being friendly.
I would also like to know how this villain-stereotypes affect children’s perception of for example people with scars and if switching them up might have a positive effect on their critical judgment and create less prejudices.
As the practical work I would like to develop a scene, probably a dialog between two people and create it twice – once with both of them looking „nice“ and once with one of the two looking stereotypically villain, show it to people and let them guess what the intention of the person who is altered in the versions might be and see if the reactions are different depending solemnly on the looks.
