Portrayal Of Daedalus And Icarus Myth In Finding Nemo

Myths are known to be part of every society, they include stories of gods, origins, and like most myths they teach a moral lesson. In Chapter 8 of How To Read Literature Like A Professor, Foster briefly mentions the Greek myth of “Daedalus and Icarus”, in which a boy falls into his death due to his own disobedience. To this day, there have been many movies made that contain a modern day parallel similar to that of the myth of Icarus. In the movie Finding Nemo, the young fish Nemo disobeyed his father as an act of rebellion, but it resulted in Nemo getting kidnapped. Aside from both the myth and the movie containing a similar exigence, audience, and constraints, they also contain an authority figure that tell the young characters what not to do, an act of willing disobedience, and lastly a loss, all of which make these two works a parallel.

The myth of Icarus takes place on the island of Crete where the unruly King Minos is in charge. One day Minos ordered Daedalus, an ingenious inventor, to build him a maze and he agreed only to find out that the labyrinth contained a Minotaur that fed on men and women. When he found out about this, Daedalus wanted to flee the island with his son, Icarus, but King Minos didn’t permit this and kept them as royal prisoners. Day and night, Daedalus worked on his greatest invention that would get them out of Crete, which turned out to be two pairs of wings made out of feathers and wax. Icarus at first was skeptical about his father’s invention and didn’t want to leave, but as fathers do, he gave him strong words of encouragement. Before they set off, Daedalus warned Icarus to “Above all, don’t fly too high! Don’t fly too close to the sun!” Once they set off, Icarus’ enthusiasm got the best of him and he tried to go higher than the sun. Sure enough, his wings melted, and Icarus fell into the sea and drowned.

In the movie Finding Nemo, Nemo lives with his overprotective father who like any parent, only wants what’s best for him and wants to keep him safe. One day, during a class trip, Nemo and his friends go off on their own towards the end of the reef and play a small, childish game of who could swim the farthest to the open sea. Nemo’s dad quickly steps in before Nemo could swim out. His dad starts yelling at him saying that he isn’t ready to be going out on his own. Nemo takes what his father says to heart and makes him furious. Soon after, as his father isn’t looking, Nemo swims off to the open sea towards a boat. As Nemo is coming back towards the reef, a scuba diver comes from behind him, puts him in a bag and swims off back to the boat. As the movie progresses we find out the Nemo was taken captive in a fish tank and soon to be given as a gift to a reckless child.

In both the myth and the movie, they contain three elements that make them a parallel. They both contain an authority figure that warns the young characters about certain dangers, an act of willing disobedience, and lastly a loss. In the Icarus myth, the authority figure would be his father, Daedalus, who told him to not fly too close to the sun because he knew what would happen if he did. In the movie Nemo’s dad, was the one who told Nemo not to swim off to the sea. Both Icarus and Nemo ignored their fathers warnings and decided to disobey which led to two losses. In the myth, Icarus dies and in the film Nemo gets kidnapped.

In addition to the myth and the movie having a similar elements that make it a parallel, they also contain a similar exigence and intended audience, but different constraints. The purpose of the myth and the movie was to teach a lesson to younger audiences about the consequences that come from disobeying an adult. As mentioned, the myth and story’s intended audience are young people, seeing as how they are the ones who would benefit the most from the lesson. For the myth of “Daedalus and Icarus”, some constraints include that the myth could have been changed because during that time, everything was told through storytelling. As a result, not everyone heard the same version. It could also be that not many people knew how to read, so there was no way of knowing the story. Some constraints of the movie could be that not everyone has seen the movie, or not everyone could afford to watch it. This rhetoric also makes the Icarus and the film a modern day parallel.

In conclusion, the myth of “Daedalus and Icarus” has been portrayed in many ways. One example is the 2003 children’s film Finding Nemo. Both of them contain an authority figure who warn the young characters about certain dangers, the young characters ignore them and as a result it leads to a severe loss. The rhetoric of the myth and the film also play a role between the parallelism. In the end, the use of myths in other literature, are used to make our experience of literature as readers more meaningful and to help us make connections with modern real world stories.