I’ve seen “Rise of the Guardians” a few times but I never
really paid attention to the metaphors in it before. Despite having very little
to do with religion directly, “Rise of the Guardians” is focused on faith and
belief, and is a very spiritual movie.
One of the main points of the story is that when the
children don’t believe in the Guardians, they can no longer see them. The
guardians can still do things that affect the childrens’ lives but the children
can’t benefit from those things the way they could if they believed. Similarly,
we don’t always see the blessings we receive, and we can benefit much more from
God’s gifts to us if we believe in Him and are aware of them. This metaphor can
be taken too far, of course. When children stopped believing in the guardians,
the guardians started losing their powers and becoming weaker. God doesn’t
become any weaker when we don’t believe in him. However, there are some real
things, like legends, that do fade if people don’t keep telling them. I’m sure
there are many wonderful stories that have been written or told that we no
longer know about because no one passed them on.
The villain in “Rise of the Guardians” is a symbol of fear.
Pitch causes nightmares and spreads darkness and terror. I think he was a
perfect choice for an antagonist. Fear and doubt are the polar opposites of
faith and hope. And Pitch isn’t just an overwhelming blanket of darkness, he
attacks each person with what they are specifically afraid of. He doesn’t seem
to like outright confrontations, instead sneaking into children’s rooms and
turning their dreams dark. He takes away the guardians’ support before
attacking them outright, capturing Tooth’s fairies and destroying Bunny’s eggs
before going after the guardians themselves.
During an earlier part of the film, Pitch is confronted
by, and defeats one of the guardians. Sandy has similar powers to Pitch and can
be seen as a representation of hope. Sometimes our fears do defeat our hopes
and we are left in darkness for a while. But in the end, Sandy was brought back
by a small group of children in some town somewhere in the United States. It
could have been any town, in any place.
The number of children who believe in the Guardians
dwindles as the film progresses. In the end, there are just a few left. But
there is one light that just refuses to go out. Pitch discovers that it only
takes one single light to fight off a whole horde of darkness. My favorite
moment in the film is when Pitch asks the Guardians who will defend them, and
the boy who refused to stop believing steps forward and declares with
determination that he will. More than anything else it is children who
defend our stories and holiday rituals, and even our religions. I know that for
me, Christmas has become less and less magical as I’ve grown older. But I’m
pretty sure it will be more special again when I have kids of my own who will
see it as I did when I was young.
In the end of the film the villain is banished to
obscurity, and light is restored across the world. One of my favorite things
about stories like this one is that the metaphors are not forced or obvious. If
you want to see them, you have to actually pay attention to them. I think all
well-crafted stories have good metaphors. It’s hard to tell a meaningful story
without representing truth in it, one way or another, and we humans are
pattern-finders. Even if the makers of the film didn’t attempt to put all of
this symbolism in it, we will make the connections. “Rise of the Guardians”
just happens to be an especially good example of a film that promotes
spirituality, in that it touches on a lot of truths about light and faith.
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