Disney Plus Dream Vacation: Oliver & Company

Introduction

Faculty, residents, and students at my university participated in the Disney Plus Dream Job and watched 30 Disney films in 30 days. While we completed the dream job on Friday, December 13, we’ll continue to post our top 25 blogs on Psychology Today. Our twenty-third blog post is on Oliver & Company (1988).

Synopsis

Oliver & Company (1988) is an animated musical film produced by Walt Disney Feature Animation based on the classic Charles Dickens novel Oliver Twist. In the film, Oliver is a homeless kitten who joins a gang of dogs to survive the streets of New York City.

At the time of this posting, Oliver & Company holds a rating of 6.7 out of 10 on IMDb and an audience score of 62% on Rotten Tomatoes.

How it relates to the field of psychiatry

At our medical school, psychiatry is taught through a curriculum that incorporates various forms of popular culture. While the majority of our courses are film-based, music is also used to teach behavioral science and psychiatry at several levels of education. Accordingly, we’ll focus on the movie’s soundtrack as well as the plot. The instrumental score for Oliver & Company was composed by J.A.C. Redford. Billy Joel, in addition to voicing Dodger, performed the character's song in the film (1).

Billy Joel (unknowingly) has co-directed several didactics at our medical school. The singer-song writer has provided content for (a) presentations on the mental status examination and Personality Disorders; (b) course outlines through music videos; and (c) a poster presented at the 2018 national American Psychiatric Association meeting.

In the film's opening scene, Oliver is introduced as an orphan in a litter of kittens. To the music of Huey Lewis, Oliver’s sibs are taken one by one, leaving him alone to survive in New York City. The rest of the plot unfolds and follows Oliver’s trials and tribulations as he joins a gang of dogs. If one chooses to view the film as a product of Oliver’s mind, one could draw the connection between social isolation, the use of fantasy as a defense mechanism, and subsequent development of Schizoid Personality Disorder (SPD). While there does not appear to be firm evidence that Oliver & Company is a case study of SPD, it does prompt a discussion of the Cluster A Personality Disorder and its risk factors. Specifically, Oliver experiences neglect as a child and is emotionally detached from his parents (2).

Schizoid Personality Disorder (SPD) is characterized by a pervasive pattern of social detachment. Schizoid individuals characteristically demonstrate a restricted range of emotional expression, tend to be socially isolated, and almost always choose solitary activities.

Sometimes a Fantasy (Billy Joel) was a 1980 single and is the 2nd track on the album, Glass Houses. The lyrics depict a sexually frustrated man who tries to convince his significant other to engage in telephone scatologia. While the song may represent a paraphilic disorder, it also reviews a proposed etiology of SPD.

As the song title suggests, one defense mechanism characteristically employed by schizoid individuals is fantasy; defined as an autistic retreat into an imaginary life created to protect against the anxiety related to social interaction. The retreat serves to protect the schizoid individual in the face of psychological conflict resulting in a state of isolation, ambivalence, and confusion (3). Nevertheless, the schizoid individual may feel an intense need for intimacy. The unconscious conflicts that inhibit the development of intimacy include sexual anxieties (4) as depicted in the song – “When am I gonna take control and get a hold of my emotions?” – and the MTV video. However deep-seeded and suppressed those desires may be, the schizoid personality could be otherwise persuaded – “It’s not the real thing, but sometimes a fantasy is all you need.”

We Didn't Start the Fire

Source: Anthony Tobia, MD

With all Billy Joel has done to teach the next generation of physicians at our medical school, we now segue to yet another of his songs, We Didn’t Start the Fire, to set up our remaining Disney Plus Dream Vacation schedule: "Davey Crocket, Peter Pan, Elvis Presley (Lilo and Stitch, 2002), Disneyland!" Isn’t it ironic that at 1:17 into the video (Figure 1) when Joel references Davey Crocket, the father is reaching for the telephone (thus linking to Sometimes a Fantasy!). While Davey Crockett’s stories were adapted into a television miniseries which aired between 1954 and 1955 on Walt Disney's Disneyland, we’ll skip this character and remain loyal to analyzing film. We’ll return after the New Year and post on Peter Pan (1953) on January 5!