Nature has a certain order

Rating: 8/10 (4 April 2006)

Abridged from 2,308 words to fit the IMDb limit of 1,000 words.
Since drawings are inherently genderless, the animation of gender provides unique opportunities for distorting gender stereotypes.
A Bug's Life opens with a portrayal of gender hierarchy. The ants are technically ruled by a queen, but in reality by her daughter, the princess. Hence we see from the outset the intrusion of human gender politics into a world created to amuse, and perhaps educate, human children. Note: real queen ants doesn't rule, they merely breed.
In Disney's bug society the workers are subservient to female ants. That is nature. What is not natural is that in A Bug's Life the worker ants have male voices. Real worker ants are female: male ants only exist to inseminate the queen, and die shortly after mating.
In this imaginary world all the ants of both sexes have enough to live healthy and natural lives. There are only two problems with this microcosm: and males cause both.
Flik is a bumbling male inventor and engineer. Engineering seems to be a negative, destructive, patriarchal force. We see plant stalks damaged by one of his inventions, and the princess - a female - being crushed. This emphasises a stereotypical female victim/male destroyer role.
The male worker ants gather food into a huge pile. They are directed by male ants. The gatherers are clearly of very limited intelligence: when a leaf falls in their path, they need help in order to get around it. The male helpers are slightly more intelligent, but not by much.
The ants hide underground. The princess heroically ensures that her subjects are safe from what is evidently a dangerous situation. But bumbling Flik has been left outside. In an instant he contrives to lose the whole feast. The food pile was very precariously balanced to begin with - by male gatherers and male directors. The disaster is engineered entirely by males.
Note that a real queen ant does not protect her colony, and has a smaller brain than her workers.
The food was a conciliatory offering to a gang of grasshoppers: the matriarchal ant society had found a peaceful solution to a physical threat, but male action threatens that stability. The grasshoppers seem to be all male. They threaten, they swagger; yet they are bumbling and hypocritical. Stereotypical males, in other words.
Cut to a fight between a beetle and a spider. The beetle is very threatening and appears to have all the physical advantages. Somehow, the spider hurts the beetle, which then bursts into tears. The spider consoles it. The beetle's voice is male, the spider's voice is female. Ergo, males can't really fight, despite their advantages; females are stronger and braver than males, regardless of size and strength. This message is repeated in the closing grasshopper scenes: aggression is all front. It is a questionable message. In reality, kids who confront bullies may find they win, or they may get beaten to a pulp: some bullies are tough.
We soon realise that the fight is a performance in an insect circus: but that the snivelling isn't a part of the act. The circus is losing money. Through a quick succession of argumentative, vain, childish male characters, we learn why the circus has problems. The two females - the spider and the butterfly - don't share the blame.
There are a couple of heckling male flies in the audience. Their comments are not only unhelpful, they are also sexist, referring lewdly to the ladybird who they believe to be female. Or perhaps they are joking about this. No females behave in an overtly sexist manner in the film, so sexism is being portrayed as a male trait. The ladybird is male, and doesn't like being mistaken for a female. His reaction is unduly aggressive, i.e. he exaggerates his maleness. This is instantly recognisable as a portrayal of male sexual identity crisis: but anyone who doubts this should note that at the end of the film we are told he is now "in touch with his feminine side".
We learn that the beetle's name is Dim, i.e. he is stupid, as well as aggressive, bullying and cowardly. None of the females have such derogatory names. This is not to suggest that every single negative quality is associated with males, and vice-versa. Flik in particular is brave, intelligent and resourceful. However the very few female weaknesses are both relatively trivial and justified, for example the princess's impatience with Flik. All of the male characters, on the other hand, are at best deeply flawed.
The ants win the battle. "Nature has a certain order", the princess tells Hopper. Females, it seems, head this film's view of that order. The final scene is in part entirely natural: hopper ends up being fed to some chicks. But it is made very clear that he is still alive, which may not be very realistic. His screams are certainly not realistic: grasshoppers do not have human male voices. Hopper's demise is merely another example of trivialising male death - even hideous death - in the name of entertainment. In this case, entertainment for children.
Most films would have ended with the male and female leads beginning a relationship, but this one is so steeped in 1990s political correctness that it can't allow that to happen - despite the hints earlier in the film, and even with the female in the superior role. The final message, then, is that women do not need men.
A Bug's Life is an entertaining film whose animation is never less than astonishing. The closing credits alone are amazing. Nevertheless it is a consistently sexist portrayal of gender roles.