An interesting thing I noticed when they showed the parents emotions was Sadness seemed to be in control for the mother and Anger was in control for the father. Was that because of what they were feeling at that moment or do you think that drives their personality?
Joy was obviously in control and when she wasn't all the other emotions had no idea what to do, so I took it as the same when they showed the parents.
I think you're right. Not sure how much can be read into it, but I think the same thing. The boy at the ice rink at the end with the "GIRL! GIRL!" klaxon in his head, you see fear cowering on the floor after all the other emotions have fled the scene. Also relevant I think :-)
shareI noticed this, too, and thought it was a cool little detail. But I wish they'd done a better job of paying it off by having the parents' actual personalities onscreen reflect their dominant emotion more (i.e., make Dad angrier and Mom sadder).
Great movie, though!
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A couple things...and neither of them might be right.
A) If you notice, in Riley's mind, Joy is very much in control. She's the boss, she's in charge, and she doesn't like anyone else taking over. Contrast that to Mom's mind, where Sadness might be the leader, but she's very respectful of the thoughts and opinions of the other emotions ("Did you hear that?" "Mmm hmmmm"). This isn't as present in Dad's mind, but it's still there -- everyone's working together. Perhaps, as you grow up, your emotions start to work together better -- they all are working together for the good of their person, rather than the constant need to feel one particular emotion. This can be supported at the end of the movie, when you see lots of memories being driven by multiple emotions.
B) Remember the scene where Bing Bong's wagon is tipped into the dump, and as he's sitting on the ground all despondent, Sadness comes up to him and puts her arm around him? One of Sadness' deeper talents is empathy. She sympathizes with others. She feels their pains. In this one particular scene, Mom's Sadness deduces that Riley is upset about something, so she's the one who takes control of the situation. Dad's had a long day at work and doesn't want to deal with any more hard issues (he wants home to be the one place where everything's ok), so when Mom signals him, he's frustrated with everything that has happened that day. Frustration and exasperation are part of Anger's domain, so that's which emotion takes control at that particular moment.
I was wondering the same thing. It makes sense, though, when you think about it. While it's possible to have a personality driven by multiple emotions at different times, it's also possible to have one dominant emotion, as was the case with Joy being dominant in Riley. It's also possible for that dominant emotion to change and transition over time. I would guess that the mother's personality wasn't always being driven by sadness, but rather it was just at that particular moment. Likewise with the father and anger. Bl82-1's point about the emotions in the adults working more as a team and less individualistically as we see in Riley's case also makes sense. I think they did a really good job in anthropomorphizing such things in this film.
shareMother is driven by Sadness, father driven by Anger, and Riley so emotionally stunted that she harbors s deep fear of a vacuum cleaner.
I'm guessing it's an abusive home.
Take them to the security kitchen!
It's meant to be subtle. The parents, like any other adult, mask their emotions based on any given scenario--in this case, for the benefit of Riley.
The driving emotion is an indication of that individual's personality. Anger isn't necessarily JUST anger, and it doesn't mean the Dad is literally always angry. Obviously, he isn't. If you pay attention to the characteristics of the emotions, anger (at least in Riley's head) is sarcastic, blunt and pessimistic. If we can assume these characteristics are universal to each individuals emotions, then it's safe to assume the Dad is more of a blunt, straight-to-business type of person. The mom, by contrast, is led more by emotion than logic. She's more of a "glass is half empty" person.
Given, these are subtle details shown in the movie, but it's easy to assume that the parents, like all parents, mask their emotions in front of their child. It doesn't necessarily mean the dad is beating the mom or that the mom is popping Prozac like Tic-Tacs.