Hans Christian Anderson is the author of the original version of the fairy tale “The Little Mermaid,” this fairy tale demonstrates that there is no limitation to love. The young mermaid has 6 sisters who are told they will be able to rise above the sea when they get 15 years old. The youngest mermaid among them is inspired to develop into an eternal soul in order to lead a human life, and when she reaches the age of 15 she is finally able to surface above the water. She notices a ship dying during this and immediately thinks of a way to help; as a result, she saves the prince who fell into the water. The little mermaid attracts him with her lovely voice, this kinda sounds like a typical love story but it doesn’t end there. Wanting to be a human she then goes to Urseala to negotiate a contract, and there is no question in her mind that she wants to become a human. She would have to make sacrifices as part of this agreement to exchange her voice to grow a pair of legs, but if she fails to win the prince’s love, she will die. Anderson’s version of this fairy tale demonstrates to the audience that we don’t always receive what we want just because we want it. The little mermaid’s sisters end up making a deal with the evil witch, they sacrifice their hair in exchange for a chance to save their little sister in order to give her the opportunity to save herself, since the prince ends up falling in love with someone else instead of her and because time is running out. This must’ve been a hard decision for her and we would think she would’ve chosen herself over a prince who did not love her, but she chose not to kill. him. You could assume that because of her good nature, she can still save herself, but the fact that she chose not to kill him means that she would ultimately perish. 

  Love is shown not just by words but by true sacrifice in the film “ The Little Mermaid” directed by Rob Marshall, the theme of love and sacrifice is shown in the film. In the original fairy tale, the mermaid sacrifices herself to save the prince but in the film, the father sacrifices himself and dies in place of the mermaid but he eventually comes back to life. The mermaids in this movie are all prohibited by their father from rising above the sea level. In this version, everything ends happily ever after as you might reasonably anticipate. This movie doesn’t contain any death threats; for example, when Ursula and the little mermaid are negotiating, she isn’t in danger of dying herself. If the prince doesn’t end up falling in love with her, she won’t perish and turn into sea foam she will just turn back into a mermaid and belong to Ursula. In both movies, he is meant to marry someone else; however, while in the first movie he succeeds in doing so, in the live-action movie I think Aerial was more determined and genuinely fought for the Prince’s love by battling the girl he was scheduled to marry, who turned out to be evil and worked for Urseal. Ariel was able to recover her voice after recovering the necklace that the girl had taken from her and had hidden it inside.  In the film, Ursula is killed by Ariel because she was in a boat and spun the wheel to purposely lose control over the skip, to squish Ursula. Although this version is more kid-friendly, I do believe that many important elements of the original narrative are absent. As a Disney film, this is once again to be anticipated. The prince and the mermaid do indeed end up having their love story in the movie’s conclusion, and Aerial succeeds in achieving her goal of becoming a human. Her father uses his abilities to make this happen. Both these versions of fairy tales show the audience the true meaning of love, in the original fairy tale Ariel’s sisters sacrificed their hair being cut although it all came in vain. It was the intention that mattered, in the original version the little mermaid sacrificed herself knowing the prince’s heart belonged to someone else. Not expecting anything in return but making a sacrifice that’s genuine  is what’s really shown in the first one. In the film version, Ariel’s father was willing to die for his own daughter which shows true love and care although she didn’t listen to him when he specifically told her not to rise up the ocean. Sacrifices are shown when she doesn’t take no for an answer and fights for her true love instead of accepting that he is going to marry someone else. 

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