The Hunchback of the Paris Inquisition

Released in 1996

  Hello Internet and all welcome back to History of Disney, where today we get medieval. Normally movies try to avoid touchy subjects such as religion, but this is 90's Disney we are talking about. In 1996 Disney came out with a movie based off a book written by Victor Hugo, and it is called the Hunchback of Notre Dame. In this movie we see that a Mr. Claude Frollo has a bit of a vendetta against the gypsies and anyone he deems lower than him. The result, a near Spanish Inquisition style death for Esmerelda. But how close is this method of thinking to the renaissance era thinking that dominated France in the High Middle Ages.

  First off it is worth noting that Frollo is the "Minister of Justice" for Paris and he apparently takes this task very seriously as he kills an innocent gypsy for entering Paris illegally, and tries to kill the protagonist. The fact that Frollo's sense of justice is very harsh and hypocritical, we all know he is the bad guy. However I  don't see him as just the bad guy, I also see him as some Christians out there today. In the song "Hellfire," Frollo makes a claim that he is so much purer than pretty much everyone else in Paris, but as w see later, that isn't the case. From our perspective it's ironic. A man of who believed that he was righteous, ends up fall to a metaphorical version of hell. Does this not sound like some Christians we see in certain areas of our lives. We think we are all so holy that we criticize everyone's minute faults and yet we are oblivious to our own problems.

  Now how is this movie linked to the Spanish Inquisition? Simple, it was a matter of repent or die. No third option, no alternatives, you are quite literally forcing repentance onto to them and using fear as a mechanism. This was common throughout Europe as Christianity went through the Crusades and attacking anyone who wasn't a Christian back home. These supposed infidels were then dragged away  by the clergy and forced to "confess" whatever sin they committed and put their faith back in the church. Do you see how flawed this system is? All it takes is one false accusation, by  someone who doesn't like you, and you could be burnt at the stake for a crime you didn't commit. Well this is what happened in the Middle Ages and when you have men like Frollo as the Minister of Justice, anyone who Frollo sees as a threat or deems unworthy for his perfect world, could dragged off and burned alive.

And the inside took 5 years alone.

  If you watched the movie and saw the people begin to rise up and attack Frollo, you may have been confused as to why. Well aside from the fact that these peasants have just lost their homes, they were also about to lose their church. In Medieval Society, the church was such a center for every day life, one could imagine how the people would react when they saw their social link being attacked. Also, it's Notre Dame that's being attacked. If I was in that position I'd defend that building, because the church took over 100 years to build. Notre Dame was started in 1163 and was completed in 1345. So yeah, I 'd defend that building with my last breath.

  So, what have we learned? Well we have learned that Frollo is a hypocritical jerk who makes his own spin on the Spanish Inquisition by hunting Gypsies. We also learned that these people had more than enough reason to go out and overthrow the corrupt minister. Thank you for your valuable time, and I'll see you next week.