Enola Vs The Mariner: Does Importance Determine The Hero
In Waterworld (1995), extreme global warming has caused the polar ice caps to melt. The Earth has flooded over, and survivors were forced to adapt to a new world, living on floating communities known as atolls. Amidst this, we are introduced to the Mariner, a lone drifter, who ultimately employs his survivalist knowledge to protect Enola, the perceived hope of survival, and her guardian, Helen, from antagonistic pirates, known as the Smokers. This is because Enola is rumoured to have the map to the mythical Dryland imprinted on her back, the only hope for survival in a resource-depleting world, and whoever who finds Dryland, will enjoy unimaginable riches and pleasure (Oswalt, 2016). Knowing this, we immediately perceive the Mariner to be the hero of this film, especially since this narrative is in line with the popular movie trope of the strong and burly man being the saviour of the people.
However, the Mariner does not directly contribute to the salvation of the people, as it is Enola, who holds the literal map to survival. This contrast between the role of Enola and the Mariner is unique and intriguing. Although, the Mariner is assumed to be one of the heroes due to the protection he provides Enola and Helen, it is Enola, who was gifted the map to the metaphorical Garden of Eden, who arguably holds the most importance in the film. This illustrates a deficiency in both Enola and the Mariner, where the Mariner, who has the agency and means to forge his own path, has no clear destination or key to survival. On the other hand, Enola lacks the ability to be independent and has little to no power in the film, nonetheless she holds the key to the future. This deficiency is what allows the film to reach its climax and helps cultivate the eventual relationship between the Mariner and Enola. Thus, I claim that Waterworld illustrates a rare genre of having multi-protagonists as both Enola and the Mariner hold much importance to the film’s plot, and that importance is not a necessary condition for being a protagonist in the film. With this in mind, there is a lack of literature illustrating the importance of Enola in the movie, and by writing this article, I hope to shed light on why we should not discount her role in this film. Importance does not necessarily determine the main character, and heroism and being the protagonist can be mutually exclusive.
The role of the child is important and can make the difference in any situation. The Mariner is the stereotypical hero of Hollywood – male, brawny and competent. This rationalises the use of the Mariner as the major protagonist instead of Enola, especially since it could be reflective of the gender rights of the era. The second-wave feminism movement that occurred from the 1960s to early 1980s arguably helped gender rights to be more liberal. However, it was not as successful as hoped, as feminism was considered as a form of etiquette instead, and attitudes were not altered as they desired. In addition, the legislations made was based on the premise that the women needed protection from men due to them being physically weaker, and hence powerless. Thus, the Mariner is the major protagonist due to the large amount of power he holds, especially over Enola and Helen. Firstly, his power can be portrayed by how he only answers to himself. He is a lone wolf, the King of his trimaran, and both girls are intruders on his ‘sanctuary’. His individualistic survivalist character can be seen by how he channels fluids around his trimaran, which portrays the ongoing effort of the Mariner to demarcate a stable identity and domain away from the undifferentiated seascape. The resources and items he forages from the forgotten world’s submerged ruins facilitate his independence and grant him economic power over the survivals living upon the atolls, who has depleting resources. In addition, the trimaran is initially represented as a private possession admitting no other occupants or uses and a direct extension of the Mariner’s body that swerves and tilts in response to his dashes and leaps across its hulls.
After allowing both Helen and Enola to board his ship, he takes advantage of the sea’s abject qualities, throwing Enola overboard and threatening to abandon both passengers within hostile waters after they hijack his property for their own uses. Furthermore, at one point of the movie, he symbolically cuts short both Enola’s and Helen’s hair, creating an image of submission to him. The Mariner protects himself and his home first, and this treatment of water, possessions and others, creates a heavily exclusionary place-based sense of self (Wintle, 2013). The Mariner captains his own boat, and because the Mariner is largely a misanthropist, he may only be helping Helen and Enola to find Dryland to let go of them as being constraints to his own voyage. The Mariner thus has much power. He is self-sufficient and knowledgeable, and saves the damsels, being Enola and Helen, from distress, namely the Smokers. However, there is a unique paradox portrayed in the protagonist, he is a hero but not necessarily the one that Waterworld needed. This is because the Mariner is unable to promise a better life for the people of Waterworld.
Hence, he has less importance in the film, despite the attempts to instil more importance in his role with the large verbal space and screen-time he has. Waterworld needed a way out of their resource-poverty, and the Mariner could only rescue them in the short-term, by fighting off pirates, but was unable to guarantee them long-term survival. This brings me to the point that Enola, is the most important character in Waterworld, as she can promise a better future for the people. Enola is an apocalyptic and environmental symbol, whose name parallels that of Enola Gay, the B-29 that dropped the atomic bomb on Hiroshima and that has been a symbol of that apocalyptic beast in the last half of this century. However, in Waterworld, Enola delivers not the apocalypse, but escape from it; not nuclear annihilation, but the key to paradise (Oswalt, 2016). Hence, the usage of Enola as the name could be reflective of the importance of her role in Waterworld. Just like the atomic bomb, Enola had the power to change Waterworld, either for the better or for the worse. Hence, her role as the minor protagonist is multi-faceted. The duality of Enola is that she is more than just a child in a post-apocalyptic world. She symbolises the future of civilisation.
On the surface, Enola’s role is clearly that of being a child. Her adolescence and childishness, where in the film she was considered an annoyance by the Mariner due to her constant talking being “like a storm when [she’s] around. ”The fact that Enola’s name reversed spells out ‘alone’ reinforces the idea that she is alone in her own world, and perhaps that she is the only child in Waterworld. She is not as concerned with the map on her back as compared to the adults as she lacks the knowledge about the proposed Dryland, and the paradise it proposes. Enola is unable to read the map on her back and does not consciously remember the actual things signified by her drawings of terrestrial flora and fauna. The only confirmation of Dryland’s existence and location depends upon adults’ efforts to decode her markings. Her tattoo and drawings are valued as artefacts of an old-world awaiting decipherment and therefore as a means of finding the coast, she faces the threat of total objectification. A feminine terrestrial ‘utopia’ promised by a girl who is unknown of her own ability to bring salvation to the people. Hence, Enola is objectified from the start, due to the map on her back. She is valued materially, as an asset, and her physical body holds more importance than her life. Enola as a child is irrelevant, and she is merely a ‘map’ to them. Afterall, the Smokers’ leader, the Deacon, regards the girl as a mere tool in his quest to despoil Dryland.
At one point, the Smokers suggests skinning her so that they can stretch the skin to see the map better. This objectification can be further explored in the idea of patriarchal Western cartographic practices where the idea of a body as a map has long been used in cultural myths and national iconology, and more commonly, the woman as being bodily collapsed with the terrain. Enola’s can also be considered the metaphorical Mother Nature. In the mythological sense, Enola is likely to be considered the ‘mother of the new civilisation’, due to her possible role in repopulating the Earth, which corresponds to the undertones of infertility from inbreeding in the film. On the other hand, Enola is Mother Nature as she promises resources to the people. (Olson, 2015)In overall, Enola also lacks agency because of both of her roles. She lacks authority and the ability to make her own decisions due to her adolescence. She is constantly under the care of Helen. In addition, the people of Waterworld hold greater importance on her tattoo than of her person, causing her to be constraint to the role of being an object before being a subject. In fact, the way she is held in reverence by the people of Waterworld is akin to how one would treat an artefact. Enola-as-a-map is a precious resource to Waterworld, and throughout the film, she is escorted to places, in which she is constantly being accompanied by an adult. Enola is not a hero. She does not embody the typical noble qualities or courage that characterises them, but she holds great importance in the film and can be easily considered as a secondary protagonist. Without Enola, the possibility of the atoll inhabitants surviving is bleak, due to infertility and lacking resources. After all, the Mariner is only the means of transport for the characters, and it is only Enola, or more specifically her body, who can promise and elicit hope for a better future, and she is thus a necessary part of the post-apocalyptic Waterworld.
Therefore, there is a challenge between heroism and importance. Although both Enola and the Mariner are protagonists in the film, the driving force provided by the two characters differ. Enola’s role demands to be a protagonist due to the large influence she has on the main plot, whereas the Mariner is a protagonist because he is the supposed hero of Waterworld. Knowing this, I inquire into the role of the child protagonist in films. In an ideological way, the innocence of the child implores us to see the world differently, through the rose-tinted glasses of the child. In this way, the world takes on a more positive light, and the negative aspects seem to shed aware due to the lack of importance it holds to the child. In the context of Waterworld, Enola only wishes to have fun, and does not understand her own objectification, where she is figuratively wrestled between the Smokers and the Waterworld civilisation due to her map tattoo. The use of the child in films can also represent the truism that children are ultimately our future. The child shoulders both our future and our past and is the person who is supposed to bring the world to greater heights. Hence, Enola embodies the fragility of the world due to her character still holding onto her childlike innocence and dependency, she directly symbolises the need to protect our own Earth, less we live in a world alike Waterworld. All in all, the portrayal of the child in apocalyptic films can symbolise hope, a light in a bleak world.
