Chapman and her daughter Emma © Patch
Chapman and her daughter Emma © Patch
The complex relationship between Merida and her mother is at the heart of Brave’s story, and that’s no coincidence. Writer and original director Brenda Chapman drew inspiration directly from her own life (Alegre, 2021). The idea for the film came about ten years before its release, when her daughter Emma Rose was only four or five years old. Chapman recognized a lot of herself in her: headstrong, independent, and strong (Alegre, 2021). She describes their bond as intense, full of love, but also full of friction: “We clash, we're both control freaks, but the intensity of my love for her is always there” (Pixar Portal, 2011).
Chapman searched for existing fairy tales with a mother-and-daughter story. She found hardly any, only stories in which mothers are often absent or replaced by evil stepmothers. So she decided to create her own mother-daughter fairy tale (Breen, 2015; Giardina, 2013). She wanted to write a story about a young girl’s relationship with her mother and the struggles they can have on a daily basis as well as the big struggles (Breen, 2015).
For Chapman, Brave felt like a love letter to her daughter, she was the heart and soul of the story. When the film came out, her daughter was proud knowing she was an inspiration: “When she sees a kid with a Merida doll, she says, ‘That’s me.’” (Giardina, 2013).