The Parent Trap
Most movies that use doubles to give an uncanny feel to the film and to scare the audience. In the beloved comedy “The Parent Trap” instead uses doubles as a way to promote friendship and sisterhood to the audience. This classic family film is about two twin sisters, Annie and Hallie, who were separated at birth when their parents got divorced. Hallie grows up with her father in Nappa Valley, while Annie was raised with her mother across the world in London. The twins meet at a summer camp where they realize they are twins. They decide to switch places in order to reunite their parents again. The family goes through separate adventures to finally reunite at the fathers weeding. He cuts the wedding off once he sees his ex-wife and his girls and realizes that his family being together was more important.
“The Parent Trap” strongly reflects the theme of doubles through its use of identical twins, Annie and Hallie. They completely mirror each other’s appearance while living vastly different lives. Their physical similarity allows them to switch places, creating a duality in identity as they navigate each other’s worlds. This type of doubling was used as a symbol of merging two halves while other movies involving doubles could symbolize dividing two halves. Also, on the set of “The Parent Trap”, Lindsey Lohan played both twins throughout the movie. They had to use body doubles for it to be possible for the twins to have face to face dialogue. Twins are often considered doubles because they share physical resemblance and, in some cases, similar traits, creating a sense of two individuals who mirror or duplicate each other.
