Aging & Wisdom Quote by Neil Jordan

Jordan frames The Company of Wolves as a coming-of-age story that treats fear as a social curriculum, not a natural instinct. The sharp move is how he relocates danger: it isnt only the wolf outside the door, its the story society tells young women about their own bodies and appetites. In that sense, the film isnt simply revising Little Red Riding Hood; its exposing how fairy tales can function as soft propaganda, rehearsing girls to police themselves.

The line about being taught "how to look at themselves" signals the real antagonist: the internalized gaze. Jordan points to a culture that hands young women a mirror and a warning label at the same time. Desire becomes a booby-trap, curiosity becomes recklessness, the unknown becomes shame. By naming this instruction as learned, he implies it can be unlearned - and that the cost of obedience is a life narrowed down to what feels safe.

His final image, "worth getting your teeth into", is doing double duty. Its a sly reversal of predation, giving the girl the wolf's agency without making her monstrous. Sensuality here isnt sanitized empowerment-speak; its messy, risky, bodily. Context matters: in the mid-80s, with feminism arguing over pornography, purity narratives, and who gets to define sexual danger, Jordan positions the Gothic as a space where taboo can be handled honestly. The subtext is permission: not to ignore threats, but to refuse fear as a default identity.