Beauty and the Beast (1991 film): Difference between revisions

Beauty and the Beast
File:Beautybeastposter.jpg
Directed by	Gary Trousdale Kirk Wise
Written by	Linda Woolverton Roger Allers Kelly Asbury
Produced by	Don Hahn
Starring	Paige O'Hara Robby Benson Richard White Jerry Orbach Angela Lansbury David Ogden Stiers Bradley Pierce Jesse Corti Rex Everhart
Edited by	John Carnochan Ellen Keneshea
Music by	Howard Ashman Alan Menken
Distributed by	Buena Vista Pictures
Release dates	November 13, 1991
Running time	Original: 84 min Special Edition: 90 min
Country	USA
Language	English
Budget	$20,000,000

For other uses, see Beauty and the Beast (disambiguation).

Beauty and the Beast is a 1991 American animated film, the thirtieth animated feature to be produced by Walt Disney Feature Animation. The film was originally released to theaters on November 13, 1991 by Walt Disney Pictures and Buena Vista Distribution. The animated film, one of the best-known of the Disney studio's films, is an adaptation of the well-known fairy tale Beauty and the Beast, about a beautiful woman kept in a castle by a horrific monster. It is the first and only animated picture to ever be nominated for the Academy Award for Best Picture. Beauty and the Beast features the voices of Robby Benson (Beast), Paige O'Hara (Belle), Richard White (Gaston), Jerry Orbach (Lumière), David Ogden Stiers (Cogsworth), and Angela Lansbury (Mrs. Potts).

Beauty and the Beast ranked #22 on the American Film Institute's list of best musicals and #34 on its list of the best romantic American movies. On the list of the greatest songs from American movies, Beauty and the Beast ranked #62. The film has been deemed "culturally significant" by the United States Library of Congress and selected for preservation in the National Film Registry.

Overview

The movie was adapted by Linda Woolverton from the story by Roger Allers, based upon the version of Beauty and the Beast by Jeanne-Marie Leprince de Beaumont (uncredited in the English version of the film, but credited in the French version as writer of the novel). It was directed by Gary Trousdale and Kirk Wise, and the music was composed by Alan Menken and Howard Ashman, both of whom had written music and songs for Disney's The Little Mermaid.

It was a significant success at the box office, with more than $171 million in domestic revenues alone and over $377 million in worldwide revenues. [1] [2] This high number of sales made it the third-most successful movie of 1991, surpassed only by summer blockbusters Terminator 2: Judgment Day and Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves. It was also the most successful animated Disney film at the time.

Beauty and the Beast won Academy Awards for Best Music, Original Score and Best Music, Song for Alan Menken and Howard Ashman's "Beauty and the Beast", sung in the film's most famous scene by Angela Lansbury, and at the end of the film by Céline Dion and Peabo Bryson. Two other Menken and Ashman songs from the movie were also nominated for Best Music, Song are "Be Our Guest" and "Belle". Beauty and the Beast was also nominated for Best Sound and Best Picture. It is the only animated movie ever to be nominated for Best Picture.

In 2002 the United States Library of Congress deemed the film "culturally significant" and selected it for preservation in the National Film Registry. In October 8 of the same year, Disney released the film as a Special Edition DVD.

This film inspired a Broadway stage musical, which earned tremendous commercial success in its own right and a Tony Award, and became the first of a whole line of Disney stage productions. It will close in June to make room for another production, The Little Mermaid. There are also Disney versions of the story published and sold as storybooks and a comic book based on the film published by Disney Comics.

In 1995, a live-action children's series called "Sing Me A Story With Belle" started on syndication, running until 1999.

In November 11, 1997, a midquel called Beauty and the Beast: The Enchanted Christmas was released directly to video. It was quickly followed by another midquel titled Belle's Magical World that was released on February 17, 1998.

Plot summary

One cold winter's night, an old beggar woman stumbles up to a prince's castle. She begs the prince for shelter from the cold and offers a single rose to give him as payment. Being selfish and heartless, the prince refuses her simply because she is ugly. The old woman warns him that true beauty is within one's heart, not in one's appearance. After the prince refuses again, the woman reveals herself to be a beautiful and powerful enchantress and, as punishment to the cruel and selfish prince, she transforms him into a beast and unleashes a ghastly spell on the castle that transforms the servants into anthropomorphic household items and the castle grounds into a dark, forbidding place. This spell can only be broken if the Beast learns to love another and receives the other's love in return before the last petal of the enchantress's rose withers and falls, or else he will remain the Beast forever. A magic mirror is the beast's only window to the outside world. As the years go by, The Beast falls into depression as he wonders who could ever love such a hideous monster.

The main story starts ten years later. The "beauty" of the title is a girl called Belle who lives with her father, Maurice, in a small French village in Provence (Belle). Maurice is known for his Rube Goldberg-type inventions. Even though the townspeople note Belle's beauty, they consider her odd because of her passion for books. Her beauty has attracted the attentions of local hunter and the hero of the village, Gaston, but Belle considers him "rude and conceited" and therefore politely ignores him.

One day, Maurice decides to take his latest invention to a fair outside the village. On the way, he becomes lost in the woods. When wolves chase him, his horse Phillipe bucks him off in fear. Maurice flees from the wolves and eventually comes to the Beast's castle. The servants of the castle welcome Maurice, but when the Beast discovers him, he rapidly loses his temper and has him locked up in a tower dungeon, accusing him of trespassing, and believing that he has come to laugh at the "beast" (referring to himself)

Back in the village, Gaston proposes to Belle. He explains to her that she is going to be his "little wife", have six or seven "strapping boys, like me", to quote the character, and makes a number of other chauvinistic comments, such as how she will rub his feet and rid them of his callouses and bunions after he comes home from work, and how she, being a good wife will cook and clean for him. After she throws him out, humiliating him in front of the entire village (Belle Reprise), she is astonished to find her father's horse without his master. She traces her father to the castle. Once there, she offers to take the place of her father as the Beast's prisoner; the Beast agrees and sends Maurice back, much to the distress and heartbreak of both Belle, because she was not allowed to say goodbye to her ill father, and of Maurice, because he has "lived his life", and does not want his daughter exposed to the Beast.

The Beast, realizing that Belle could break the spell, allows her to have her own room and permits her to go anywhere in the castle she likes, except the West Wing - the Beast's quarters, where he keeps the enchantress' magical rose.

Later, Belle, still sad after seeing her father leave the castle, doesn't want anything to do with the Beast, and turns down his "invitation" to dinner. At this, he rages to the servants that "if she doesn't eat with me, she doesn't eat at all!"

File:131222 beauty l.jpg

The famous ballroom dance sequence from the second act of Beauty and the Beast.

When Belle eventually leaves her room, the various household items, including Lumière the candlestick and Cogsworth the clock and head of the household, entertain their guest with a fancy French dinner and all the comforts a team of servants can provide (Be Our Guest). The household items are, of course, eager for Belle and the Beast to fall in love so that they can become human again. Unfortunately for them, Belle and the Beast don't get along very well, mostly due to his appalling temper and selfish nature.

Back in the village, Gaston is sulking in the village tavern over his rejection by Belle earlier that day. His lackey, LeFou, rallies the villagers to cheer him up (Gaston). Suddenly, Maurice bursts in and calls for help to save Belle from the Beast. He is ridiculed and thrown out. Gaston comes up with a plan to force Belle to marry him by threatening to throw her father into the asylum (Gaston Reprise). Meanwhile, Maurice has decided that if nobody will help him, then he'll return to the Beast's castle alone. Shortly after he leaves, Gaston and LeFou come to the house with the men from the asylum. When they find that both Belle and Maurice are gone, Gaston makes LeFou wait by the front porch until they come back.

During a tour of the castle, Belle, bowing to her inquisitive nature, discovers the West wing a dark, lonesome, shadowy and disturbingly scary place. There, she sees evidence of the Beast's rage and self-hatred: The room is littered with slashed furniture, broken mirrors and a ripped-up picture of his pre-enchanted human form - where she notes his penetratingly blue eyes. Entranced by the enchanted rose, Belle moves to touch it, only to be stopped and confronted by an enraged Beast. She flees from the castle, only to come across more wolves in the forest. At the last moment, the Beast shows up and defends her, but is badly hurt after winning the fight. Grateful to him for saving her life, Belle takes him back to his castle, where they start to become friends.

Over the following days, the Beast becomes more human in behavior, showing more kindness as Belle sees a side of him she never saw before (Something There). He displays his kindness when he announces he wants to give her something special, acting on Lumière's astute suggestion to give her the castle's enormous library, which thrills her beyond belief. The improving relationship reaches its climax with a fine dress dining engagement and ballroom dance while Mrs. Potts sings the movie's title song (Beauty and the Beast). He then takes her to the balcony where he nervously manages to ask her if she is happy staying in the castle with him. She readily agrees, but hesitantly tells him that her happiness would be complete if she could see her father once more, even for a moment. When he gives her his magic mirror that will show her anything she wishes to see, she asks to see her father. He is lost and sick in the forest, having been unable to find the castle again. The Beast, having fallen in love with her, does what he thinks is right and releases her to go rescue him. Belle finds her father and she takes Maurice back to their house in the village. Upon their arrival, a lynch mob arrives to take Maurice to the asylum. Gaston offers to clear up the "misunderstanding" if Belle agrees to marry him, but she still refuses.

Eager to prove that her father is not crazy, Belle shows them an image of the Beast with the magic mirror and refers to him as her friend. When Gaston calls the Beast a monster, she accuses Gaston of being the monster. Gaston quickly convinces the villagers that the Beast is a threat and a menace to the community and leads the mob to the castle to pillage it, rallying with the cry "Kill the Beast!" (The Mob Song) Belle and her father are locked in their cellar but are later released by an enchanted teacup named Chip who hid inside of Belle's bag. Although most of the mob is fought and driven off by the enchanted artifacts of the castle, Gaston reaches the Beast and attacks him. The Beast, disheartened by the belief that Belle will never come back, doesn't fight back. Gaston is about to defeat him on the castle's roof when Belle appears. The Beast, reenergized, turns to fight Gaston. However, as the Beast is about to finish him off, Gaston pleads that he will "do anything". These words strike a chord with the Beast, and the Beast realizes he can no longer find feeling in himself to kill. He releases Gaston and tells him to "Get out!" While the Beast and Belle are reunited, Gaston stabs the Beast in the back with a dagger. Gaston then loses his footing on the roof and tumbles from the castle, taking the magic mirror with him. After he is gone, Belle whispers to the dying Beast that she loves him just before the last petal falls from the rose. This temporarily leaves the servants in grief and despair, having lost both their master and their hopes of regaining their original form. Suddenly, the Beast begins to glow and rises into midair and reverts back to his former, human form. Beast moves towards Belle, who is not sure as to who the new man is, until she looks into his eyes and recognizes them as the same as the piercing blue ones of the Beast's. With the spell now broken, the gloomy castle becomes beautiful again and the enchanted objects of the castle turn back into people who closely resemble their object counterparts.

The next day, a celebration ball is held, and Belle and the prince are married. Lumière and Cogsworth try to let bygones be bygones, but they get into an argument over who knew first that Belle would break the spell (it was Lumiere). Maurice makes friends with Mrs. Potts, and with one last glance at the new stained-glass window, the film ends (Beauty and the Beast Reprise).

Voice cast

Actor	Role(s)
Paige O'Hara	Belle
Robby Benson	Beast/Prince Adam
Richard White	Gaston
Jerry Orbach	Lumière
Angela Lansbury	Mrs. Potts
David Ogden Stiers	Cogsworth The Narrator
Bradley Pierce	Chip
Jesse Corti	Lefou
Rex Everhart	Maurice
Hal Smith	Philippe
Jo Anne Worley	Wardrobe
Kimmy Robertson	Babette
Tony Jay	Monsieur D'Arque

Supervising Animators

Animator	Character(s)
James Baxter	Belle
Glen Keane	Beast
Andreas Deja	Gaston
Nik Ranieri	Lumière
David Pruiksma	Mrs. Potts and Chip
Will Finn	Cogsworth
Chris Wahl	LeFou
Ruben A. Aquino	Maurice
Russ Edmonds	Philippe
Tony Anselmo	Madame de la Grande Bouche
Larry White	Wolves

Academy Awards

Award	Recipient
Best Music, Original Score	Alan Menken
Best Music, Original Song ("Beauty and the Beast")	Alan Menken & Howard Ashman
Nominated:
Best Picture	Don Hahn
Best Music, Original Song ("Belle")	Alan Menken & Howard Ashman
Best Music, Original Song ("Be Our Guest")	Alan Menken & Howard Ashman
Best Sound	Terry Porter, Mel Metcalfe, David J. Hudson & Doc Kane

Songs

• "Belle": The opening song of the movie, Belle makes her way to the local bookshop and the whole village erupts into song, describing Belle's eccentricities.
  • "Belle Reprise": Sung by Belle after Gaston proposes to her, Belle repeats her plea of "wanting much more than this provincial life".
• "Gaston": LeFou (Gaston's sidekick) and the local drunkards sing Gaston's praises in a village tavern.
  • "Gaston Reprise": After Maurice flees the Beast's castle, he enters the tavern pleading for help, only to be mocked by the townsfolk. It is here that Gaston thinks of the idea to blackmail Belle by sending her father to an asylum if she doesn't marry him.
• "Be Our Guest": A luncheon cabaret of the castle's servants as crockery, flatware etc. entertaining Belle.
• "Something There": Sung by Belle and the Beast when they realize they have feelings for each other.
• "Human Again": Sung by the castle's servants as they clean up the castle in preparation for the romantic dance they plan. (Only in the IMAX version and the Special Edition version of the DVD.)
• "Beauty and the Beast": Sung by Mrs. Potts whilst Belle and the Beast dance in the castle ballroom.
• "The Mob Song": Sung by the villagers on their way to the castle to kill the beast.

Work-In-Progress

The film was shown at the New York Film Festival in September 1991. Because the animation was only about 70% complete, the film was shown as a "Work-In-Progress" with storyboards and pencil tests filling out the remaining 30%. This version of the film proved so popular that it has been released on VHS, the September 1993 LaserDisc, and the October 8, 2002, Platinum Edition DVD.

Titles in different languages

• Arabic: الجميلة و الوحش
• Bosnian: Ljepotica i Zvijer
• Brazilian: A Bela e a Fera
• Bulgarian: Красавицата и звярът (The Beauty and the Beast)
• Catalan: La Bella i la Bèstia
• Chinese (Simplified): 美女与野兽 měinǚ yŭ yěshòu ("Luscious woman with Beast")
• Chinese (Traditional): 美女與野獸 měinǚ yŭ yěshòu ("Luscious woman with Beast")
• Croatian: Ljepotica i Zvijer
• Czech: Kráska a zvíře
• Danish: Skønheden og Udyret
• Dutch: Belle en het beest (belle and the beast)
• Estonian: Kaunitar ja koletis
• Finnish: Kaunotar ja hirviö ("Beauty and the Monster")
• French: La belle et la bête
• Filipino: Ang Maganda at ang Halimaw"
• German: Die Schöne und das Biest
• Greek: Η Πεντάμορφη και το Τέρας
• Hebrew: היפה והחיה(Ha'yafa ve-Ha'chaya)
• Hungarian: A Szépség és a szörnyeteg
• Icelandic: Fríða og dýrið
• Indonesian: Si Cantik dan si buruk rupa
• Italian: La Bella e la bestia
• Japanese: 美女と野獣 (Bijo to Yajū)
• Korean (South Korea): 미녀와 야수
• Maltese: Is-Sabiħa u l-Bhima
• Norwegian: Skjønnheten og udyret
• Polish: Piękna i bestia
• Portuguese: A bela e o monstro (Portugal); A bela e a fera (Brazil)
• Romanian: Frumoasa şi bestia
• Russian: Красавица и Чудовище
• Serbian: Лепотица и Звер
• Slovene (Slovenia): Lepotica in zver
• Spanish: La Bella y la Bestia
• Swedish: Skönheten och odjuret
• Thai: โฉมงามกับเจ้าชายอสูร
• Turkish: Güzel ve çirkin
• Vietnamese: Người Đẹp và Quái Vật

Trivia

• When Maurice is lost in the forest and comes to a group of faded signs, the bottom one says Anaheim. This is a reference to Anaheim, California, where Disneyland is located.
• Another sign, pointing towards a more unpleasant part of the forest, reads "Valencia", a reference to Valencia, California and home of Six Flags Magic Mountain, and the California Institute of Arts, where animator Glen Keane learned the trade.
• Although the Beast/Prince's real name is never mentioned in the movie. According to the Official Encyclopedia of Disney by Dave Smith, the Beast's name is "Adam".
• In "The Mob Song", Gaston quotes Macbeth by William Shakespeare. "Screw your courage to the sticking place." (I, vii) Lady Macbeth's speech to Macbeth to tell him to kill Duncan.
• The song "Mountain Town" from South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut (1999), is meant to be a parody of the opening song, "Belle".
• The film was restored and remastered for its January 1 2002 re-release in IMAX theatres. For this version of the film, much of the animation was touched up, a new sequence set to the deleted song "Human Again" was inserted into the film's second act (the only difference between Human Again on Broadway and on the Special Edition DVD is that Chip has dialogue in the Broadway production, but in the Special Edition DVD, all of Chip's lines in the song were given to Lumiere, Mrs. Potts and the other enchanted objects), and a new digital master from the original CAPS production files was used to make the high resolution IMAX film negative. Beauty and the Beast: Special Edition, as the enhanced version of the film is called, was released on a 2-disc Platinum Edition Disney DVD in October 8 2002.

• As noted by a character in the "Belle" sequence, Belle is French for beautiful. Le Fou is French for "the fool."

• Belle was inspired by other great movie heroines. Her peasant dress was loosely based on Judy Garland's (Dorothy) attire from The Wizard of Oz. The scene where Belle runs to the hills singing is a homage to Julie Andrews and the opening scene of 1965's The Sound of Music. Also, towards the end of the film Belle holds the dying Beast in her arms. This is similar to the way Maria holds the slain Tony in West Side Story.

• James Berardinelli said in his review of this film that it "is not only the finest animated movie ever made, but deserves a prominent position on any list of all-time greats."

• Disney was originally going to have Jodi Benson, the voice of Ariel also provide the voice for Belle. However, it was decided that Belle needed a more 'European' sounding voice. Howard Ashman remembered working with Paige O'Hara and suggested she try out for the part. Jodi Benson did eventually provide the voice of Belle on the animated series Disney's House of Mouse.

• Gaston is among the few characters in modern Disney films to make chauvinistic comments about women. He calls Belle his "little wife", says that they will have six or seven "strapping boys" like himself and also says that it is inappropriate for a woman to read books because "soon she starts getting ideas and thinking".

• When Gaston places his feet on Belle's table, the mud coming off the boots strongly resembles Mickey Mouse's head, following the long standing Disney tradition of having "Hidden Mickeys" in their movies.

• Beauty and the Beast was the first animated film to win the Golden Globe for Best Motion Picture — Musical or Comedy. The only other animated films to win this honor were The Lion King and Toy Story 2.

• Beauty and the Beast is the last Disney movie where the entire main cast perform both their speaking parts and their singing parts.

• The final animation of Belle and the Prince (Human Beast) dancing in the restored ballroom is recycled from Sleeping Beauty.

• The color blue is a significant symbol throughout Beauty and the Beast. During the musical number "Belle", Belle is the only character in the village who wears blue. Later on she meets the Beast, who also dresses in blue. The idea is that both characters are social outcasts, so they can relate with one another and see the world in similar views.

• In the video game Kingdom Hearts, its sequels Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories, and Kingdom Hearts II, Belle is one of the seven Princesses of Hearts central to the game's plot. All the voice actors for the characters reprise their roles with the exception of the late Jerry Orbach, who is replaced by Jeff Bennett as Lumière, and Richard White, owing to Gaston's absence.

• Belle is one of the few Disney heroines who is not a princess, and one of the few who shows interest in books.

• A Nintendo Game Boy Color game was released due to the popularity of the movie. It consisted of a mini-game featuring the characters of the movie.

• The beginning portion of the song “Transformation” in the American original soundtrack, up to the point where magical stardusts begin to fall down from the sky, differs from the actual music used in the film, while foreign versions, including Korean, Japanese and French, match the actual film.

• For the later Broadway production, the feather duster was named "Babette" and the wardrobe was named "Madame de la Grande Bouche" (translation: "Mrs. Bigmouth").

• Kevin and Kell briefly parodies Beauty and the Beast. When Martha Dewclaw (formerly Fennec) returns from the human world as still a human (rather than a red fox), she is distressed by what has happened to her appearance, and therefore considers herself ugly. She finds that only a gold-colored dress is left among her clothing; Ralph dresses up in clothing similar to what The Beast wears, and they dance in the foyer of their mansion to a parody of "Beauty and the Beast" on July 7, 2002, the joke being that in the anthropomorphic world of Kevin and Kell, the human Martha, subject of the song, would be the beast.

• Tony Jay played Paracelsus in the Beauty and the Beast tv series.

• In the final scene of the Dreamworks film Shrek, Princess Fiona's "transformation" is similar to the Beast reverting to his human form. Also, in Shrek 2, two of the factory workers are transformed into a clock and a candlestick, a reference to Cogsworth and Lumiere.

• When Belle goes up to the West Wing, the background music is a variation of Aquarium from Camille Saint-Saëns's Le Carnaval des Animaux.

• In track #1 ("Prologue") of the Original Motion Picture Soundtrack, the narrator says "If he could learn to love another, and earn their love in return by the time the last petal fell, then the spell would be broken". However, when the movie was released, the words "earn their love" was replaced with "earn her love", presumably to play down the gender ambiguity of the original narration.

• Julie Andrews was considered for the role of Mrs. Potts.

• The design for the Beast is a composite of a bison, gorilla, lion, baboon and a wolf. Also, when the Beast is preparing for his dinner with Belle, he refers to his haircut as "stupid". The haircut he has is identical to that of the Cowardly Lion from 1939's The Wizard of Oz.

• In the Chinese dubs of Beauty and the Beast, the voice of the Beast is provided by Jackie Chan. He does both the spoken and sung portions in the dubs.

• Belle makes a brief appearance in Disney's animated movie The Hunchback of Notre Dame, during Quasimodo's song "Out There". She can be seen walking across a town square reading her book.

• Beast also makes an appearance in the Disney film Aladdin, where he is seen as a small glass toy amongst a pyramid of toys in a scene with the Sultan.

• Originally, a 1/2-hour short subject starring Mickey Mouse, Donald Duck and Goofy entitled Mickey's Arabian Nights was set to be shown with this movie theatrically but due to conflicts with production of Aladdin, it was decided having 2 productions with the same source material would be too much. So this short's production ceased.

• The majority of the statues seen in the castle are early versions of the Beast.

See also

• Beauty and the Beast (theatrical production)
• Direct to Video Films
  • Beauty and the Beast: The Enchanted Christmas
  • Belle's Magical World
• Films considered the greatest ever

References

• Official Website of the Academy Awards
• Official Website of the HFPA and Golden Globe Awards

External links

• Beauty and the Beast at IMDb