Is beauty and the Beast a French story that has any connection to the myth of Psyche and Cupid that appears in the Latin classic The Golden Donkey. Today we all remember it from the 1991 Disney film adaptation.
She recently returned to the big screen, this time in a non-animated version, under the direction of Bill Condon and with a cast starring Ewan McGregor, Ian McKellen and Emma Thompson, with Emma Watson as Bela and Dan Stevens. in the beast.
- In the 1990s there was a real fury for Disney princesses.
- Most of them were born in this decade.
- Although some were already veterans.
- Such as Snow White or Cinderella.
- The truth is that if we order the princesses in chronological order to this day.
- We will realize the great evolution they have known.
Most of these princesses, especially the first, responded to the image of the ideal housewife: they were beautiful, young and loved to clean, reflecting the exemplary woman of an era, all have in common a dark past (they lost their mother or father). ), a stormy situation and a happy ending with your prince. It took Disney a long time to realize that these stories had to be repeated, so the steps were gradually taken.
Bela would be the first to deviate a little (just a little) from the path her predecessors had marked. Bela was special. Physically, she was a beautiful young woman, but not a Snow White of unattainable beauty. Its features were more similar to those of the “mortals”. Choosing the color of the eyes and hair (chestnut) is a break with the standard of beauty.
Chestnut is the eternal forgotten in the world of hair, think for a moment about the standards of beauty; in songs or poems allusive to women’s hair. In the dye ads? Anyway, when you want to represent beauty, you switch to blond or black or even redhead, which is the least common, but chestnut is almost invisible.
Bela comes from a small French village, a place where people are little or nothing interested in reading. He has a passion for reading that earned him the nickname “strange. “Reading allows you to move away from your life in the village, to know other worlds and broaden your horizons; she is a girl with many concerns and thirst for knowledge.
As we can see, Bela is a smart, confident girl who breaks up a little with the stereotypes Disney had drawn, but of course, we wouldn’t be talking about a Disney princess from the ’90s if she didn’t have a prince. Bela would be no exception, it would also fall into the clutches of love and, although the purpose of the film is to show the power of inner beauty, however, it falls on the subject of the princess who has a happy ending with her prince who, even if he was ever an animal, becomes a very beautiful man.
The intention of the 1990 film was certainly good, and it is true that the message that beauty is in the country has been transmitted to everyone (or almost everyone). Bela falls in love with the Beast and therefore leaves appearances aside, so I think we should take the transformation of the Beast as the liberation of her true self, as a reflection of her inner beauty. This beauty, in addition to being subjective, is also influenced by the interior of the person.
The truth is that Disney is advancing in terms of female representation in its latest films, but this new version of “Beauty and the Beast”, released in 2017, is very interesting because it includes a few small winks that give it a touch of freshness. to an old story.
It is inevitable that this new version will remind us of its sister in animation, because visually the similarities are indisputable, from the costumes and the choice of actors to the stages and objects of the castle; we also refer to version 90 thanks to the soundtrack, where the changes are barely noticeed.
I believe that the essence of this new version was, above all, this respect for its predecessor, because when making an adaptation of a classic you have to be very aware that the public will take into account the previous version. in an extreme renovation and create something completely different and far from the original idea.
? Beauty and the Beast respects the main plot, adding an element that clarifies the fallacy of the animated version, such as what happened to Bela’s mother, bringing us closer to the characters and feeling greater sympathy for them.
On the other hand, it includes many black characters that mix with whites as normal, some still have accents that are not normally associated with blacks like Madame de Garderobe, who has an Italian accent and is black; proof that skin color doesn’t necessarily have to be related to origin. There are also many interracial couples, such as the aforementioned Madame de Garderobe and her husband, Master Cadenza; Or Light, the mythical chandelier, and his beloved Plumette, who is also black.
Besides, along?We notice that the character LeFou, whose French name means crazy or crazy, has changed a lot since the 1990 version. In the previous film, he was a character who honored his name and was Gaston’s theme; in this, we realize that this devotion to Gaston may go further and that he probably isn’t as crazy as it seems.
The Madman shows signs of passion for Gaston, but when he discovers what he really is, he reveals himself. There is a very significant scene in which Ms. Garderobe, still in a closet, dresses three young women and two of them are angry; however, one of them seems to be at ease and smiles with gratitude. It’s very subtle, a little wink, but very important. Also, at the end of the film, we see this character end up dancing with LeFou and both are happy. .
Thus, it normalizes what should be normal and reaffirms the purpose of the work, which is inner beauty. Regardless of gender, race or provenance, none of this matters, love goes further and does not include barriers or impositions.
I think this new version of Beauty and the Beast?It really had to be, we had to include this kind of relationship in a classic like this, which precisely speaks of love regardless of appearances, this is a small step, but very important and very necessary today. . If we continue like this, perhaps one day and in future versions of Disney princesses, being beautiful is no longer a requirement to be a “princess”.
“It is not wrong to be beautiful, evil is the obligation to be beautiful. “- Susan Sontag-