The Disney Dilemma Part 1: Beauty and the Beast

Beauty and the Beast was released in 1991, and sits at the epicenter of the late ’80s early ’90s Disney animation rebirth, following the hugely successful The Little Mermaid and The Rescuers Down Under. It was actually originally pitched alongside Snow White back when Disney was all about adapting pre-industrial revolution fairy tales.

As was the standard for this era in Disney film making, the goal was to create a family-friendly feature that spoke to a modern audience, in part trying to make up for past injustices and gender stereotypes so prevalent in their early catalogue.

What we end up getting, as is the case with nearly all the movies in this grand rebirth of Disney animation, is a beautifully animated feature with easily understandable morals, an emphasis on love (or more accurately true love), and some classic musical numbers. Unfortunately what you also get beneath that surface, are some pretty destructive lessons accompanied with basic stereotypes which, lest we forget aren’t great for impressionable children to take in.

As with most Disney movies, it’s a mixed bag (a trailmix, if you will), and if you are just eating handful after handful until the bag is empty, at the end of the day you’ll be full and satisfied. But in sticking with the metaphor, when you indiscriminately are just eating handfuls of whatever’s in the bag, you might fail to realize the high sugar content and potential for developing diabetes later in life (okay, so the metaphor kind of worked).

POSITIVES

The main theme in Beauty and the Beast is the same now as it was back in the 18th century when it was written: don’t judge a book by its cover. Belle’s able to fall in love with the Beast even though he’s not human, and the Beast is able to fall in love with Belle even though… I don’t know, even though she reads (more on that later). What’s especially nice is that Disney chose to include a new element in the story that they borrow from an earlier French film adaptation of the fairy tale, with the chauvinistic suitor being a villain. Their aim was to promote suffrage, women’s independence, and teach that being a tall-dark-and-handsome type is not necessarily desirable. It also de-emphasizes the importance of physical beauty, at least, as far as men are concerned. While there are underlying problems with this sub-story, the idea is still important, and is definitely counter to classic Disney.

The music’s also very good. There are only a handful of songs (one of which is repeated at 3 different points in the movie with different lyrics), but they are all really pretty good. It really cemented Alan Menken as the go-to for musical-izing Disney features, fortunately.

I also really like the prologue and the way it’s presented with the stained glass storyboard. In the original version of the tale, you don’t learn about the spell until after the spell is broken, as a sort of twist. I do think, however, the movie pulls off switching it to the intro effectively and adds important tension later in the film.

It should also be noted that both the original fairy tale and this film try to avoid any sort of “class struggle” in its narrative. Of course it doesn’t succeed in this, but the effort is kind of there. In the original, Belle is of the merchant class and the Beast–though living in the castle–is not really royalty and doesn’t have any subjects. In the film, Belle is merely the daughter of an inventor, neither rich nor poor, and the Beast–while rich and owning slaves servants–is not a model of aristocracy.

Really it’s apparent that Disney has gone out of their way to make Belle an example of the modern woman, pro-feminism in Victorian France, which isn’t exactly anti-historical. In any case, it’s a positive thing to attempt to portray.

The last thing this movie pulls off with some success is a minor respect your elders message with Belle’s father playing the kindly eccentric who turns out to be right even though no one takes him seriously. “Maybe we should’ve listened to the old guy!” some character might’ve thought.

BELLE

I guess I’ll start where the movie starts, then, with the reason that Belle has a problem living there in the first place. Belle makes it rather clear that she has disdain for living in the town amongst the common folk.

Every morning just the same, since the morning that we came, to this poor provincial town.

OK so maybe it is a little bit about social class after all, but I think the writer would argue that it’s more about her just wanting a little adventure, and less about her disdain for poor people. Still, the message from this musical number is that she’s supposedly ostracized and doesn’t belong there. Even though this isn’t really the case. We should be careful not to get the impression that Belle is actually unpopular or alienated, as we know all the men in town want to be with her, she’s apparently insanely beautiful by any standard, and the townsfolk only real concern seems to be that she’s more interested in a fantasy world than living in a functioning society:

Never part of any crowd, because her head’s up in some cloud, no denying she’s a funny girl that Belle.

So, really, Belle is just bored with living in a small town and that’s it. When reduced to this, Belle seems much less a victim and only semi-relatable at best (again not really relatable because of her ridiculous good looks). But then we have Gaston, who as I’ve said before, provides a pretty decent moral lesson in that being a brutish chauvinist will not always win you the girl. Unfortunately, though, there aren’t a lot of guys in this film, and the ones that are reinforce an old stereotype that men are emotionless, brutish, and generally stupid. Beast is the same way, of course, until Belle changes him. So while Gaston is definitely a villain, it’d be nice to have a male character who’s independently good to balance it out.

TRUE LOVE & THE RELATIONSHIP-MARRIAGE CONUNDRUM

And this actually brings up a major problem with the film, if not the major problem. The only character that learns a lesson and changes is the Beast, and he only does this because Belle works to change him. The Beast is not just ugly on the outside, he’s a terrible person at the start of the film. Over the course of the film, Belle works to transform him on the inside. Which is all well and good, but, what does this teach? Stripping away any unnecessary romanticism, whether you like it or not, it’s in part teaching that you can change someone if you really love them. There’s a reason why people stay in unhealthy relationships; someone in the relationship is being abusive but every once in a while the other person sees something inside them, so that means they must really be good in their heart and they just need the right person to come along and help them see it, right? Beauty and the Beast unfortunately succumbs to this romantic ideology, which I shouldn’t need to point out is a bad thing. If you are in an abusive relationship, you are not going to change your partner with magical love. You are going to be abused, over and over again (of course I mean either physically or mentally/emotionally), until the lesson you learned as a child is undone.

True love as a concept is not inherently bad, but it’s inherently complicated. Even adults struggle with wrangling with what love really means (as evidenced by America’s 50% divorce rate), so boiling it down to “true love solves all problems” for children is not just wrong, it’s detrimental to their understanding of how relationships and people really work. Let’s not forget that neither the Beast nor Belle start out liking each other to any sliver of a degree. But, they do begin a relationship immediately out of necessity: Belle is looking for an adventure, and the Beast is looking to break a curse. Over time (in the fairy tale much longer than in the movie) they grow to enjoy each others company and eventually fall in love, which is great, but again, problematic.

Disney also has a habit of expediting love. The movie seemingly takes place over the course of a couple days, which is apparently enough time for true love to work its magic and ensure you will be happy ever after. It should be noted that this in itself is a bizarre message to try and impart: that if you meet someone and fall in love, then congrats! You’re going to be happy for the rest of your life and you should get married (as soon as possible). It stresses, against the earlier moral, that love does equal marriage. There’s already enough pressure in society to be in “meaningful” relationships and to get married, and the films in Disney’s ’90s renaissance do nothing to mellow this pressure.

To summarize, A) true love exists, B) true love solves all problems, C) you can meet someone and know within a few days whether or not they’re perfect for you for the rest of your life, and D) you can change someone to make them into someone you’ll love.

So, those are the real, heavy problems with its theme, but of course that’s not all.

STEREOTYPING FOR THE SAKE OF COMEDY

Keeping in Disney’s long tradition of falling back on stereotypes for comedic relief, Disney takes this opportunity to make the only 2 French characters in the film (which I always thought odd for a movie that takes place in France) exaggerated French stereotypes. Lumiere is, of course, both overtly sexual and a chef. He also has an obnoxiously thick French accent (much like his chambermaid counterpart who’s of course apparently the only other French stereotype they could think of: a sexy French maid) which is curious since the character isn’t voiced by a French actor. And, while these aren’t negative stereotypes in the traditional sense, it’s unfair to take the only apparently French characters in the movie and debase them down to only the broadest of stereotypes. From Lumiere’s section in “Human Again”:

I’ll be cooking again, be good-looking again, with a mademoiselle on each arm

Not to mention the rest of the servants being exceptionally British, to the point where it’s a little awkward. Also this is kind of a weird thing to say:

Life is so unnerving for a servant who’s not serving, he’s not whole without a soul to wait upon

Right?

So, is all this as bad as the Chinese cat in The Aristocats or the crows in Dumbo? No, but it’s in line with all the old, bad traditions and follows that same ideology that created those racist characters in the first place.

CLASS COMMENTARY

It also takes an oddly specific stance against small towns and small-town people. As we’ve already established, Belle’s true desire is to break free from her “provincial life”. This is probably because the provincial life portrayed in this movies is full of small-minded, angry-mob forming, conservative thinking bumpkins. They all think the old man is crazy, they all think Belle shouldn’t be reading, they all adore Gaston, they all pick up pitchforks and torches as the drop of a hat, and they all represent what Disney thinks of “provincial” people. For a movie that’s based on something that tries so hard to not say anything about social class (remember, they’re going out of their way to change Belle’s father from a merchant to an inventor), this movie really says a lot about social class. Belle is effectively delivered from her poor yokel-dwelling town to a rich prince’s castle.

And much like all of the other themes, this too trips over itself with what it’s trying to say. To cut to the chase on this one, yes it’s a good lesson that angry-mobs are bad. No, it’s not good that you unveil this lesson by having poor small-town people be the ones to so irrationally form the mob.

CONCLUSION

I want to really stress that the important thing to do when watching anything that someone’s put work into making and presenting to you, is to take it as a whole. As a finished product, Beauty and the Beast is a beautifully animated, lovely musical soap opera that teaches you good morals sometimes, and reinforces bad ones at others. It’s crucial not to be dismissive of the latter, especially when your target audience is incredibly impressionable. As an adult, you should be responsible enough to cope with both the good and the bad, and understand to what extent each exists. As a child, you’re not expected to, and that’s really the danger there.

In general, I think what’s so disappointing, is that the film squanders so many opportunities. At the end of the day, you still come out with Belle falling in love with a prince she’s sculpted to suit her liking, and there’s nothing really all that appropriate about that.

Who among us though can say that Disney hasn’t done worse? While they definitely get points for trying, all too often this movie is glorified and deified to an extent that can only be described as unreasonable. Why? Because it’s romantic and has some good music? If those are the only qualifiers, then I suppose Disney might not’ve even needed to try that hard at all.

BONUS MATERIAL

Find yourself really agreeing with everything I said but think I could’ve gone further? How about these:

• Wolves are evil, godless creatures and you should be taught to fear them always. Thanks for teaching me this, movies
• Why does the Beast not know how to use a spoon? I can understand not being able to read, because he was a spoiled prince, but he’s only been in his current form for 10 years.
• Instead of dying, Gaston could’ve just fallen in love with Le Fou. Win-win.
• Lastly, anyone else think it’s weird that people drink out of Chip?

The Disney Dilemma: Introduction

 

I’d like to start by saying that I’m what I think most would consider to be a fan of movies; a quick flip-through of my Netflix ratings will show that I’ve seen a ton of films (from a wide variety of genres), and the majority percentage of those I’ve given pretty decent marks.  It’s not hard for me to see the value in even the worst films I’ve watched, and I’ve gone on record as saying that there are so very few movies that have no redeeming qualities whatsoever. It’s through this lens that we’re able to separate what’s good about something from what’s not. Likewise, there are so very few things that are so great that you can say there’s absolutely nothing wrong with them.

This should be obvious, but the reason I bring it up is that often when I have what I think can effectively be called “The Disney Argument,” I’m met with intensely hostile reactions, as though criticizing Disney in general means that I hate them, their childhood, everyone else’s childhood, and magic in general. I should like to point out that this is not the case. In fact, an introduction seems to be a fine time to point out that I’m–like many people–a fan of Disney movies in general. And being a parent, I’ve come to appreciate what Disney does on a much more tangible level.

Disney, though, has gone through quite an evolution from Steamboat WIllie to its current, CG-friendly incarnation. And while Dumbo might seem miles away from Meet the Robinsons, a great percentage of the Disney catalogue, unsurprisingly, holds itself to a rather comfortable formula that emphasizes 1940’s American family values, that, for better or worse, resonates with the movie-going public.

It’s certainly unfair to say that all Disney does is reinforce outdated societal norms and negative stereotypes, but boy, it sure does it a great deal. Some examples are easier to find than others. Movies like Cinderella and Sleeping Beauty are pretty transparent with the value it places on self-image and class. Movies like, Tangled, though? And Princess & The Frog? Those take a bit more analysis, but unfortunately they suffer from the long legacy of lousy, archaic views that their predecessors did, though thankfully to a lesser degree.

Two things, real quick: first, I want to make it clear that while Disney is often a “product of its time”, its nonetheless guilty or reinforcing negative ideas. Being the super-power that Disney is, the responsibility is all the more great to make sure that its core audience (impressionable youths, lest we forget) is getting a positive and well-rounded moral at the end of the day.

Second, I’d like to separate Disney’s owned properties from its central film generator, for the sake of this writing. Studios that Disney owns, like Pixar, and Lucasfilms, I’m going to exempt from a lot of this debate. Pixar for instance has its own internal operating structure, and its movies end up coming out rather different from their Disney Animation counterparts at the same time. Not to say that Pixar is perfect, but in general it doesn’t fall as easily into the traps that most other Disney features do.

And those traps? I’d really like to think of them more as ghosts of Disney past, coming back to haunt its modern form. As I said before, racist crows might’ve flown (pun!) in the 40s, but carrying that template over 50 years later to French or Middle Eastern stereotypes in the 90s? Less excusable than you’d like to think. And really, when churning titles along the line affixed to these templates, what you end up with is this: a nice story with a good moral on the surface, that has dangerous lessons directly beneath that shiny surface. It’s hard to find a Disney movie that doesn’t have at least some proper moral you’re supposed to walk away with, and in general, those morals are universally accepted as being good, even across the decades. I’d be a fool to argue with those morals, and I have no intention of doing it. What I’d like to do, is highlight everything else that gets glossed over on the way to that moral conclusion.

Is this important to do? I mean, do children really watching a movie and thinking “that crow is racist!” Well, no, children aren’t actively thinking that. But you can be damned sure that on an unconscious level, these things do filter down. Little girls will look at Prince Charming and think “wow, if I’m beautiful then I can get a rich guy to fall in love with me, too!” Do they say that out loud while they’re watching it? Hopefully not, but that doesn’t stop this from affecting their attitudes on everything from relationships, to societal class, to socio-political prejudices down the line, always keeping in mind that you watch these first when you’re young and impressionable. Impressionable, unless you couldn’t guess, is the key word there.

And even if this wasn’t the case, if children somehow weren’t being affected by what they watch, is that any excuse for the hard emphasis on negative stereotypes, gender roles, and outmoded values that are so prevalent in the films?

The answer, simply, is no.

So while again I feel I have to make it clear that I am a Disney fan, and a fan of movies in general, it doesn’t make sense to blindly accept everything they throw at you and expect it will only have positive consequences for its devout viewing audience. And what exactly the problems are, along with what they could’ve done differently, will be my aim in this writing.