or Beauty and the Beast, if you couldn't figure that out.
I don't recommend reading unless you've already seen the film.
Cocteau's rendition of Beauty and the Beast moves through itself strangely, and upon viewing it I'm not sure what to think. Everything about the film is scattered and the story and setting feel as though were lost long ago and only traces remain. Elements of satire are obvious in Belle's sisters, in the hyper-gallant Avenant, even in central characters like the Beast on occasion, yet other parts are almost laughably somber. It portrays romance, but the awkward love between Belle and the Beast is meandering and uncertain. We have the fairy tale tradition of purely unexplained phenomena which we are expected to accept as truth, like the smoking paws and the events that follow the arrow hitting Avenant. And between all of this something else lurks, hiding in the mist and behind doors that open themselves, something subversive we see most clearly in the bizarre and (intentionally, from what I understand) unsatisfying ending.
I don't mean to imply that I didn't like the movie, because it gave me beauty and mystery at face value, the way they should be given, and it does so with extroardinary delicacy. It's the otherworldliness of everything and the inconsistent attitude of the film that captured me, the sheer defiance toward explanation and logic. The characters in the everyday parts of the film, Belle and her family and Avenant, are funny and simply likeable, even the mean sisters. We can't take the sisters too seriously, conniving though they may be, because we know how the story ends and they won't prevent that. It's not that sort of film. So these average people give the film a lot of vitality and movement, qualities it often lacks in the abstractly beautiful sequences in the Beast's castle. The setting is used to great comic effect, the dialogue is fantastic (in that inexplicably French way), and it provides contrast and relief when put alongside the scenes of the castle. It's good to know that Belle still wants to live her life in a place that is real, where things don't always go in slow motion or move without your help. Later, the Beast's implements gradually invade this territory, when he begins eclipsing Belle's concerns, with the mirror and the key and the horse and everything else. But that's what happens when you step into another world. It invades you.
Appropriately enough, that other world is what everyone remembers about the movie. Looking back, we see Belle's room: half palatial and half pastoral, a blending of leaf and wood with the fineries of silk and stone. We see Belle herself, gliding down the hallway, past the billowing, translucent white curtains. We see her running through the front corridor and up the stairs, crossing over to the Beast's world at that dreamy pace and allowing us to see every graceful motion she makes. We see the Beast, too, bowing before Belle the instant he meets her, in spite of his savagery elsewhere. We see him backing away from Belle very slowly after her refusal, keeping his eyes upon her frame as he slinks back into obscurity. Everything is slow and deliberate yet in a manner that defies reason. Their exchanges, like their surroundings and the time they seem to move through, are delicate and confused and endearingly unnatural. This is a world where a beautiful girl could relate to a beast and learn to love it.
My favorite scene in the film is the first approach to the castle, when Belle's father wanders there unwittingly. Even at the start, when the branches move away and we see the facade of the castle, there is a sense of the unknown. Anticipation when he stood on the stone steps and carefully ascended. The first thrill came when his shadow loomed large against the doorway suddenly. The door opens by itself, which is commonplace by now, although I wonder whether this was the first film to ever use the idea (and doubt it). And then follows the most beautiful moment of the movie: Belle's father moving hesitantly forward while the candelabras on the walls, held by pale human arms that stretch out as he passes, light themselves in a flurry of smoke and colorless flame.
The ending also lingers with you. The disappointment we feel, which Belle actually expresses, when the Beast turns into the prince, so similar to Avenant. He loses all his mystical charm. He's handsome and a bit sly, and he now lacks that simplicity and innocence that only animals can possess. We see Belle turn away from him and then, with a sudden change in attitude, accept him the next moment, as a prince, as an Avenant look-alike. Together they float off into some magical land in a very pale rectangle highlighted against the dark clouds (an admirable attempt at such a special effect, for the time). The situation seems as phony as the block around them. That's what Cocteau wanted, though. According to the man himself, he wanted to make a film where his "story would concern itself mainly with the unconscious obstinacy with which women pursue the same type of man, and expose the naiveté of the old fairy tales that would have us believe that this type reaches its ideal in conventional good looks." Why he went for that, exactly, when the rest of the fairy tale seems so earnest and tender, I can't say, but it works along with the same haphazard logic of the rest of the film. Somehow, this unexpected and almost disappointing ending serve to make this film something more than just the beautiful but standard fairy tale it would have been otherwise.
Quotation taken from Jean Cocteau's essay on the film, included in the Criterion Collection DVD (insert).
Links:
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0038348/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beauty_and_the_Beast_(1946_film)
http://www.criterion.com/asp/release.asp?id=6
Cast and crew:
Cast | |
| Avenant/Beast/Prince Ardent | Jean Marais |
| Belle | Josette Day |
| Félicie | Mila Parély |
| Adélaïde | Nane Germon |
| Ludovic | Michel Auclair |
| Moneylender | Raoul Marco |
| The merchant (Belle’s father) | Marcel André |
| | |
Credits | |
| Written and directed by | Jean Cocteau |
| ‘Illustrated by’ | Christian Bèrard |
| Based on the story by | Mme. Leprince de Beaumont |
| Technical consultant | René Clément |
| Art directors | René Moulaërt |
| Lucien Carré | |
| Costume design | Marcel Escoffier |
| Castillo | |
| From the house of | Paquin |
| Music | Georges Auric |
| Orchestra directed by | Roger Désormieres |
| Director of photography | Henri Alekan |
| Camera operators | Henri Tiquet |
Note: I know this is wordy, a bit much. I intend to break later posts up a bit with visuals, such as stills from the film, artwork, posters, and possibly videos if they're available. My writing style and format will also vary drastically depending on the film and the mood I'm in while writing.
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