Beauty and the Beast

“Beauty and the Beast” is Disney’s best animated film. A bold statement, I know. “Lion King” is terrific. There’s no way you can dismiss the historical and cultural significance of “Snow White”. “The Little Mermaid” brings me to tears. It’s ok to object, as long as we can agree on the fact that this 1991 animated musical is a masterpiece.

It’s about a prince (Robbie Benson) who has been punished by being magically transformed into a monster. To break the spell, he needs to get someone to fall in love with him before his 21st birthday. The film follows his efforts to woo Belle (voiced by Page O’Hara), a young woman imprisoned in his castle.

The animation is first-rate. The characters are elegantly designed, the movements are smooth, the world they inhabit is rich and lively. I’ve seen this picture countless times and only now did I realize that on the side of Belle’s house, it appears that her father (an odd inventor voiced by Rex Everheart) has created a perpetual motion machine, or that whenever Mrs. Potts (the castle cook, transformed into a living teapot) or any of the other animated dishes move down to the floor, they always land on pillows to avoid shattering into a thousand pieces. There’s a ballroom waltz sequence that features some of the finest, most fluid and visually dynamic animation I’ve ever seen. Yes, computer technology was involved in that sequence… to generate the background. It's the kind of display that inspires artists to become animators.

No single song in the soundtrack stands out as “the one to watch out for”. They all serve different purposes in the story, each features lush rhymes, wit, immortal melodies and a wide range of emotions. It’s impossible to separate the visuals and the music from the emotions that you feel.

"Beauty and the Beast" is a love story, a convincing one. The songs help convey the emotions being felt, but even if the film was on mute, you’d be able to tell. The body language, the slow progression as the feelings develop, the way both Belle and the Beast experience a full gamut of joy, sorrow, anger and warmth is so organic that you don’t really realize that it’s happening. Only in hindsight are you able to pinpoint the exact moment where everything changed.

An 84-minute running time? Is it possible? “Beauty and the Beast” is so rich that when you first see that number, it doesn’t seem right. How could you deliver the character arcs, sub-plots, wonderful songs and iconic moments in less time than most live-action films? I checked. Unless you’re seeing the elongated version, which includes the song “Human Again” incorporated in 2002, that number is correct. It simply confirms how masterfully this story is constructed. There is not one line, not one shot that is wasted or that could be cut.

Now comes the time to address an "issue". “Beauty and the Beast” suffers from what I’ve dubbed the “Wikipedia Smurfette syndrome”. If you read an abridged version of the story, it sounds all kinds of messed up. Cynics will compare Belle and the Beast’s relationship to the Norrmalmstorg robbery, in which hostages eventually became emotionally attached to their captors. Sure. If you look at it from a purely academic, cold, emotionless point of view, it is the story about a woman who is held prisoner and falls in love with her captor. This way of thinking requires you to deliberately ignore evidence to the contrary, and I don't believe that a story in which magic is real can be judged like a real-world traumatic bond. Ask a child. When they’re not dismissing stories for ridiculous reasons like “not enough lava”, they often understand fairy tales better than adults do. It’s clear that “Beauty and the Beast” is a real love story. Maybe it is irrational, but isn’t that what love is?

"Beauty and the Beast" has a timeless quality to it, the romance is genuine, the soundtrack is excellent, the visuals gorgeous… You get the point. It's absolutely delightful. Every time I see “Beauty and the Beast”, I find something new to admire about it. (Theatrical version on Blu-ray, August 26, 2016)