The Personal Canon is a recurring column discussing my favorite movies of all time. While they may not necessarily be "A" rated, they are the movies that, for some reason or another, hold a special place in my filmgoing experience.
Beauty and the Beast (1991)
[in 3D in select movie theaters]
Featuring the voice talent of Paige O'Hara, Robby Benson, Richard White, Jerry Orbach, David Ogden Stiers, and Angela Lansbury
Directed by Gary Trousdale and Kirk Wise
Where does one even begin when writing about a movie that they absolutely love? Right up there with Alfred Hitchcock's masterpiece Psycho (and only a smidge behind that horror classic), Disney's Beauty and the Beast is my (2nd) favorite movie of all time. I don't know if it came along at the right time in my youth (I would have been eleven at the time it was released), but something just clicked from the first time that I saw this film. A meld of lovely hand-drawn animation, the best musical score ever written for the screen, and a simple story with charming characters, it's easy to see why Beauty and the Beast was the first animated film to be nominated for Best Picture at the Academy Awards. [And let's be honest, if the field wasn't opened to ten nominees in the past two years, there's no way Up and Toy Story 3 would've been nominated, so part of me still feels that Beauty and the Beast is rightfully the only "real" animated Best Picture nominee.]
There's no way anything I write here is going to do this movie justice or truly depict why I think this movie is so special. I don't even know if I can pinpoint and express all the reasons I love it so much. However, watching it again on the big screen was a real joy. [Although I'd love to see it with the non-necessary 3-D which, while not detrimental to the film in the slightest, didn't do a thing to enhance the experience.] Animation-wise, it's amusing now to look back and see how far we've come in two decades. The shift from hand-drawn to computer animation is certainly the key change, but even from a hand-drawn stand-point, the advancements have been huge. That isn't to say that Beauty and the Beast looks out-dated or passé, but it is interesting to note that what was perfectly acceptable back then (most notably background characters standing perfectly still rather than have some motion to them) would never be kosher now. Still, the film looks stunning. Even with the darkening caused by the 3-D glasses, it looks bright and vibrant. Scenes like the ballroom dance are gorgeous on the big screen and haven't lost any of their awe-inspiring wonder over the last twenty years.
The simple story is enhanced by charming songs crafted by the duo of Alan Menken and Howard Ashman. The songs come naturally here, fitting in perfectly, enhancing and advancing the characters' storylines rather than stopping the story cold. It struck me as I was watching the film this go-around (which was my first watch of this movie in probably close to five years) just how witty the late Howard Ashman's lyrics were. One need look no further than "Gaston" than to see this on display where Ashman manages to rhyme "expectorating" and "celebrating" with great ease (and a lack of any feeling of force). That isn't to give short shrift to Alan Menken's music either which runs the gamut from Broadway showstopper (in "Be Our Guest") to introspective (the often overlooked "Something There") to expository ("Belle" tells us all we need to know about several major characters within the first five minutes of the movie) to love song ("Beauty and the Beast"), each, with the help of Ashman's lyrics, hitting exactly the tone they set out to achieve.
Even at age eleven, I guess I was predestined to like this as I was already being groomed to be a Disney fan by my parents which may very well explain why I liked Beauty and the Beast so much back then. However, the love for this flick has continued on for two decades and I think it's because it combines so much of what I look for in a great movie coupled with the love I have for the genre of animation. It's got fantastic visuals, strong characters, comedy, drama, a great villain, wonderful songs, and beautiful animation. All of that is coupled with a story that despite its simplicity resonates with audience of all ages. This isn't a children's film -- this is simply a film. It doesn't try to appeal to the six year-old in the audience any more than it tries to appeal to the sixty year-old in the audience (heck...what six year-old would get the classic Cogsworth joke "If it's not Baroque, don't fix it?" which still made me crack up even though I knew it was coming). Often, this lack of trying to pin down an audience proves to be a failure for movies, but in the case of Beauty and the Beast it's what makes it so successful.
Much like when I wrote my first thoughts on Psycho on this blog, nothing I can write for Beauty and the Beast will be able to give justice to my thoughts on it (and anything that I do write about it will just be a disappointment when I go back and look at it two weeks from now). So, rather than ramble on, I'll just bring this review to a stop only to say that I can't recommend enough that you go check this masterpiece out on the big screen once again.
The RyMickey Rating: A+
Check out the other films in my Personal Canon like Return to Me and Once by clicking this link.
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