We've all heard of it, but how many have actually seen the legendary Jean Cocteau version of this iconic fairy tale? I hadn't until today, when it aired on IFC.

This masterpiece by cinematic poet Jean Cocteau has enchanted audiences for more than fifty years with its surreal beauty and magical visual effects. Josette Day and Jean Marais shine in the definitive filmed version of the classic romantic tale, which has come to supplant the original fable in the modern imagination.

At the end of World War II, when France was reeling from pain and exhaustion, Jean Marais suggested to Cocteau that a welcome diversion might be a film based on La Belle et la Bête, the famous 18th-century fable of Madame Leprince de Beaumont. Cocteau leaped at the idea, since it revived his own childhood fantasies and promised to introduce a new genre: fairy tale on film.

from frenchculture.org

The Beast says, "All I possess I possess by the power of magic." Despite the hystrionic acting, the overwrought background singing and the melodramatic skulking through the hallways of the Beast's castle, I found the film to be magical indeed. Some of the set details were delightful - architectural details and sculpture that are real people - sconces of arms holding candelabra and fireplace finials of human faces who move as they watch the main characters move about the room. Belle cries diamonds. The Beast conjures a pearl necklace by calling it into his hands - the necklace later turns into a shank of smoking hair when Belle tries to give it to her sister. The oracular mirror that reveals Belle's nasty sisters to be an old hag and a monkey.

One detail that this witch didn't fail to notice was when Belle's sister, Felicity, threatens to turn her in for practicing witchcraft after the incident with the necklace. Usually, when an evil character does something, the film is making a statement in support of the opposite view. Cocteau's Beast explains his condition to Belle: "My parent's didn't believe in magical spirits so the spirits took their revenge through me." When Belle's brother and his friend, Avenant, try to break into Diana's Pavilion to steal the Beast's fortune, a sculpture of Diana comes to life, shoots Avenant with her bow, and transforms him into a Beast. With all of the magic going on in the film, it's certainly easy to draw the conclusion that Cocteau is pro-magic. It would be a fun exercise to explore whether he or the original author of the story, Madame Leprince de Beaumont, had any pagan or occult leanings. But I digress.

The film is completely over the top, fun and amusing in the way that such stylized old films can be. Belle's sisters work in the fields and do laundry in their finery. At the castle, Belle's brother says he's not scared, he's thinking, and Avenant retorts, "Same thing." The Beast himself is perhaps the best example, as this line from a review in the Village Voice suggests: "All breathy exhortations, he comes off like a lovelorn drill sergeant with laryngitis." The Beast frequently appears literally smoking. Is this a none-too-subtle metaphor for his lust for Belle or we meant simply to take this as evidence of his beastliness?

The film, originally released in 1946, was re-released to theaters in 2002. The Village Voice didn't much care for the film, but I think the reviewer is missing the point. Miller writes, "What's both appealing and problematic is its visual opulence." I think whimsical frothiness was precisely what Cocteau wanted for his film, to draw people into its magic to make them forget the horrors of the war they'd just endured.

One of the enduring lessons from this fabled fairy tale is that love can turn a beast into a man. But we know that girls are always attracted to the bad boys. When the Prince, formerly the Beast, asks Belle if she doesn't prefer him to the Beast, she says, "I'll have to get used to it."

Posted by Angela-Eloise at 1:23 PM