American children everywhere are familiar with the tale of Beauty and the Beast. The story has been a part of culture for many years, as are many fairy tales. It is read and told to children not just for entertainment but for the moral lessons it offers. What most people do not realize is that there is more to these stories than just moral values. These hidden messages are a vital part of the culture from which they came from. Most fairy tales have an underlying meaning for people to consider and use the moral to better themselves. The morals in Disney’s version of Beauty and the Beast serve the same purpose. It shows that beauty comes from within and good nature and kindness is better than wit. The message of never judge a book by its cover is the obvious moral value, however. In this film, Beauty is shown to have strong feelings toward her father. Beauty loves her father, and she takes the role of the mother by doing chores and taking care of the man of the house. She is asked several times for her hand in marriage, but she denies each of them. When beauty sees the Beast, she sees him as ugly because she is not ready for a relationship since she is still loves her father. It is not until she gets over the love for her father that she can see the Beast as a handsome prince. Another underlying aspect of Beauty and the Beast is the class structure. In the Disney film, Beauty lives in a town with the rest of the villagers representing the middle class. The Beast lives in a huge mansion which represents the upper class. When the townspeople go to attack the mansion of the Beast it resembles a revolution; the villagers begin to resist the power of royalty. However, the upper class defeats the middle class in the end of the story. So... ... middle of paper ... ...outcasts. Belle is a middle class woman who likes to read, and her father is an inventor. It was not in the cultural norm for women of lower class society to read or be educated in any way, and the invention of new technologies often brought fear of the unknown to the people. Gaston, however, was considered to be the social norm. He is portrayed as rude, cocky, and egotistical, but he was viewed as the ideal man and, therefore, was acceptable to society. Though Beauty and the Beast is a popular tale of American culture, few actually see the deep moral values in the story. Not all of the morals are on the surface, in fact very few are. People have to look beneath the surface for many of the lessons. These lessons are meant for people to reflect upon and better themselves. While the surface story serves for entertainment, fairy tales also provide everlasting lessons.
Film analysis with a critical eye can give the viewer how animation giant Disney uses literary element to relay key messages to the audience. Walt Disney’s “The Princess and the Frog” is a perfect example how different literary theories like ‘the Marxist theory’ and ‘Archetypal theory’ can be embedded in the simplest of the fairy tales. The different literary elements in the movie, shows a person how characters like ‘the banker’ and the setting of the houses helps to portray the socio-economic differences in New Orleans at that time. Applying ‘the Marxist theory’ and ‘the Archetypal theory’ to the plot, characters and the setting, shows how movies can be a medium to confront social issues and to prove that all fairy tales are of the same base.
Everyone grew up hearing them and reading them as we absorb lessons from some of our favorite characters. Fairy tales send a message out to children to teach them right from wrong and helps them decide what kind of person they want to grow up to be. In “Beauty and the Beast”, by Jeanne-Marie Leprince De Beaumont and “The Pig King” by Giovanni Francesco Straparola, the two stories share a similar story and similar behavior and mannerism in the girls. The girls were all calm and respectful as they helped break the chains of their loved ones’ curse. However, the two stories did differ a bit and had two different attitudes from the princes. The beast remained calm and collected while the pig king caused mess and murder as they found their soul mate and lived happily ever
Throughout history it is known that fairy tales were written to teach children lessons about life in a way they could understand and that is fun and unique. Authors of fairy tales put simple lessons into the stories so the children could understand them easily while reading. Whether this be a lesson to be nice to all people, like in Cinderella, or to not judge someone by their appearance, like in Donkey Skin, both by Charles Perrault. Each fairytale has a moral that can be found throughout reading the stories that teach children right from wrong while letting them use their imaginations to discover that moral. The good and the bad lets them express their thoughts openly, rather it be their negative thoughts through the villian or their
Nicholas A. Smith’s “Idealism and Insanity: The Subversion of the Southern Belle through Blanche Dubois” describe Southern Belles as charming, educated, and independent (Smith 1). These characteristics describe the main character, Flossie, in Patricia McKissack’s “Flossie and the Fox.” Southern Belles are taught at a young age that knowledge instead of beauty provides prosperity, an idea that surfaces in McKissack’s short story (Smith 1). They have a different portrayal in films, such as Victor Fleming’s Gone with the Wind; beauty is the path into prosperity (Gone with the Wind). Flossie symbolizes a Southern Belle, whose knowledge soon becomes tainted when she employs charm as a means of manipulation to trick the fox. Flossie use of manipulation transforms her into the villain of the story.
Through the three revisions of Beauty and The Beast, the fairy tales retold share many similarities as well as many differences according to their time period. In all three versions femininity and masculinity are presented in many ways. Femininity is shown through all three main female characters, Belle from the famous Disney film “The Beauty and The Beast”, the narrator in “Tiger’s Bride”, and Psyche in “Cupid and Psyche”. In all three versions, the female characters breaks society’s expectations of a typical woman. In CP Psyche stands up to Cupid’s mother Venus and accomplishes these activities usually performed by males. She shows society that women can overcome male activities and have strength to complete the same tasks. She breaks tradition of the male character fighting for her because in this version she takes on the hero role and fights for Cupid. This was not something ordinarily done by woman characters during this time. In TB the narrator breaks the tradition of the innocent stereotypical woman figure. The narrator exposes and does things most woman would never have the nerve to do. She shows society that women can fault their beauty in other ways. Even if society does not make it acceptable to have sex before marriage, she shows that women can expose their body and beauty in many ways. In DB version Belle is a great example that women should not be looked at as dolls and let males have control over them. She shows society that woman can be independent and educated. She does not get married to the most handsome male in town however she goes after someone who deeply cares about her. She displays a great example of how woman have their own mind and can think for themselves. Woman are allowed to make decisions and have ...
He is willing to sacrifice himself so his daughters can live in peace. Beauty offers herself up to the Beast. Poor, kind-hearted Beauty could not bear for her father to be at the Beast’s mercy, so she goes in his place. Beauty is a strong, compassionate girl who will risk her life for the ones she loves. When Beauty is with the Beast she is content with her life. She thinks the Beast is ugly and not that smart, and is still fearful of him, but she grows comfortable in his presence. As she spends more time with the Beast she also becomes more comfortable with herself and what she wants. Beauty isn’t afraid to ask Beast for something she wants, like seeing her father. While Beauty has been with the Beast her father has been dying of grief, with no one to take care of him. Beauty makes a promise to return to the Beast after a week, but her jealous sisters manipulate her into staying, and, of course, gentle Beauty just can’t leave her family behind. When Beauty finally returns to Beast she confesses to loving him, flaws and all, and Beast turns into a handsome, smart, man for Beauty to live with and
Standing out and being different can be very difficult because of the people and the world around us. Belle--from Beauty and the Beast--does not follow the ordinary lifestyle of the villagers. She wants more than just the same old boring routine in the village that her whole life has been about. The movie Beauty and the Beast is transcendental because it encourages that at heart the individual is a good person, self reliance, and trusting your intuition.
Leprince de Beaumon. “Beauty and the Beast.” Folk & Fairy Tales. Matin Hallett and Barbrar Karasek. Canada: Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication, 2009.
“I've told her and I've told her: daughter, you have to teach that child the facts of life before it's too late” (Hopkinson 1). These are the first three lines of Nalo Hopkinson's fairy tale “Riding the Red”, a modern adaptation of Charles Perrault's “Little Red Riding Hood”. Perrault provided a moral to his fairy tales, the one from this one is to prevent girls from men's nature. In Hopkinson's adaptation, the goal remains the same: through the grandmother biographic narration, the author advances a revisited but still effective moral: beware of wolfs even though they seem innocent.
Throughout the movie The Beauty and The Beast Disney presents a classic fairytale, but when seen in a different perspective it demonstrated that not everything is as it seems. Belle is affected by multiple disorders starting with Introversion, Schizoid Personality Disorder, Schizophrenia as well as Stockholm Syndrome. However, with psychoactive drugs and extensive therapy Belle can be treated to allow her to progress prevent a relapse in her daily
The other scene I have chosen to analyze if this film, Beauty and the Beast, was castle scene where Belle spends her time as captive to the beast and is expect to abide his rule over her and to act subservient to him, which backs up the point that females are expected to be subservient to male characters in this film and this teaches wrong messages to people watching the film. In the castle captivity scene where Belle is detained by the beast against her will, we see how the Beast expects her to obey him when he demands and when she doesn’t, he is frustrated that she is not being subservient to him even though she is a person and not an object to be owned or a animal that obeys its masters commands. She is a human being with as much equal rights
Fairy Tales have been around for generations and generations. Our parents have told us these stories and we will eventually pass them down to ours. In this time of age the most common fairytales are Cinderella, Snow White, Sleeping Beauty, Beauty and The Beast and many more. Children idolize their favorite character and pretend to be them by mimicking everything they do in the stories. The character’s behavior is what is viewed as appropriate in society. These fairy tales show a girl and a boy fall in love and live “happily ever after”. The tales in many people’s eyes resemble a dream life that they would want to have of their own. However, have you ever really looked at what makes up a fairy tale? Many things are unrealistic but the most unflattering aspect of these tales is how women are depicted in them. Fairy tales give an unrealistic view to how women should look and behave in real life.
Most modern fairytales are expected to have happy endings and be appropriate for children, nonetheless, in past centuries most were gruesome. Consequently, fairytales have been modified throughout time. The stories “Beauty and the Beast” by Jeanne-Marie LePrince de Beaumont and “The Summer and Winter Garden” by Jacob and Wilherm Grimm share similarities and differences. The two stories are distinct because of the peculiar year they have been written in. LePrince de Beaumont’s story is written in London of 1783 and Grimm’s in Germany of 1812. At the time, wealthy people in London, were educated and had nannies who would read to their children; whereas, in Germany, the Grimm brothers created their own interpretation into a short story. Because many high class parents in 18th century London would not be able to spend time with their children, nannies would read “Beauty and the Beast” to them since they were intended for children and considered appropriate. In “The Summer and Winter Garden,” the Grimm’s’ story was mostly based to entertain misbehaved children and teach them the valuable lesson that everyone should be treated with kindness. The Grimm brothers’ goal in rewriting this short story is to better children’s behavior which worked quite well. Since these stories have been re-written for children, it would be safe to say the reason why parents expose the two stories to their children is because they both portray the same moral: good things happen to good people. The two interpretations of “Beauty and the Beast,” although written in separate countries, share important similarities and differences even though the authors have different interpretations and came from different cultures.
People that grow up watching the classic Disney Princess movies, which give us false hope that every simple quiet girl will end up marrying a prince. The Beauty and the Beast being one of those movies, teaching us that if you fall in love with a hairy like creature he will turn into Mr. McDreamy. The bubbly Disney version of the Beauty and the Beast usually does not allow scholars to find a deeper meaning. Believe it or not, Disney did not create this classic tale. In fact, Charles Perrault wrote a darker version of it almost three centuries before. Perrault’s twisted feminist version has hidden messages and meanings still puzzling scholars today. Some say that at the end of every fairy tale he would put a rhyme that would be a hidden message to little girls. The messages presented caution about not trusting strangers or to stay true to who you are. Unlike Disney’s anti- feminist version, often characterizing girls as the damsel’s in distress, Perrault’s gives girls the look of independence. He shows young girls that they do not always need a prince charming by giving Beauty the decision that could change her life.
A person can take a story and look at it from many ways. Fairy tales represent the transformation of young people. Beauty is transformed into a young woman; she passes through the stages successfully and in turn is able to love. Every story teaches a lesson and in this case more than one lesson is taught. Not only is the lesson of sexuality and maturity taught, an even more important lesson is taught. Beauty and the Beast shows that true love comes from within the inside and if it is meant to be it will prevail.