I think I can safely assume that we have all seen Disney's "Beauty and the Beast". Well, La Belle et la Bete is, more or less, the same film... Well, okay, maybe that's an overstatement. La Belle et la Bete happens to be warped, and Grim's-fairie-tale-like. The French film happens to be closer to the original tale than Disney's interpretation is (of course). Directed by Jean Cocteau and Rene Clement, and written by Jean Cocteau and Jeanne-Marie Leprince de Beaumont, Le Belle et la Bete is a film depicting the classic love story of a man and a woman; an unlikely match, a Romeo and Juliet-esque tale about forbidden love. Josette Day plays Belle, the woman who offers up her own life for that of her father's by delivering herself to the Beast (la Bete). Belle is in complete control of her own destiny in this film; she may choose to leave the Beast and go home to her family, or she may stay with him in his castle. If this film were silent, Belle may have been interpreted as a damsel in distress but, instead, Belle was given the opportunity to truly express her emotions in a more natural and first-hand way. I believe that Belle is a feminist-icon. Belle ultimately shapes the outcome of her own life (although this fact is down-played a bit by her having gained a "handsome prince" in the process).
-CriticNeutral
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