Live Life Team
Disney’s “Beauty and the Beast” deserves the high honour of being the first animated film to receive an Oscar nomination for Best Picture. Frame after frame is filled with memorable images.
We find out in the opening montage that the Beast was once a spoiled prince who drew the ire of a witch who cast a spell on his entire castle. Belle is a French peasant who loves to read. Her love of knowledge and dreams of adventure set her apart from the other women in the village and attract the attention of Gaston, a burly misogynist bent on marrying her. Belle’s father becomes the Beast’s prisoner but Belle finds him and trades herself for her father’s life. While the rest of the castle has almost given up on breaking the spell, Belle comes along and brings out a side of the Beast even he didn’t know existed.
The problem with the film, as is the case with most animated films, is the rating. Parents allowing their children to watch the film should be aware of some of Beast’s hissy fits and the final climax of the film, which is not appropriate for general audiences.
The songs are terrific and the animation is amazing. It’s hard to believe it took the voters at the Academy Awards that long to nominate an animated film for best picture considering that Disney’s first animated film, “Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs”, came out over fifty years earlier.
