Film Reivew 4: Le Belle la bete (1946)

Le Belle la bete

Le Belle la beast or beauty and the beast is possibly the strangest film I have seen so far in the space oddities program. Thanks in no small part to the special effects used at the time and the bizarre ending. The beauty and the beast wasn’t the Disney version of the fairy tail but the 1946 version by Jean Coteau based of the same fairy tail. Being from this time it is in black and white with voiced dialogue but is in a different language which required subtitles. Something that becomes very clear from the start is that this version of the classic fairy tail is very surreal and bizarre when compared for the Disney version. I am mainly going to talk about the set design and special effects as that what stood out to me the most in this film as well as a little about the costume design.

If you have seen the Disney version, then the stories are fairly similar as they are both based of the same fairy tail. The film revolves around Belle that comes from a poor background and ends up being forced to live with the beast in his castle in exchange for her fathers live. She ends up returning to her home for a week while also being entrusted with a golden key to the treasure being kept at the beast’s castle. Her sisters, brother and his friend come up with a plot to steal the key as well as kill the beast in order to get the treasure. This all ends with the friend being turned into the new beast and the original being cured, Belle and the cured beast then fly of into the sun set. The ending is probably the most bizarre part of the film as it ends so abrupt and them flying in to the sky despite no such ability being established up to this point. Despite this the moral of the film became clear at the end where its saying that it is what is on the on inside that matters, not the outside.

The main thing I want to talk about is the set design and by short extension the special effects as they where probably the best part of this film. The castle decoration is very creepy to look at witch its special effects don’t help or how Peter Bradshaw from the guardian put it in his review “its special effects are prehistoric when compared to those of our 21^st century and yet deeply disturbing” (Peter Bradshaw 2014). The candles through out the hall ways are held by human hands that are sticking out the walls, at the table there is a hand that helps prepare diner and not to mention that there was a scene where outstretched arms move the curtains covering a door way. Something I noticed is there are a lot of arms and hands shown in the castle but there is also busts and statues that have live heads as well as other parts which look at Belle whenever she is nearby. Even several pieces of furniture talk such as doors and mirrors. It feels like literally the entire castle is watching Belle and in extension the audience which comes of as being very unsettling. I also noticed several camera tricks being used in places such as when the beast now cured gets up, when they fly into the sunset at the end or the candles that appear to light up them selves.

This leads to the special effects and camera tricks the movie uses to do all of this or as Roger Ebert put it in his review “a fantasy alive with trick shots and astonishing special effects” (Roger Ebert 1999). In terms of the outstretched arms and hand I am fairly sure is that they used make up to make the actors arms look like it is made of stone or some other material. Then in the sets where they where needed cut holes into the walls so they can get their hand through, give them a candle and decorate the outside of the hole so it looks like it is part of the castle then suddenly they have an arm candle. I imagine the busts where done similarly but instead with a much larger hole and from the actor’s torso and up made to look like stone via the makeup ant costume. The statues where a more extreme version where no hole was needed however the entire actor has to be dressed up to look like a statue. With the cameras tricks a lot of it was just reversing footage to achieve certain effects such as when the cured beast gets up it is just reversed footage of him falling over which is why it looked like he got up strangely without moving his legs. The candles lighting up was done by reversing footage of them going out. Even in the ending where they where flying into the sun set as strange as it was likely used a projector on to put the clouds on the wall. Compared to green screens and CGI we have today, all these effects are simple and provide very strange looking effects but at the time these where all they had for special effects. The exception being stop motion that I imagined where used in the film but I didn’t spot them. Perhaps the scene where the quilt moves of the bead was done with stop motion but they could of easily used some form of concealed thin wire for that. The black and white aspect of the film helps hide a lot of the special effects so they are not as noticeable as they probably should be.

In conclusion I have very mixed feelings about the film as I liked the effects they used but I didn’t like everything else. The special effects used where either creative or essentially the precursors to our current ones where projectors where used before green screens and stop motion used before CGI. While using fairy tails to create a film was not common at the time it is made more common today by Disney as Geoffrey Macnab from the independent said in their review “the very fact it is a fantasy allows the film makers to demonstrate their artistry in the most extravagant fashion”(Geoffrey Mcnab 2014). It is a fairy tail rooted mostly in fantasy so this allows for more work to be put in to creating the magical effects and setting as the fantasy part encourages the use of more creative special effects. The fairy tail part mean it is already a established story that people would likely be familiar with.

References

Macnab, G. (2014). La Belle Et La Bete: Film review - Cocteau's Forties fantasy is still. [online] The Independent. Available at: https://independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/films/reviews/la-belle-et-la-bete-film-review-cocteaus-forties-fantasy-is-still-a-thing-of-real-beauty-9035506.html [Accessed 30 Oct. 2019].

Ebert, R. (1999). Beauty and the Beast movie review (1946) | Roger Ebert. [online] Rogerebert.com. Available at: https://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/great-movie-beauty-and-the-beast-1946 [Accessed 30 Oct. 2019].

Bradshaw, P. (2014). La Belle et la Bête – review. [online] the Guardian. Available at: https://www.theguardian.com/film/2014/jan/02/belle-et-bete-review [Accessed 30 Oct. 2019].

Billson, A. (2014). Beauty and the Beast: low on budget, high on poetry. [online] Telegraph.co.uk. Available at: https://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/film/10561337/Beauty-and-the-Beast-low-on-budget-high-on-poetry.html [Accessed 30 Oct. 2019].

Davis, P. (1946). A poster for the film Beauty and the beast 1946. [image] Available at: https://www.cinematerial.com/movies/la-belle-et-la-bete-i38348/p/pykfpunt [Accessed 30 Oct. 2019].