Keeping its tradition of anniversary screenings of beloved films, the Film Society of Lincoln Center will show Disney's 1991 critically acclaimed blockbuster Beauty and the Beast next month. To make the evening even more special, the original cast members will be there: Robby Benson (the Beast); Paige O'Hara (Belle); and Richard White (Gaston); and the one and only Angela Lansbury, a.k.a. Mrs. Potts.
The animated film actually premiered as a "work in progress" 25 years ago at the New York Film Festival—a third of the film was, the Film Society says, "storyboard art and black-and-white animation tests" at the festival.
Presented on September 29, 1991 at the New York Film Festival, the Work-in-Progress cut of Beauty and the Beast.
The NY Times reported at the time that Disney decided to take a chance by showing it at the more arthouse/world cinema-oriented festival—a Disney executive recalled, "There was a lot of gulping here. It was a risky but interesting idea to show it before that audience. We knew no one would hate the film. The worst they could say was, "O.K., it's an animated film; why is it here?'"
The NYFF crowd gave a standing ovation, and the film went on to become the first animated motion picture to be nominated for a Best Picture Oscar (the other nominees that year were Bugsy, JFK, The Prince of Tides and, the winner, The Silence of the Lambs). It solidified Disney's return as an animation powerhouse (Aladdin, possibly foreshadowed by Belle, was released in 1992; The Lion King in 1994) and also launched Disney's takeover of Broadway and Times Square, as Beauty and the Beast was the first film to be adapted into musical.
It's also argued that, relatively speaking, Belle was Disney's first attempt to remove its female heroines from the princess mold; screenwriter Linda Woolverton fought to make her less passive. From Time:
In one scene, for example, Woolverton wrote Belle sticking pins into a map of all the places she wished to travel. By the time it got to storyboarding, Belle had been rewritten into a kitchen, decorating a cake. Woolverton protested, and the compromise that was reached had Belle with her nose in a book, a pastime at first considered too passive to be compellingly animated, which is why she always walks as she reads.
One of Belle's main characteristics, though, is still her exceptional physical appearance, and the romance itself might be characterized by others as "Stockholm Syndrome."
Disney is preparing for a big Beauty and the Beast push: It will finally be available digitally on September 6, and its live action version—directed by Kenneth Branagh and starring avowed feminist Emma Watson as Belle; Cousin Matthew Crawley portrayer Dan Stevens as as the Beast; and Ewan McGregor taking over Jerry Orbach's Lumiere role—will be released March 2017.
The film will screen on Sunday, September 18th. Tickets are $20 and on sale now at filmlinc.org—the catch is that the event is only available for Film Society members and patrons (details).
