Beauty and the Beast
1946, NR, 95 min.
D: Jean Cocteau.

Cocteau works his visual magic on the age-old story of a girl and her beast. La Belle et la Bête is the French artistic master’s first full-length feature, and he brings his fluency in fine art and theatre to this sumptuous fairy tale. Walls and statuary move unbidden and the otherworldly look of the film, costumes, and make-up are magnificent. Cocteau also understands and imbues his movie with a modern, post-Freudian take on fairy tales as childhood’s forum for working through subconscious maturation processes – i.e., the young woman reluctant to leave her father’s home and go live with a wild, hairy beast.

This article appears in September 28 • 2001.

A note to readers: Bold and uncensored, The Austin Chronicle has been Austin’s independent news source for over 40 years, expressing the community’s political and environmental concerns and supporting its active cultural scene. Now more than ever, we need your support to continue supplying Austin with independent, free press. If real news is important to you, please consider making a donation of $5, $10 or whatever you can afford, to help keep our journalism on stands.

SUPPORT US

Marjorie Baumgarten is a film critic and contributing writer at The Austin Chronicle, where she has worked in many capacities since the paper's founding in 1981. She served as the Chronicle's Film Reviews editor for 25 years.