Beauty and the Beast: A Response to a Response

Last updated on: May 31, 2017 at 8:59 pm by John Mark N. Reynolds

Beauty and the Beast: A Response to a Response 2017-05-31T20:59:44-04:00 John Mark N. Reynolds

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

With permission.

Opine and the world opines with you, but attack Beauty and the Beast and you will opine alone.

Having taken on the animated classic more than once, I have received some spirited responses, though saying I was shaped like LeFou with the romance of Gaston seemed harsh. Fortunately, an excellent critic has arisen to defend the film and I am honored to respond.

We both agree that Disney has taken the original story, a tale not quite as old as time, but fairly old, and done something totally new with the tale. A great many virtues go missing in the animated film: content with one’s lot and talents, humility, and piety. Shebuel Varghese concedes the point, but rightly says one must take the film as film. What about the merits of the animated movie?

They are very great. Beauty and the Beast is beautifully crafted and the story telling is tight. Of all animated films, it may be my favorite, certainly my favorite American film. Yet despite the virtues, I still have ought against it and it begins with Belle “wanting so much more than this provincial life” and the destruction of provincial France at the end of the movie.

Varghese defends this ably here:

In the story, Belle wants more “than this provincial life.” This is a classic trait found in the heroes of some our greatest stories. Consider Christian in Pilgrim’s Progress who yearns for more than the city around him, and this innate sense drives him to go on the adventure and satisfy this inexplicable longing, found ultimately in the Celestial City. Lucy, Edmund, and Eustace know that there is more than their world, and long to return to the enchanted Narnia. A number of Disney characters possess this sense of unsatisfied longing as well: Aladdin, Hercules, Simba. Rather than this being a matter of pride or superiority, Belle is attune to the fact that there must be more to life than the world she experiences. Her eyes see past the shadows around her, and she senses a life beyond the one she has been living. A number of great thinkers have called attention to this human condition, from Plato to C.S. Lewis. As Lewis points out, “If I find in myself a desire which nothing in this world can satisfy, the only logical explanation is that I was made for another world.” Many of these thinkers point out that this earthly and material world must not be all there is; there must be something beyond the natural: the magical.

Nobody who is Christian could ever argue against this point of view. If only that were the viewpoint, found in Beauty and the Beast!

Read the lyrics to the song. The townspeople are all boors, because on a workday they are going about their normal business. The town has a well stocked book shop, putting it ahead of most American towns, where the book store owner gives Belle the book of fairy tales she is reading because she likes it so much. The town is made to look bad, but even then it is not so bad.

There is, of course, a life beyond the one Belle leading, but in the film that life turns out to be a castle with a prince. At the end of the tale, the castle is disenchanted. Belle does not go from the town to Narnia, or Heaven. Instead, she is “moving on up” to a higher social caste. Of course, if everyone in town is a boor, if Gaston is the arbiter of mores, then Belle should want more, but isn’t that part of the problem with the film? The townspeople (country folk) are stereotyped unmercifully. The women are either matrons or bosomy cheerleader types and the men are like Gaston or cartoonish. Who buys all the books?

Even the song has the townspeople sing:

The girl is strange but specialA most peculiar mad’moiselle!

And, in fact, Belle is peculiar, she wants to live in a fairy tale. Now I can relate to this desire, but it is contrary to the spirit of fairy tales. Children of earth cannot stay in Narnia. We must go home and grow up, not to hate fairy tales, but to live the life of selling bread and raising other children. We do take our heads out of the clouds, though we need not forget the magic of fairy. We live a balanced life where we belong: like Odysseus when our adventure is over we go home.

Belle does not go to another world. The castle is next to the town and the people go to destroy the Beast and disappear in good Disney fashion. Gaston has led them to ruin. Belle is left living not a magical life, but a self-indulgent life in a castle with servants, full of books. Now I have monarchist tendencies, and Prince Charles living in Saint Jame Palace is delightful to me, but I don’t want his life. I delight that he has it, he is, after all, the Prince of Wales, a job not for me! I am son of Dayton, I am proud to say, while he is son of the Good Queen Elizabeth. (God save her!)

I dream so I can enchant the lake here in Sugar Land. I dream so the garden at The Saint Constantine School can be more than it is for the children. I want more for the provincials, but I recognize the wisdom of the folk . . . who created most fairy tales (if not this one). When I journey to Fairy, it is so I can come home and share a baguette with the baker and rejoice that he is there with his tray, like always. Faithful Baker! And surely we could go to the bookstore and find those who go there and form a reading group of those who want this provincial life, but more too.

Let’s enchant the world.

Mr. Varghese?

That is my complaint with the film. I am not persuaded, but this much I know. Nobody should ignore the nifty stuff going on at Faith Colloquium. Read Faith Colloquium.

Culture

Pop Culture

Previous Post

May 30, 2017

On Satan: Questions from M

Next Post

June 1, 2017 Lawyers and Devils- Questions from M

Browse Our Archives

Select a Category Apologetics Art Culture Education On Books On Education Philosophy Politics Pop Culture Spiritual Reflections Uncategorized

Select a Month October 2026 September 2026 August 2026 July 2026 July 2025 June 2025 September 2024 July 2024 June 2024 December 2023 June 2023 September 2022 May 2022 April 2022 March 2022 February 2022 July 2021 June 2021 May 2021 April 2021 March 2021 February 2021 January 2021 December 2020 November 2020 October 2020 September 2020 August 2020 July 2020 June 2020 May 2020 April 2020 March 2020 February 2020 January 2020 December 2019 November 2019 October 2019 September 2019 August 2019 July 2019 June 2019 May 2019 April 2019 March 2019 February 2019 January 2019 December 2018 November 2018 October 2018 September 2018 August 2018 July 2018 June 2018 May 2018 April 2018 March 2018 February 2018 January 2018 December 2017 November 2017 October 2017 September 2017 August 2017 July 2017 June 2017 May 2017 April 2017 March 2017 February 2017 January 2017 December 2016 November 2016 October 2016 September 2016 August 2016 July 2016 June 2016 May 2016 April 2016 March 2016 February 2016 January 2016 December 2015 November 2015 October 2015 September 2015 August 2015 July 2015 June 2015 May 2015 April 2015 March 2015 February 2015 January 2015 November 2014 October 2014 September 2014 August 2014 July 2014 June 2014 May 2014 April 2014 March 2014 February 2014 January 2014 December 2013 November 2013 October 2013 September 2013 August 2013 July 2013 June 2013 May 2013 April 2013 March 2013 February 2013 January 2013 December 2012 November 2012 October 2012 September 2012 August 2012 July 2012 June 2012 May 2012

TAKE THE

Religious Wisdom Quiz

True or False: 1 Peter teaches that believers are living stones being built into a spiritual house.

Select your answer to see how you score.

FALSE TRUE

Books by This Author John Mark Reynolds

See All Titles »