1940s La Belle et la Bête

For our stop in 1940s film history, we screened La Belle et la Bête (1946), an adaptation of the classic French fairytale Beauty and the Beast directed by surrealist master Jean Cocteau. He brings his sense of poetry to cinema, not aiming to create it but allowing it to unfold and be found naturally. Filmed in a newly liberated France, the production was beset by several setbacks: a lack of materials for filming and props, injured actors, and Cocteau himself had to be hospitalized in the middle of filming. Despite all of this, Cocteau and his crew soldiered on, bonded together by their belief in what they were making. The result continues to captivate and enchant today. So sit back and let yourself be swept away in the land of fairytale.

• Does the ending feel earned or imposed? Belle gets a prince, but loses the Beast. Is that a happy ending or a trade-off dressed up as one?

• What does it mean that the Beast transforms into the man Belle least wanted? Is the ending a reward or a punishment in disguise?

• Happy endings in fairy tales tend to restore order. Does this film restore order, or does it quietly mourn something?

• Is Avenant a villain, or just a man who wanted what he thought he deserved? What makes him sympathetic, and where does that sympathy run out?

• The Beast is gentle, patient, and honest about his desire. Avenant is charming, handsome, and dishonest about his. Which one is actually the monster?

• Does the Beast become less interesting the moment he becomes a man? What does it say about the film that the transformation might feel like a loss?

• Belle is the one with agency throughout. She chooses to stay, chooses to leave, chooses to return. So why does the ending take the choice out of her hands?

• If the Beast represents something Belle cannot name or explain, what does his human form represent? Relief? Disappointment? The end of mystery?