Each week, THN takes a look back at one of the Walt Disney Animated Classics. The ones that the Walt Disney Company showed in cinemas, the ones they’re most proud of, the ones that still cost a bloody fortune no matter how old they are.
This week, we’re back in the big league with CINDERELLA.
Directed by Clyde Geronimi, Hamilton Luske and Wilfred Jackson
1950/74 Minutes
Budget: $2.9 million
Box Office: $85 million
After a decade of scraping every barrel to make package films on the slimmest of shoestring budgets, Disney made one doozy of a comeback with CINDERELLA, returning to the fairy tales that made his name. With the oversees markets open once again after World War Two, Disney made a real profit for the first time in almost a decade, allowing Walt to branch out into television and further expand his vision.
SYNOPSIS: A storybook opening (literally) introduces us to the tale of CINDERELLA, the daughter of a widowed aristocrat. While he dotes upon his daughter, daddy fears she needs a mother’s love, so he marries Lady Tremaine (betcha didn’t know that was her name), a widow with two daughters about the same age as Cinderella. After his untimely death, Lady Tremaine takes charge of the house. Her daughters, Drizella and Anastasia, are rather plain and socially inept. As a result they harbour deep resentment for the beautiful and intelligent Cinderella, who soon becomes a servant to the three women and is exiled to the barren tower. Despite all this, Cinderella tries to see the best in everyone and everything, even the spiteful old cat, Lucifer. After an accident involving a newly arrived mouse, Cinderella is given a much larger workload than usual by her stepmother.
In the royal palace, The King is brooding. His son, The Prince (that’s the closest thing he gets to a name) has grown distant and seems uninterested in marriage. Determined to see grandchildren before he pegs it, The King demands a ball be arranged, and that “every eligible maiden in the kingdom” attends.
Upon the arrival of said decree, Cinderella shows some spine by demanding to be allowed to attend; Lady Tremaine agrees, on the proviso she finishes her chores, and finds something suitable to wear for the occasion.
Naturally, the three of them give Cinderella such a workload that she barely has time to breathe, let alone make a start on a dress for the evening. Cinderella’s animal friends – Disney law decrees that every Disney hero or heroine be allowed at least one animal sidekick – take it upon themselves to make the dress for her, using materials thrown out by the spoiled sisters.
A surprised Cinderella joins the equally surprised Tremaines in the hall. Lady Tremaine, however, is suspicious of the beads and bangles used to make the dress, and ever so subtly mentions them to her daughters. In a surprisingly harrowing display of domestic abuse, Drizella and Anastasia tear the dress from Cinderella’s body, leaving her in rags.
As the last of her hope and faith leaves her, Cinderella is comforted by her Fairy Godmother, who gives her the chance to go to the ball, and even provides a coach, horses, driver and footman for the night. This wonderful gift comes with a price; it will only last ’til midnight.
So, Cinderella arrives late and unannounced to the ball, where The Prince is lazily waving off any woman passed in front of him, while his father watches in despair. And then, lo and behold, he looks up and sees Cinderella. Immediately falling for the girl, he strides off past her stepsisters and dances the night away with this mysterious new arrival. Cinderella is too caught up in the moment to realise who she’s dancing with, and loses all track of time. As the first stroke of midnight tolls, she legs it from the palace, dropping her glass slipper on the way.
The next day, The Duke arrives with orders to try the slipper on every maiden in the kingdom. When Tremaine twigs something’s up with Cinderella, she locks her in her bedroom, away from the weary Duke. The combined efforts of Cinderella’s Animal Friends free her from her imprisonment, so she catches them just as they are leaving. Tremaine plays her last card, tripping up the squire with the glass slipper, which shatters into a thousand pieces. Of course, Cinderella has the other one.
In quick succession the pair are married and whisked away by horse and carriage, and they lived happily ever after…
Lessons Learned:
1. Don’t give up on your dreams.
2. Farmyard animals are smarter than they look.
3. You can’t always judge people by their appearance; some people hide their true and darker motives deep in the shadows.
THE HEROINE
Cinderella is clearly the heroine. She is voiced by singer and actress Ilene Woods. In many ways the archetypal fairy tale princess; a rich girl pressed into servitude by a wicked pseudo-relative, dreaming of her one true love whilst living her life as best as she can. Unlike Snow, she does seem to have her own mind and does at least show a little defiance, once or twice.
THE HERO
Let’s get this out of the way; it’s not the prince. Much like the likewise unnamed prince in SNOW WHITE, the Prince here has nothing going for him.
Instead, let us turn to the mice. Yep, that’s right, the mice. They’re the real heroes here. They’re the one’s that help Cinderella in the final act, rescuing her from imprisonment. And while there are countless mice in the movie, it’s down to Jaq and new arrival Gus, both voiced by Jimmy MacDonald to carry the picture.
THE VILLAIN
SIDEKICKS/HENCHMEN
Whether you count the Fairy Godmother as a sidekick or a plot device is up to you, but most of the ancillary characters are of the four-legged variety. I’ve mentioned Jaq and Gus, but there’s a plethora of other rodents, many of whom have their own little moment. It’s also debatable whether Cinderella’s spoiled (not necessarily evil) step-sisters qualify as henchmen, but there’s no argument that Lucifer does. A spiteful, overweight, vindictive ball of fur, he seems to exist solely to make Cinderella’s life that little bit harder.
PLOT
If it weren’t for all the stuff with the mice, Disney would have had a hard time dragging this one out past the half hour mark. Very little happens for long swathes of the film, and the whole thing has a rather laconic, dream-like air to it. I have to admit it wasn’t as bad as I feared it would be, and I have to say I’m not as averse to it now as I used to be.
Much like SNOW WHITE, it glosses over a lot of the darker elements of the “original” story, but here we have a perfectly sound take on the tale. In fact, a little more originality would have made all the difference.
LAUGHS
While most of the picture is played straight, there are some laughs to be had, mostly through the background characters; Drizella and Anastasia have their moments, as do many of the animal characters, but the real comedy element comes from the brooding King and the long-suffering Duke, both voiced by Luis van Rooten.
SCARES
Lady Tremaine is a wonderfully sinister character; you can tell her heart is as dark as the shadows she resides in. The King’s soldiers sent to “capture” Cinderella’s coach are quite sinister as well, swirls of black and red reminiscent of the Headless Horseman. But when Drizella and Anastasia physically attack Cinderella to take back their “stolen” property, it’s bloody terrifying.
MORAL/ EDUCATIONAL VALUE
Cinderella is a strange one; she spends five minutes singing about how you shouldn’t give up on your dreams and that one day everything will turn out okay, then she tells Bruno off for dreaming about chasing Lucifer, something he’s obviously quite passionate about. It’s a bit of a double-standard. Aside from that there’s a few life lessons; be kind to people (or mice) and just maybe they’ll help you out in the future.
MUSIC/SONGS
Again, a pleasant surprise. A lot of the songs are quite good; aside from the really annoying twee ones that get mentioned in those music CDs, like ‘Bibbity Bobbity Boo’, we get little gems like ‘Sing Sweet Nightingale’ and ‘So This is Love’ (I always thought that was from BAMBI. Weird, I know). And unlike Snow White, Cinderella can actually sing without setting teeth on edge.
LEGACY
CINDERELLA is still regarded by some as one of Disney’s finest works, and the character has remained a mainstay for the company for almost seventy years.
Aside from numerous cameos in games and TV series, CINDERELLA had two direct-to-video sequels produced in the ’00s: DREAMS COME TRUE (2002) is a package movie wherein Jaq and Gus tell three stories set after the original film. Despite being rather successful in video sales, it was met with mixed reviews and wasn’t well received by critics or fans. 2007’s A TWIST IN TIME is a surprisingly dark-sounding affair; Lady Tremaine gets ahold of the Fairy Godmother’s magic wand, and sets about destroying Cinderella’s happy ever after.
According to Cinemablend, a live-action re-imagining of the original film is in the works, with Cate Blanchett in talks to play Lady Tremaine, with Kenneth Branagh said to be in talks to direct. Couple that with the long-gestating MALEFICENT movie, and we may be seeing a whole string of live action Disney remakes…
FINAL SCORE: 39/53
Sources: Wikipedia, Disney Wiki, CinemaBlend, IMDb.
