The film I watched for the extra credit assignment is Sleeping Beauty, released by Disney in 1959. The head director was Clyde Geronimi, sequenced by Les Clark, Hamilton Luske, and Wolfgang Reitherman. The writers of the film were Erdman Penner, Charles Perrault, Joe Rinaldi, Winston Hibler, Bill Peet, Ted Sears, Ralph Wright, and Milt Banta. In addition, Princess Aurora was cast by Mary Costan; Prince Phillip was cast by Bill Shirley, and Maleficent was cast by Eleanor Audley. When the film was first released, its production was $36,479,805. As it re-released in 1986, production declined to $15,120,195 (boxofficemojo.com). From this trend, we deduce that the film was less appreciated in 1986 compared to 1959, which implied a shift in society’s values. Moreover, as one of the parents mentioned in the review, “People must realize this is based on a story written in the 17th century when male and female roles were very different from today. The film was also made in the 1950s which was also very different from today” (Robert W., 2018). Society’s values of gender roles in the mid-20th century were definitely different from values in the late-20th century, so is it today.
Love at first sight was one of the most dominant themes in the film. When Princess Aurora sang and danced in the forest, Prince Phillips appeared. Despite they had “never met” each other before and they had so different backgrounds--a royal descendant for the throne and a peasant girl--at the time, they fell in love at first sight. Just as the lyrics suggested, “Yet I know it’s true / The visions are seldom all they seem / But if I know you / I know what you'll do / You'll love at once / The way you did once upon a dream” (31:50), They would fall in love right away. In fantasy, a beautiful young woman and a handsome man are considered perfect matches although there were not any other developments in relationships. This idea implied an underlying message: love will fall upon, just wait for the day, which discouraged the audience from taking active actions toward the destiny. This might be one of the reasons why Sleeping Beauty was less appreciated in 1986 when it was re-released. Compared to The Little Mermaid, released in 1989, its production was $84,355,863 (boxofficemojo.com), which was more than five times Sleeping Beauty’s re-released in 1986. This was a very obvious shift in what people valued.
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