Deep Dive Disney: Wes Looks at Sleeping Beauty

Welcome back to Deep Dive Disney and welcome to one of Disney’s most beloved films of all time, Sleeping Beauty. It may have been an even longer space of time between now and my initial viewing than there was with Cinderella. What that means is, more than any other movie so far, I’m pretty much flying blind here. Based on a Fairy Tale that dates back to the fourteenth century, Sleeping Beauty tells the story of a faraway kingdom that has just celebrated the birth of a baby daughter. A celebration is held in honor of the newborn child, Aurora and anybody who’s anybody is in attendance, including three magical fairies, allies to King Stefan. However, one who was not invited was the powerful Dark Fairy, Maleficent. So affronted by not being invited was the self-proclaimed Mistress of All Evil, that she casts a curse on the child purely out of spite. Said curse declares that sometime before her sixteenth birthday, the girl would prick her finger on the spindle of a spinning wheel and die. Though the fairies were unable to undo the curse, they were able to amend it to where the sleeping death could be undone with True Love’s Kiss. Still, King Stefan didn’t want to take any chances so he ordered every spinning wheel in the kingdom burned and entrusted the Fairies to hide the Princess away in the forest until her sixteenth birthday had past and Maleficent’s curse was presumably lifted. The film is beautifully animated, well-acted and… when the villain is not screen, Boring As Shit! We’ll talk about Maleficent when we get to her section, but man, without her, this movie would be VERY appropriately titled if you catch my meaning. Well, we may as well take a look at Sleeping Beauty.

Main Character:

What? You think just because she’s the Princess that means Aurora is the main character? Seriously? The girl has the personality for a wooden fence post. The real main characters in this version of the story are the Fairies. They’re the ones who put together the plan to hide Aurora and it’s ultimately them who influence things so Phillip is able to defeat Maleficent and save Aurora. They are the real heroes of the story. So, how are they? Eh… I’m not really a fan. I honestly found them more annoying than anything else. Their squabbling amongst themselves over differences in color wore thin after a while and so many other choices revolving around them just kind of irked me. You’d think after living in the woods without magic for sixteen years they’d have picked up some basic skills such as sewing, cooking and cleaning, but apparently not. What the hell were they doing all that time? Then, once they tell Aurora of her true origins, they’re somehow surprised that she’s upset that her whole life has basically been a lie and that she’s apprehensive about leaving the only life she’s ever known. And then, once Maleficent is able to enact her curse, something that was only possibly because the Fairies’ insistence on using their magic lead her straight to them, instead of coming clean to the king, they cast a sleeping spell on the entire kingdom just to cover their own asses. Yeah, these Fairies kind of suck at their jobs, and they’re the ones we’re supposed to be rooting for? I don’t know. I know a lot of people like these characters and that’s fine I guess, but me, I gravitated more towards… someone else.

Villain:

Now on to the real star of the show. I mean it, Maleficent makes this flick. Ironic that she casts the sleeping curse since she was the only one that was keeping me awake the entire film. Despite my misgivings with the live action film, a discussion for another day, they absolutely made the right call by making Maleficent the focus since she is the most memorable and interesting character by an extraordinarily wide margin. Maleficent absolutely owns every second she’s on screen. Every moment she maintains a level of grace and majesty while always remaining threatening. Her design is perfect for a Disney villain. Dark and imposing with green skin, a long flowing black cloak with purple trim and a pair of demonic horns atop her head, wielding an impressive magical staff with a sinister looking raven perched on it. Maleficent is a terrifying presence even before she says a word. When she does speak, her voice is equal parts soothing and chilling, ensuring that you hang on her every word. She’s voiced by Eleanor Audley, the same voice actress for Lady Tremaine from Cinderella, and she brings the same gravitas she brought to her previous role and then some. Ironically for one of the most celebrated Disney Villains of all time, her motivation is easily the most petty, cursing an innocent child all because she wasn’t invited to a party. I’d hate to see what she’d do if they really pissed her off. One could say that her motivation is weak, but I think it plays into her character. Maleficent is, after all, the mistress of all evil and she wants everyone to make sure her station is recognized, respected and most importantly, feared. Such an insult, even one as minor as a party invitation cannot be allowed lest people think she’s gone soft. Some of the things I like most about Maleficent is how vindictive she can be. She could easily have killed Aurora outright, but that would have been over too quickly. Maleficent seals Aurora’s fate and forces the kingdom to endure sixteen years of despair waiting for the inevitable. She does the same to Prince Philip, locking him away and saying that she’ll release him only when he’s too old and decrepit to break Aurora’s curse. However, while Maleficent appears to prefer psychological torment, she’s got plenty of raw power at her disposal, including the power to transform herself into a massive nightmare dragon. With all this going for her, you’re damn right Maleficent is one of Disney’s franchise villains, but it goes so much further than that. If any member of the Disney rogue’s gallery could claim a sort of leadership over their contemporaries, it’s Maleficent. Mistress of All Evil, it’s kind of in the name. It seems others have realized this as well since Maleficent often appears as the main antagonist any time that the Disney Villains band together in Disney Parks stage shows and other media. My personal favorite has to be the first Kingdom Hearts video game, a series I hope to talk about in greater detail sometime in the future. In that game, a cabal comprised of several of the greatest baddies every to emerge from Disney’s film library have banded together to serve as one of the game's primary threats. Hades, Jafar, Ursula, Captain Hook and Oogie Boogie all form a veritable dream team of villainy, but who’s the one calling the shots? That’s right, our girl Maleficent. I say again, Maleficent makes this film and is celebrated as one of Disney’s great villains by many, including yours truly, for a damn good reason.

Side Characters:

I’ll give brief mention to King Stefan, who is portrayed as a kind and fair king who misses his daughter and will do whatever it takes to protect her, even if that means he must be parted from her for a long time. Man, did this guy get done dirty in the live action version. King Hubert, Philip’s father is also a fun character and the friendship between the two kings is actually kind of fun. However, we should really talk about Philip and Aurora. When people say that Disney Princesses are vapid and uninteresting blank slates, they’re probably thinking of Princess Aurora. She’s about as boiler plate generic as a Disney Princess can get. She’s wide eyed, innocent, kind to animals and has about as much personality as an especially uninteresting cement block. Don’t get me wrong, it’s not like Snow White and Cinderella were exactly oozing with charisma, but at least they either had fun personalities to bounce off of or hardships to endure that engendered sympathy towards them. Aurora gets none of this, and her character suffers as a result. Philip is given a little more to work with, I actually got a good laugh out of the Flynn Rider/Maximus dynamic he had going on with his horse, but despite getting more lines and character than previous Disney Princes (not to mention a name), he’s still not exactly a dynamo of personality himself. Really, the Prince and Princess really aren’t characters unto themselves, more pawns in the game played between Maleficent and The Fairies. I guess in that regard it sort of works, but I just wasn’t feeling it.

Songs:

You probably want me to discuss the much beloved “Once Upon a Dream.” Gotta be honest, wasn’t feeling that one either. Like much of the movie that didn’t feature Maleficent, I found it mostly boring. A song I surprisingly did enjoy was a song called “Skumps,” a drinking duet between Kings Stefan and Hubert. Like I said, I rather enjoyed the friendship shared between the two, and I liked seeing them toasting to their children’s seemingly bright future and getting delightfully drunk about it. The minstrel getting completely plastered by the end got a laugh out of me.

Memorable Scenes:

With the possible exception of Ichabod’s encounter with the Headless Horseman, the final confrontation with Maleficent is one of the most epic climaxes in a Disney movie that we’ve covered. Philip has escaped from Maleficent’s dungeon with the help of the Fairies and needs to fight his way through her disgusting troll-like minions. Once he breaches the castle gate, Maleficent puts forest of thorns to block his path, making for a creatively dark setting for the final battle. Once Phillip gets out of the thorn bush, Maleficent herself stands in his way and then utters the now iconic line “Now Shall You Deal With Me Oh Prince, And All The Powers of Hell” before transforming into an enormous fire breathing dragon. Phillip battles the Dragon to the edge of a cliff and it looks like he’s done for until the Fairies enchant his sword, allowing him to impale Maleficent. They even show blood, I wasn’t expecting that. It’s probably one of Disney’s most memorable climaxes and one of the reasons that this film is remembered as fondly as it is.

Story:

I mean, the story is one of a princess cursed by an evil witch who can only be saved by the kiss of a handsome prince. This is about as standard as fairy tales get. In that regard there’s nothing wrong with it, it’s just nothing we haven’t seen before. I’ll it this though, the prince and princess actually exchange more than one line of dialogue before they decide they’re meant for each other and unlike in Snow White, it’s established ahead of time that kissing the dead girl will indeed break the spell, which is more than I can say for Prince Necrophiliac.

The Dark Disney Factor:

We’ve covered most of the good stuff in the other sections, but there’s still one especially creepy scene I’d like to discuss. It’s the scene where Aurora pricks her finger on the spinning wheel. Aurora has finally been brought back to the castle and is left alone in her room. The fire goes out and glowing green orb appears, leading the you woman up a mysterious flight of stairs behind the fireplace in an almost-trance like state. At the top, Aurora finds the spinning wheel that spells her doom, but cannot help herself but to prick her finger. By the time the Fairies come to her aid, there’s Maleficent, gloating over her apparent victory before revealing the Princess, having fallen under the sleeping curse. It’s beautiful and haunting scene and it’s just the right amount of creepy. It’s just another one of the many reasons Maleficent is awesome.

Final Thoughts: Maleficent is awesome and the final battle is one of the best Disney has ever produced, but outside of that, the film is a bit of a snoozer, so I guess it kind of breaks even. It’s beautifully animated and the stuff that’s good is still really good, so I guess I understand why it’s considered a Disney Classic. Not my favorite, but not all that bad. Next time, we cover another Disney Classic in which the Villain is the best part when we tackle 101 Dalmations