Unpacking Sleeping Beauty
By Isabel Graham and Victoria Walton
Sleeping Beauty — Clyde Geronimi 1959
Link to IMDB movie: https://m.imdb.com/title/tt0053285/
In Disney’s Sleeping Beauty, the evil witch, Maleficent, curses the newborn Princess Aurora to die on her 16th birthday. Aurora’s guardian fairies put a spell on Aurora so when she falls into a deep sleep, that can be ended with a kiss from her soon to be husband, Prince Phillip. To prevent Prince Phillip from rescuing Aurora, Maleficent kidnaps and imprisons him in her castle. The guardian fairies are Prince Phillip’s hope in order to wake Aurora. When Prince Philip finally reaches Aurora after many obstacles, he kisses her and wakes her up from a deep sleep. They get married and live happily ever after.
The Beauty Sleeping in the Wood — Charles Perrault 1697
Link to eBook: https://www.pitt.edu/~dash/perrault01.html
In The Beauty Sleeping in the Wood, the king and queen give birth to a daughter and invited seven fairies to bring her gifts except for one old aged fairy, who became very mad and began to mutter threats. Once she made her evil death threat, one of the good fairies was able to reverse this by making her fall asleep for 100 years when she touched a spindle instead of die. One day, the princess was running around the castle and saw a woman sitting using a spinning wheel, when the princess touched it she immediately fell asleep. The good fairy that turned the evil wish of death to sleep, came to the castle and touched her wand to everyone in the kingdom and made them fall asleep except the king and queen. Once a hundred years had passed the throne was passed down and the new king’s son went hunting and heard stories of the beautiful princess who lives in the tower. The prince made his way to the tower and got down on his knees beside her. At that same moment, the princess awoke as well as the rest of the kingdom. Two years passed and the princess and the prince had two children, however the queen, who was an ogre, was back at his home and his father had died making him the king. The queen heard of the princess and her two children so she forced her servants to bring her kids to her to eat. Luckily, the cook saved the children by killing two animals instead. The queen (ogress) also wanted to eat the princess, and instead he killed a large animal and cooked it for the ogress. She planned to tell the king once he returned from hunting but she heard the voices of the princess (now queen) and her children. The ogress was enraged and threw herself into a vat and was devoured by the hideous creatures she placed in it. The king, the queen, and their two children lived happily ever after.
The Use of Colors
Throughout Sleeping Beauty, bright, vibrant colors are used that help portray Aurora’s personality and make her a distinguished character. In the original text The Beauty Sleeping in the Wood, there is not much color imagery used to describe the characters within this story, which leaves room for the producer and writer to add that color.
Color is not typically described in text, which I think is a little difficult for writers and producers of films Pink is a color that is typically associated with happiness while blue sometimes sadness or darkness. A bright color was important to use, especially for the ending, when Aurora is married and gets her happily ever after. When Princess Aurora touched the spindle and fell asleep, she was wearing blue, which is a color of sadness, depicting how the fairies felt and also how the kingdom would feel if they did know she had fallen asleep. Aurora is typically pictured wearing pink, which symbolize the happiness she has with Prince Philip. Darkness is specifically seen with the black, green and purple used with Maleficent’s castle. These dark tones are always used in eerie settings and are typically used with the villain. The different colors that producers and writers use bring stories to life. The bright colors that are used in the forest, convey the beauty of the love story between Aurora and Prince Philip.
Good v. Evil
In Sleeping Beauty the trope, good v. evil, is very prevalent. It is seen mostly in the characters actions, colors and the plot of the story. We start off by learning about the evil Maleficent, who curses Princess Aurora. She is dark and has an eerie presence which makes the good v. evil aspect much more apparent. The guardian fairies are able to protect Aurora through her adolescent and teenage years in a little cottage in the forest. This cottage represents the good of the story. It is where Aurora grew up and experienced things for the first time, she built her life there. The use of light, calm colors shows how peaceful this cottage was, especially with all the wildlife and nature surrounding it.
Throughout the story we are able to learn that the castle where Princess Aurora’s family lives is also a part of the good side of this fairy tale. It is bright with helpful and loving people, while Maleficent’s castle is more ill-lit with long vines and dark smoke surrounding it. It is very easy to see the good and the bad in this story and it makes all the difference in creating a loved fairy tale. Without the good and evil in Sleeping Beauty, there would be no conflict or obstacle to overcome, making the story much less interesting and more one sided.
Princess Put Under a Spell Causing Flatness
Princess Aurora is put under a spell by the evil Maleficent in Disney’s Sleeping Beauty. With Aurora being put under a spell it becomes very apparent that there is so much flatness in the characters, specifically in the parents. When Aurora is first cursed as a newborn the parents have a very small role and we never truly see how they feel about their child needing to be hidden away until her sixteenth birthday. When her birthday finally rolls around, Maleficent discovers that she is in hiding and is able to make sure she is put into a deep slumber. While all of this is occurring we never see the side of her parents. Did they think she was still safe? Were they worried? Because we have such little background on their characters it makes it much easier to forget about their roles and assume that the guardian fairies are her “parents.”
