Cinderella was the first true Disney animated feature since Bambi (1942). Several feature length had been made in between, such as Fun and Fancy Free and The Three Caballeros, but they were generally collections of lesser shorts stitched together.
Cinderella and its follow-up Alice in Wonderland (1951) represented a brief comeback for the classic Disney animated film. While Cinderella was not of the same quality as Dumbo, Pinocchio or (especially) Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937), it was still a very good film.
Cinderella was based on the familiar fairy tale, but it had as much in common with Snow White. Both films have a beautiful, gentle, passive woman as the heroic lead, whose arch enemy is a crafty and jealous older woman. Our heroine ends up living happily ever after with a dreamy but bland and equally passive prince. Both films are assumedly set somewhere in Europe, sometime before the industrial revolution.
The witch's crow has been replaced by a sinister cat. The dwarfs have been replaced by little talking mice, who go to amazing lengths to help their Cinderella find true happiness. Disney would subsequently make yet another feature with the same themes, Sleeping Beauty (1959).
Cinderella has of late been subject to the revisionist history of political correctness. Why does the sweet and gentle Cinderella have to be beautiful, while the two selfish and lazy sisters are grotesque? Why is Cinderella rewarded for her slavish and passive behavior, when we all know that in fact such toil only brings dishpan hands and back pain?
Of course Cinderella is a morality play as well as a fantasy for pre-teenaged girls. Cinderella overcomes her enemies with persistence and assistance, rather than through Xena-styled martial arts. But the world needs more people with grace and a good work ethic, like Cinderella, and less people who believe that the world revolves around their own agenda, such as Cinderella's step-sisters. If the sisters act ugly, they deserve to look ugly, even if it doesn't work that way in real life.
There are no surprises in Cinderella. We know how the story goes from the endless sanitized variations of the classic fairy tale. We know that Prince Charming will get the girl, thanks to Cinderella's helpers and the first class dating service as reluctantly executed by the Grand Duke.
Still, there is much suspense in the telling. The wicked stepmother is a formidable adversary. The evil cat, appropriately named Lucifer, is given many chances to eat the excitable little mice that surround it. Especially fat and slow Gus. Since Cinderella does little to help herself, the mice have assumed that responsibility for her. They are constantly racing against time to free Cinderella from her latest obstacle to royalty.
It must be an extraordinary peaceful kingdom, if finding a bride for the Prince is the only matter of state. I also wonder why the glass slippers don't lose their guarantee at midnight, instead of reverting to form like the pumpkin coach. It is difficult to believe that the Prince, who looks like Rock Hudson, is from the same gene pool as his father the King, who looks a portly and elderly version of Elmer Fudd.
Cinderella was nominated for three Academy Awards, demonstrating that Hollywood was pleased with Disney's return to form. The Oscar nominated song was "Bippity Boppity Boo", sung by an Angela Lansbury lookalike fairy godmother. But I prefer the chorus sung by the mice, "We can do it! We can do it! We can dress up Cinderella!". The mice have their voices sped up, and are proof that Alvin and the Chipmunks were not the first rodents to be so blessed. (76/100)
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