Sexy, Sparkling, and Grotesque

Jean Cocteau's La Belle et La Bête remains ahead of the curve, almost 80 years after its release. Why?

One of my favorite movie moments happens at the end of Jean Cocteau’s La Belle et La Bête (1946), when the Beast turns back into a Prince, the spell that bound him undone by Belle’s gaze of true love. 

Belle (Josette Day), upon seeing her love’s new form, reacts in a way that’s both mildly disappointed and vaguely thrilled. Gone is the big, hairy Beast that she earlier had – literally – drinking from the palms of her hands; in his place appears the powdered and gleaming Prince Ardent (played by Cocteau’s muse and romantic partner of many years, Jean Marais). The Beast’s gothic and seductive aura has evaporated and been replaced by a sparkly eyesore; Marais as Ardent is lacquered, moisturized, and glossed to the heavens. Considering that Jean Marais was and remains an icon of French male beauty, the effect is pearlescent and nauseating, “gilding the lily” incarnate. 

When she recoils from his touch, he asks, “What’s wrong, Belle? It’s almost as if you miss my ugliness.” 

She definitely does.