With a wave of a magic wand, we move on to the next film, entering a new decade of Disney magic. Cinderella has always been one of the most magical films for me partly because of this trailer. For this project, I’m focusing on the story itself, including dialogue, character development, any subplots, how a story presents itself, the speed at which it moves, if it slows down unnecessarily, etc.
Update: In February 2022, I started a video version of the DFP on Tiktok. You can find the video below. Thoughts expressed in the video may be different than what are expressed in the blog post, due to the time difference in posting.
A Brief Summary
One of the most famous fairy tales comes to life in this next Disney picture. Cinderella has spent her life a servant to her wicked Stepmother and Stepsisters. On the night of the Royal Ball, Cinderella is left at home in rags when who should arrive but her Fairy Godmother. With her Fairy Godmother’s help, Cinderella is able to attend the ball, catching the eye, and the love, of the prince. But time stops for no one and at midnight, Cinderella turns back into a servant, leaving only a shoe behind. Includes a mean old cat, lots of mice and a pretty special pumpkin.
What works
- The first “Princess” film since Snow White back in 1937, this film follows that pattern with its own lavish storybook. But while Snow White’s film opened with words on the page, Cinderella gets a voice-over that, I believe, provides a deeper introduction to Cinderella and her world.
- Not only is this the first princess film, but it is the first single-story full-length animated feature film since Bambi, 8 years earlier!
- I don’t know if it was just because I was paying closer attention because of this project, but Cinderella is not the perfect princess I thought her to be and I mean that in the best way possible. She has this fantastic stubborn streak. She is smart and kind, but she also gets frustrated (like when the castle clock rings and she shakes her fist at it for ‘ordering her around’) and even upset (like when Lucifer messed up her clean floors). And with all that, she does not idle around and let things happen to her. She keeps herself in control. She is deserving of her movie ending because she actually has worked to make it happen. The only time when she can’t do something is when she is locked in the tower and when her animal friends help her with the dress. And with the dress, she was helpless in that she couldn’t just not do her chores and she couldn’t just not do the extra tasks that her stepsisters and her stepmother kept piling on. After realizing she wouldn’t be attending because she hadn’t finished the dress, she acknowledged and accepted her fate, showing more grace than any of her step-family ever had. She is a much stronger person than I had originally given her credit for.
- While the film is about Cinderella with her being the title character, and the majority of the film is about her, there are still a good amount of scenes where she is not present, that focus on the other characters. There are the scenes with the stepfamily, there’re the scenes with the mice and birds (with a whole song to boot), there’re the scenes with King and the Grand Duke, the ball before she arrived, and then finally the whole scene of trying on the slipper while she’s trapped up in the tower. There are all these other scenes where she is not present, where she can’t carry the scene and they carry it. They carry those scenes. And it’s great because these are action scenes. Stuff is happening and because these are action scenes, the characters aren’t just sitting around waiting for the next moment that Cinderella appears. We get to meet and know and understand these characters further, better.
- SUB-PLOTS
- Take the King and the Grand Duke, for starters. The motivation for the King is that he wants grandchildren and his son will not play ball. His son won’t play ball, so the King throws him a ball, literally. Then he’s insistent, threatening the Grand Duke’s life to make sure that his son finds a bride that night at the ball. And then he threatens the Grand Duke again to motivate him to make sure to find the girl who fits the glass slipper. Which, I swear, is like a size 4 or a size 5 shoe. I think it’s a size 5 shoe. Side note: Just about all of the main movie action takes place in 2 days. 2 days. Man, I can’t remember the last time I had 2 days that were that jam-packed with stuff.
- Then there are the mice. There’s Gus, who is just adorable. He’s brand new, which I liked. It was so helpful to have him included because it provided some hero moments for Jaq (and Cinderella) who had to save Gus from Lucifer. It also said something about the other mice, like the fact that they know this, they know this routine and the love and trust that they have in Cinderella, enough to make her a freakin’ dress. So I guess, I would say their motivation is in living, avoiding Lucifer and helping Cinderella, such as making her dress. Especially for Jaq and Gus, who are the main mice and are behind getting the key that helped Cinderella escape from the tower.
- Finally, there’s the stepfamily, where it says at the beginning of the movie after the husband died, and after Lady Tremaine’s true evilness came forward, her goal is to promote her “awkward” daughters. Bless their little hearts. That is her motivation. To humiliate and degrade Cinderella and to promote the interests of her daughters and to potentially get them married to the Prince, though that obviously doesn’t happen.
- SUB-PLOTS
Honorable Mentions
- I never noticed it before, or really just didn’t pay attention, but only the female mice and birds stay while Cinderella gets ready for the day. It’s the little details that add to the story and the film.
- When Cinderella couldn’t come up with a single good quality about Lucifer. It was worth seeing Lucifer’s face and just made me love Cinderella more.
- The yawn and stare the prince gives his father during the ball, pre-Cinderella. Between that and the eye roll he gives when Drizella and Anastasia arrive in front of him, he clearly, visually, does not want to be there. I love that we get a subtle glimpse of his personality, to see more of the Prince himself than we got during Snow White.
- If I were to choose between the Evil Queen and Lady Tremaine for ‘Most Evil Family Relation’, I’d go with Lady Tremaine hands down. She causes the glass slipper to break and the Grand Duke starts panicking that he’ll lose his head for it. What does she do? She smirks, having caused Cinderella not to try on the slipper (as far as she knows). She doesn’t even care that she just potentially ruined the lives of the Grand Duke and the footman.
Side Questions
- Does Lucifer like anyone? He messes with Cinderella, annoys Bruno and gets annoyed with Lady Tremaine when she insists he gets a bath.
- Why did the glass slippers last longer than midnight? Shouldn’t they have turned back into her old shoes?
- Why is the king’s bed so big? It’s not even king size, it’s bigger than king size.
What I learned from watching this film
- One of the main things, if not THE main thing, that I learned from watching Cinderella, was the importance of practice in improving stories. Cinderella is one of the most sophisticated films to date (in the project) and definitely shows that they have improved their craft, that they have improved how they tell stories.
- It is a more immersive film than Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. That is not me saying anything against Snow White. Snow White was the first, the original princess, and more often than not, the first will not be as good as what comes after. Watching the film, I realized that Cinderella is such a strong character, more well-rounded and more three-dimensional than Snow White was. I think that has more to do with the fact that Snow White was the first and the Disney Studios had time to practice and developed better skills by the time Cinderella came around. If the films had been flipped with Cinderella being the first princess, I think Snow White might have had similar improvements and would have become a more popular princess.
If you’ve seen Cinderella, what did you think? Share your thoughts in the comments below!
Rewind to the beginning of the Disney Film Project
Skip back to the previous film with The Adventures of Ichabod and Mr. Toad
Fast Forward to the next film with Treasure Island
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