Customer Reviews

Disney's Beauty and the Beast - Belle's Magical World (Special Edition) [VHS]

5 star:		(14)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(6)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(15)

 

 

I find it interesting that many of the reactions to this collection of shorts are extremely hostile. The shorts are not that bad, but neither are they that good. This DVD is much like three Saturday morning cartoons that are in one collection. My only complaint is that the price of the DVD is quite high for the value received, which may have been the reason some reviewers were upset.

The title of the first story is "The Perfect Word." In this story the Beast and Belle disagree and there is a copious amount of rudeness and insensitivity all around. The story heaps on the need for each of the characters to forgive each other, which I found distracting. The story made the point early and was relentless in setting up the need for people to apologize and forgive.

The second story is "Fifi's Folly." This time Fifi, Lumiere's girlfriend, is upset with Lumiere because she thinks that Belle is trying to steal Lumiere away. Fifi acts meanly and tries to sabotage the evening that she thinks Belle and Lumiere are going to have. Of course, the evening is for Fifi and Lumiere and the plan predictably backfires. Once again the story was heavy-handed because the point was made early in the short, but the point was continually ground in until the final moments of the short.

The final story is "Broken Wing," which I found charming in some ways. Belle rescues a small bird with a broken wing. The Beast first wants to throw the bird out and then he wants to cage the bird. I was annoyed that the Beast's behavior was so awful. I thought that some younger children might find the beast to be terrifying in some places, particularly as the Beast seemed prepared to hurt the bird. However, the bird was nicely animated and Belle tried her best to get the Beast to be kind. This story has a nice ending if you can reach it through the Beast's heavy-handed and over-the-top behavior.

In addition to the three shorts are a variety of other features on this DVD. While some of the features are interesting, the value of this DVD should be the "feature," which is not a feature because the three stories are independent stories. The voices of Robby Benson, Paige O'Hara, Jerry Orbach, David Ogden Stiers and others are unable to make this DVD a must have. The stories are too forced and try too hard to capitalize on the success of the original "Beauty and the Beast" movie. I recommend this movie only to those who must have all the "Beauty and the Beast" movies, or all Disney movies. Everyone else should move on to better Disney movies.

Arriving in today's post Disney's Beauty and the Beast: Belle's Magical World SE on DVD was a surprise as I had forgotten I had ordered it. The cover is very nice and you can imagine how delighted I was (as a 24 year old male) to have a Belle compact mirror attached to it to add to the excitement.
The DVD loads up showing trailers for Finding Nemo, Stanley March 11th, Lion King SE, Sleeping Beauty SE (with no more news on a release date) as well as the Disney Princess toys/clothing trailer.

The nicely animated view of the castle acts at the animated dvd menu. The animation here features swallows oddly flying through falling snow?! Whatever, it's pretty and marked with SFX as well as a subtle underscoring musical narrative from the feature.
Bonus features include Belle's Delightful Dinner Game which actually transpires to a three screen static hide and seek game. Once completed a series of 8 questions to light eight candles results in footage from the feature of Belle and Beast eating dinner.
Disney's Song Collection is less of a collection as two unmemorable songs which can be played with onscreen lyrics. Yawn.
The truly spectacular thing here is the Enchanted Environment - it's an animated change of season taken from the very beginning of the original Beauty and the Beast - the bit with the parting trees and the waterfall. Birds fly, trees blow, snow falls, icicles form, dappled light penetrates through the forest and mists come and go. The music has a very relaxing non-synth sound and you can toggle between five soundtracks or just the SFX. It is probably the best feature of the disc. I love it.
As for the feature I am actually quite disgusted. The dust grains on the feature are too often and too bad for a DVD SPECIAL EDITION!!! I bought Fritz Lang's Metropolis made in 1927 which has a cleaner presentation. The additional CGI linking each tale really does no favours and merely highlights the varied quality - Belle looks disfigured sometimes due to a lack of continuity in her animation. 22 minutes are added and these are pretty good - again making the rest look inferior.
Sneak peeks allow you to view the aforementioned trailers as well as those for the future Kiki's Delivery Service, Stitch! The Movie and Tuck Everlasting. Nothing we haven't seen before.
Instructions: Angle the the free Belle mirror to catch the reflection of the DVD - to fool yourself into thinking this feature is twice what it it is - and then you'll feel you haven't wasted your money!

I just read some of the reviews for this movie. I must disagree. This is a wonderful movie. It is wrong to be expectant of same or better results from the first movie. This isn't a part III. It's the third movie, but all on it's own. It is targeted for General Audiences of all ages, but mostly aimed towards children. It has a few "short stories". In my opinion, I think it is teaching things to it's young viewers, as well as older audiences of things we may overlook in everyday life. I really think it is worth every penny. I do recommend this movie very much. Please take a chance on it. There are so many new characters, which is a nice touch to it. Take care.

I was very disappointed. The quality was definitely not what I expected from a Disney animation. There was no real storyline. The animation was pitiful. They didn't even have the entire original voice cast for the characters. I was so disgusted I was ready to turn it off within the first few minutes. It was very excruciating to sit through the entire film. There must have been a very low budget for this film and it shows!

The quality of the animation is nowhere near as high as the original Beauty and the Beast. None of the characters look the same. The story lines are uninteresting. I would have been embarrassed to release this DVD if I worked for Disney! It hurts my eyes to watch the poor quality of this movie. Why couldn't they have made something new that was of the same caliber as the original Beauty and the Beast? They certainly have the resources to have done a better job! I am very disgusted!

The animation is grainy, the stories trite, and even my two and a half year old daughter, who loves all things Belle and watches the original over and over, could not stand it.

My kids don't watch this every day, because they love to watch all three parts. But they enjoy it, the animation in beautiful and the story lines have a lesson. I don't think you can go wrong with this one. I even love to watch them with my children.

This DVD was a huge dissapointment! The animation was poor and there was almost no plot. As a huge Beauty and the Beast fan I was really let down.Consider yourself warned!

Many other reviewers have mentioned the lack of consistency between the segments of this "feature" movie. The reason is that "Belle's Magical World" is not really a feature. It is my understanding that three episodes were made for a possible Beauty and the Beast TV series. When it was decided not to go ahead with the idea, rather than bury the animation in the vaults forever, interstitial segments were made to try and cobble the whole thing together for a Direct-to-Video release. And it shows. Considering its origins, the effort is better than might have been expected. The same process was used for Cinderella II, which in my opinion is far worse.

Wow, this was such a disappointment. For this to be a spinoff of an award-winning movie is just sad. The plot was unimaginative and trite, and the animation was comparable to an "okay" TV cartoon series. We wasted a free rental coupon from Blockbuster on this, and we felt very "ripped off." So definitely don't waste your time buying it.