Sleeping Beauty (1959)

A snubbed malevolent fairy casts a curse on a princess that only a prince can break, with the help of three good fairies.

Director:

Clyde Geronimi

Writers:

Erdman Penner (story), Charles Perrault (story),

Stars:

Mary Costa, Bill Shirley, Eleanor Audley

Nominated for 1 Oscar. Another 1 win & 3 nominations.

Cast

Complete credited cast:
Mary Costa	...	Princess Aurora (voice)
Bill Shirley	...	Prince Phillip (voice)
Eleanor Audley	...	Maleficent (voice)
Verna Felton	...	Flora / Leah (voice)
Barbara Luddy	...	Merryweather (voice)
Barbara Jo Allen	...	Fauna (voice)
Taylor Holmes	...	Stefan (voice)
Bill Thompson	...	Hubert (voice)

Storyline

Adaptation of the fairy tale of the same name. Princess Aurora is cursed by the evil witch Maleficent - who declares that before Aurora reaches her 16th birthday she will die by pricking her finger on the spindle of a spinning-wheel. To try to prevent this, the king places her into hiding, in the care of three good-natured - but not too bright - fairies.

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Plot Keywords:

fairy | prince | princess | king | 16th birthday | 

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Taglines:

Now the magic moment! Full-length feature fantasy - Beautiful beyond belief

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Genres:

Animation | Family | Fantasy | Musical | Romance

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Certificate:

Approved

Details

Official Sites:

Disney - DVD and Blu-ray Disc Platinum Edition

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Release Date:

6 February 1959 (Brazil)

Also Known As:

La bella durmiente

Box Office

Budget:

$6,000,000 (estimated)

Gross:

$51,600,000 (USA)

Company Credits

Production Co:

Walt Disney Productions

Technical Specs

Runtime:

75 min

Sound Mix:

Stereo (original release)

Color:

Color (Technicolor)

Aspect Ratio:

2.55 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

One of the film's iconic scenes - when Briar Rose meets Prince Phillip for the first time to the tune of "Once Upon a Dream" - was called Sequence 8 when it was being produced. It was a particularly hard sequence to get right (Walt Disney rejected it several times) and ultimately had to be done 4 times, almost bankrupting the studio in the process.

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Goofs

During his revelation of the living palace he has had built for Aurora and Phillip, King Hubert places a bottle of wine at the end of the buffet table behind an elevated bowl of food, but when he and King Stefan proceed to the center to share a laugh, they separate to reveal that the bottle has disappeared from the end of the table to the center.

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Quotes

[first lines]
Narrator: In a faraway land, long ago, there lived a King and his fair Queen. Many years they had longed for a child, and finally their wish was granted. A daughter was born, and they called her Aurora. Yes, they named her after the dawn, for she filled their lives with sunshine. Then a great holiday was proclaimed throughout the land, so that all of high or low estate could pay homage to the infant Princess. And our story begins on that most joyful day...

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Crazy Credits

The opening credits say Technirama, but not Super Technirama 70, which is the process it was filmed in.

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Connections

Featured in Brows Held High: Sleeping Beauty (2012)

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Soundtracks

"I Wonder"
(1958) (uncredited)
Music by George Bruns
Lyrics by Winston Hibler and Ted Sears
Performed by Mary Costa

User Reviews

One of the finest films of the 1950's

In its scale, beauty, and dramatic power, Sleeping Beauty stands as (I think at least) the pinnacle of Disney's animated features. While in terms of cultural significance, it holds a second tiara to Snow White and Fantasia, it is set apart by its richly detailed, groundbreaking expressionistic design. The Disney animators had decidedly moved away from the European storybook feel of its 30's and 40's triumphs with Alice in Wonderland (1951) and Lady and the Tramp (1955), yet it was Sleeping Beauty that was the most radical departure. With its $6 million budget, the film has an epic sweep and scope never before achieved in animation. From the crowds of celebrators in the beginning to the tremendous size of King Richard's throne room, it achieves a tremendous feel of space and depth pioneered by the multi-plane work in Snow White and Fantasia. The film shows many other applications of the lessoned learned from the great experiment of Fantasia, particularly the remarkable scene of the three fairies bestowing their gifts on the infant princess. The camera pans up and off into dreamy, surreal vignettes slightly reminiscent of Fantasia's "Toccata in Fugue" segment. Its one of animation's finest moments. Yet what surely is the most memorable element of this film in the eyes of many viewers is its villain, the Marc Davis creation, Maleficent. Voiced by longtime Disney staple Eleanor Audley, she is easily Disney's most overtly evil villain. Davis' brilliant streamlined design exudes of an infernal elegance (complete with demonic horns). She carries a royal nobility that only adds to her ambiguous, sinister nature as well as to her dramatic presence. She slanders and cackles and proclaims her evil decrees with such bile and disgust it's almost overwhelming. In the final conflict between Prince Phillip, she cries out in utter fury, "Now shall you deal with me, o prince, and all the powers of hell!" Lightning cracks, smoke gathers and Maleficent rises, now changed into a fire-breathing dragon. It is one of Disney's most daring moments and very well one of its finest. Sleeping Beauty is a masterpiece, a tremendous artistic triumph from one of Hollywood's most successful and prolific studios. Its artistry, dramatic power, and compelling performances stand it along side the great American films of the decade, which is a fact not stated often enough.