AWEJ for Translation & Literary Studies, Volume 5, Number 1. February 2021 Pp.126-143
DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.24093/awejtls/vol5no1.9
Roses in Amber: Gendered Discourse in Disney’s 2017 Adaptation of Villeneuve’s Fairytale
Beauty and the Beast
Atoof Abdullah Rashed
Department of European Languages & Literature, Collage of Arts & Humanities,
King Abdulaziz University, Jeddah, Saudi Arabia
Laila. M. Al-Sharqi
Department of European Languages & Literature, Collage of Arts & Humanities
King Abdulaziz University, Jeddah, Saudi Arabia
Corresponding Author: laila.alsharqi@gmail.com
Received: 10/28/2020 Accepted: 1/11/2021 Published: 2/24/2021
Abstract:
This study considers the dialogic relationship between the 2017 Disney live-action film Beauty and the Beast with Gabrielle-Suzanne de Villeneuve’s fairy tale and Disney’s 1991 animated version. Drawing on cultural and feminist discourse, the study seeks to examine Disney’s live-action film for incidents of cultural appropriation of gender representation compared to Villeneuve’s fairy tale and Disney’s 1991 animated version. The Study argues that the 2017 film adaptation reverses the traditional patriarchal notions and embraces a transgressive feminist discourse/approach as part of Disney’s strategy of diversity and inclusion of gender, race, class, and sexual orientation as constantly evolving cultural categories. This study finds significant alterations made to the physical and psychological attributes of the 2017 film’s three characters: Beauty/Belle, the Beast, and the Enchantress, changes that align with the film’s gendered discourse. By reversing the characteristic privileging of the male and the empowerment of the female, the live-action succeeds in addressing the contemporary audience demands of diversity and inclusion. The study concludes that the changes made in the 2017 film adaptation displace the oppressive patriarchal notions and stereotypical modes of representing the male and female as they have been perceived in the original fairy tale, for they are no longer compatible with contemporary cultures’ assumptions on gender.
Keywords: adaptation, Beauty and the Beast, cultural studies, de Villeneuve, Disney, gendered discourse
Cite as: Rashed, A. A., & Al-Sharqi, l. M. (2021). Roses in Amber: Gendered Discourse in Disney’s 2017 Adaptation of Villeneuve’s Fairytale Beauty and the Beast. Arab World English Journal for Translation & Literary Studies 5 (1) 126-143.
DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.24093/awejtls/vol5no1.9
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