By Megan Bianco
Three filmmakers who made their mark in cinema history and pop culture by making movies on idealistic, wholesome values are Walt Disney, Frank Capra and John Hughes. Disney made it as a studio head and producer for his own Walt Disney Pictures, while Capra and Hughes were directors and screenwriters. They not only found success with families through films like Pinocchio (1940), It’s a Wonderful Life (1946) and Ferris Bueller’s Day Off (1986), but also reinterpreted the fairytale genre for the screen with their own touch. Disney’s instant classics Snow White & the Seven Dwarfs (1937), Cinderella (1950) and Sleeping Beauty (1959) were big influences on animated features, and showed how much you could do with hand-drawn characters and backgrounds. Compared to the already impressive live-action fantasy movies from other studios, animation could take the movie magic to a groundbreaking level. While Capra and Hughes used the traditional tropes for more contemporary, modest stories.
The romantic fairy tale is a theme that never really went out of fashion with the public, probably because it has everything you need for entertainment: magic, love, adventure, fantasy, princes and princesses, good vs. evil, etc. Much like musicals, fairy tales are a good way to escape real life for a couple of hours. When beginning his transition from short cartoons to literally creating the first hand-drawn animated movie in 1935, Disney wisely chose the most famous fairy tale in the western world: Snow White. The production team could focus on the animation knowing everyone would be familiar with the plot. Disney’s studio would make family films of all genres over the years, but the fairy tale would be its signature. Even the Disney Renaissance in the 1990s would begin with The Little Mermaid (1989), Beauty & the Beast (1991) and Aladdin (1992).
At the same time in the 1930s, Capra was creating his own whimsical dramedies like Broadway Bill (1934), It Happened One Night (1934) and You Can’t Take It with You (1938), all featuring modern princesses or princes in a way. Myrna Loy and Claudette Colbert play pretty heiresses in Bill and One Night, while Jimmy Stewart is the handsome son of a wealthy banker in With You. Jean Arthur’s character is even referred to as a “Cinderella” in her relationship with Stewart. The couples in Capra’s films are typically a privileged character getting together with a common citizen in an echo of fairy tale plots. Hughes, probably the closest successor to Capra after the studio system era ended, also was a fan of having similar pairings in the teen verse. Hot shot Michael Schoeffling and ordinary Molly Ringwald are paired in Sixteen Candles (1984), rich Andrew McCarthy and poor Ringwald in Pretty in Pink (1986), and in reverse, popular Ringwald with burnout Judd Nelson in The Breakfast Club (1985). Nelson even sarcastically calling Ringwald “the princess” in the latter film. Even in the Vacation films it appears that Clark’s side of the family lives more modestly than Ellen’s (though it does make you wonder how her cousin Catherine ended up with Eddie).
Over the decades, animated family movies have successfully stayed relevant, but romantic comedies, light-hearted family dramas and teen movies lost a lot of momentum with studios and audiences. It’s a shame, because I feel that lately, more than ever, traditional or modern fairy tales are great pick-me-up.
Megan Bianco is a Southern California-based movie reviewer and content writer with a degree from California State University Northridge.
