Review #660: Sleeping Beauty.
Cast
Mary Costa (Princess Aurora / Sleeping Beauty), Eleanor Audley (Maleficent), Verna Felton (Flora - The Red Fairy and Queen Leah), Barbara Jo Allen (Fauna - The Green Fairy), Barbara Luddy (Merryweather - The Blue Fairy), Bill Shirley (Prince Phillip), Taylor Holmes (King Stefan), Bill Thompson (King Hubert), and Marvin Miller (The Narrator) Directed by Clyde Geronimi (#178 - Peter Pan, #373 - Cinderella, and #573 - The Three Caballeros), Les Clark, Eric Larson, and Wolfgang Reitherman (#250 - The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh and #598 - The Rescuers)
Review
Sleeping Beauty was given such a middling reaction (and little profit) that it was the last fairy tale Disney film made for 30 years. But now the movie has a legacy and is now called a classic (being re-released a few times does help), so time does change. The movie is astonishing to say the least. The movie looks beautiful to watch, the way that it is animated and how the backgrounds look so colorful and detailed. I like how the three fairies are colored, it's not just a simple red-green-blue schemes, the way that it is colored makes the difference. The cast is pretty decent, with Audley standing out, mostly because of the character she plays. Sleeping Beauty herself is alright, but her screentime is limited, focusing more on the villain/fairies. Speaking of which, Maleficent is awesome. Her design and her voice are so delightful to watch, she manages to be more interesting than Sleeping Beauty herself, which is probably why they made a movie about it...55 years later (not exactly late for Walt Disney Studios), but at least the movie is still fun to watch. The songs are alright, and the movie flows quickly enough at 75 minutes to never really drag on, it's easily watchable and easily enjoyable for anyone, with a cool villain to headline it all.
Overall, I give it 8 out of 10 stars.
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