FROM "BEAUTY AND THE BEAST"
WARNING: THERE WILL BE SPOILERS!
Just a while ago I saw the live action remake of
"Beauty And The Beast" with my girlfriend, and I have to say that
after seeing the film, and re-watching the original for the 9th spot of my
list, it's actually better than I remember it, mainly for how bland and
pointless the remake was (but that's a review for a different time). Is it
perfect, no, but the flaws in my opinion aren't distracting enough to keep you
away from the emotional appeal of the film, which is
where the focus for a film like this should be. We all find ourselves
remembering and talking about the songs, the animation, the two romantic leads,
the supporting characters, and hands-down the hottest animated male Disney
villain.
Gaston is as perfect as a man can be by carrying a handsome
face that a Disney Prince would have, a tall and muscular body with hair on his
chest, and a loud booming voice (provided by Richard White) that drive all the
girls in town nuts, and make the men wish that they were as handsome as he is.
Looks aren't the only thing that draws people to attention him because he is a
skilled hunter, who never misses a shot and doesn't fear any man or beast for
how strong and tall he is, and how violent and slick of a fighter he is. This
is a man who loves to hunt and kill wildlife so much, that he has his own bar decorated
with the many animals he's killed, including a few exotic animals (like a Bald
Eagle for example). And as if showing off his muscles to attract the girls, and
hunting wild life to impress the villagers isn't enough to make him the biggest
man in town; he's also a talented juggler, a powerful singer, and is apparently
"good at expectorating" at a spiting contest. He is truly "the
toast" of his village where the villagers will always follow him and be at
his side, constantly praising him and go along with his plans no matter if they
seem ridiculous or cruel.
What I find so amusing about Gaston is the design and
concept of his character. As Belle's lover the Beast is monstrous looking and
acts like an animal who would be the design and characteristics of a Disney
villain, Gaston looks and behaves like the perfect Disney hero, or Prince if
you will, that saves the day and gets the girl in the end. He's the complete
opposite of the villains we usually get from Disney.
Pony
from "Darby O'Gill and The Little People"
And especially
Brom Bones
from "The Adventures Of Ichabod and Mr. Toad"
They're both strong and masculine egotistical jerks that
love to hang out in pubs with the guys, and have the goal of ridding a suitor
for the most attractive girl in town. But they do have their major differences, like Pony is good looking, but not everyone in his village respects
him the same way that people respect Brom and Gaston. And while Brom is full
of himself and a bully, he's not really as mean as Pony and Gaston are because
he seems to have a genuine love for Katrina compared to the others, and even
his rival Ichabod. But while Gaston's character is nothing that new for Disney,
it seems that Disney took both of the best traits from their lesser known antagonists,
mixed them together, added a few new things to still make their new villain
feel new and fresh, and you have Gaston who tops them all!
Just like Brom and Pony, Gaston carries all those nasty traits
that make him become a good looking egoistical jerk. He's the kind of guy who
loves his looks and muscles so much that he'll look at whatever mirror, or
object that can cast a reflection nearby to pose and praise himself for his own
beauty. As well as loving to show-off for what an attractive muscular hunk he
is. And being so confident that he can get any woman because of his good looks
and nothing more, he chooses Belle for a bride, not because they both share
common interests, or because of her intelligence, or even so much as being
different from the other women in the town in terms of personality. Far from
any of those. He only wants her because she's the most beautiful girl in town
which "makes her the best" and feels like that he “deserves the best”,
that's it. He's arguably the most sexist Disney villain out there for
how much he thinks less of women. The moment when he greets Belle after
surprising her with a show-offy stunt, he rudely takes away her book as she is
reading it, complains how there are no pictures in it (well aside from one page
that we saw earlier), tosses it in the mud, and blocks Belle from retrieving it
as he tells her to stop reading books and to pay attention to him, who he
thinks himself to be more important than books. And he doesn't stop there! He
goes far as to tell her that women shouldn't read because it'll educate them
and give them ideas! And the irony of it is when Belle calls him primeval, he
laughs and thanks her having no clue what she means, probably because he's
never read or at least never finished a book himself.
Despite Belle being a bit hard to get at first when she
dismisses him, he is so confident to "woo and marry” her with his good
looks that he gets the villagers to set-up and participate at a surprise
wedding that he has prepared for Belle before he even proposes. When he does,
despite dressing up in fancier clothing this time (similar to Brom's clothes
during the dance scene at the Halloween party), he still doesn't succeed in
stealing Belle's heart away since his behavior still comes across as rude and self-observed.
Instead of throwing Belle's favorite book in the mud, he carelessly lays his
muddy boots on top of it, and takes them off with his feet stinking up the house, as he
claims to know what Belle's dreams are, when in reality they're actually his.
And every time Belle tries to walk away, Gaston always corners her showing no
respect for her personal space. Sometimes I swear from the way he walks closer
and closer to her, it almost seems as if he wants to do more than just kiss and
propose to her. That moment when he slowly walks up to Belle with a wicked and
hostile looking smile as he knocks the chair out of his way, almost looks like
that he wants to rape her. And the first image in my opinion where he goes past
the lines of being a handsome ass.
But the first time when Gaston truly reveals his true colors
is when Belle opens the front door that he's leaning against to throw him out
into the mud pond by her house. At first the scene starts out funny. We have
Gaston's little friend LeFou strike up the band when there's no sign of Gaston
or Belle coming out the door; we see Gaston's body lying in the mud; Belle
quickly tosses his stinky boots out; and when LeFou notices where Gaston is, he
stops conducting and sees a pig's head pop out of the mud (as if a pig is
wearing Gaston's clothes) to suddenly revealing that the pig is laying on top
of Gaston's head. But the laughs don't last long when Gaston chokes LeFou and
angrily promises that he will have Belle for a wife, and violently throws him
in the mud. We are followed by a nice little comical moment of LeFou talking to
the pig, but before you can really laugh, we cut to Gaston walking away angry
as he's covered and dripping with mud that ruins his good looks, where the
music sounds ominous as we wonder what drastic lengths he'll go to marry Belle.
Now where did the mud pond come from since we never saw it before or after the
scene? Why is the door suddenly closed since Belle nor did Gaston closed it
after he walked in? And how did he fall into the pond since the front door
faces the side of the porch? Who really cares? I personally don't despite its
continuity errors. Why? Because this scene beautifully captures Gaston
descending into madness that has the right balance of comedy and intimidation.
Before I go into Gaston's next attempt of marrying Belle,
I'm going to take this time to talk a little about Gaston's sidekick LeFou,
since I mentioned a little about him in the scene when Gaston first loses his
cool. Lefou is more than a friend and assistant to Gaston, he's also his little
cheerleader who praises all of his talents and looks whenever he feels down and
out, or is seeking for attention when no one else is around to appreciate it or
acknowledge it. Even as going as far as to starting and leading a musical
number dedicated to him. But as much as he praises him and stays by his side,
he constantly has to suffer his abuse, which is some of the funniest slapstick
between a villain and his goofy assistant that's up there with Captain Hook and
Smee, and Br'er Fox and Br'er Bear. My favorite bits regarding Lefou's abuse is
when Gaston punches him in the head for making fun of Belle's Father just after
laughing at the joke until Belle speaks against it. The whole surprise wedding
scene. Gaston constantly punching him out during the song named after him. And
when he's making a deal at his Tavern. However, despite LeFou getting most of
the abuse, Gaston does occasionally get his good looks ruined because of his
foolish mishaps that can all be seen in the song "Gaston", such as
pinching his cheeks and spilling beer on his face. Though the slapstick with
LeFou is hilarious, what adds plenty to it is his design, and voice work from
Jesse Corti. Out of all the characters in the movie, Lefou's comes across as the
most cartoony with his small size, wide eyes, pig nose, broken buck teeth,
goofy voice, and eccentric personality, as he has a name that literally sounds
like "thee fool". So when you see this goofball get pounded by
Gaston, while looking painful and brutal, his reactions and wild personality
make these harsh moments fun enough to give you many laughs.
After hearing a motivational song about himself from Lefou,
and sees Belle's eccentric Father Maurice barging into his Tavern begging for
help to rescue Belle from the Beast, which of course nobody believes; Gaston
smiles (in a not so charming way) as the wheels in his head begin to turn,
where he comes up with a plan to enforce Belle to marry him. With most villains who
are after women that don't want to marry them, they would either threaten the girl with
their finances by being in danger of being thrown into the street if they don't
marry, or blackmail or frame the women's true lover. And despite that Gaston
does use the second option, it's actually grimmer than you think it is. Later
on in the Tavern, Gaston has a meeting with the owner of the insane asylum
Monsieur D'Arque to bribe him to go along with his plan of throwing Belle's
Father in the insane asylum for his crazed personality, and his story about the
Beast, unless Belle marries him. Gaston's attempt to imprison the old man is a
million times worse than the Beast having him rot in the tower. It's not
totally clear if we're in the 18th or the 19th Century, but regardless of what exact
period the film takes place in, we're still at a time when people did absolute horrible and
unspeakable things to mental patients that this eccentric and innocent old man
is going to suffer if Belle turns Gaston down, which Gaston doesn't show any
care about what happens to Maurice if Belle really does refuse his proposal.
Either way, Gaston seems to be getting joy out of it as he watches Maurice
being taken away after Belle turns him down. And I'm sure that if Belle didn't
use the magic mirror to expose the Beast, Gaston would've found another way to
lure Belle to him (probably the one regarding her fiances), or encouraged D'Arque
to give the old man the worst kind of treatment possible to the point where
Belle can't stand her Father to take this senseless abuse anymore.
And speaking of Monsieur D'Arque, he's another huge part of
the reason why Maurice's supposed trip to the asylum feels so messed-up.
D'Arque is a very shady fellow. From the moment we see him as he collects the
gold that Gaston bribes him with, already you feel uncomfortable by his
presence, for how creepy and zombie-like his design is, how greedy he is when
looks at the gold and picks one up and rubs it against his face, and how eerie
and sinister voice his sounds. And for those of you who seen the film but don't
recognize the voice, or feel like that you've heard it before but don't know
where, he is voiced by Tony Jay where his voice work for this character led him
to voice the villain in Disney's "Hunchback Of Notre Dame" Frollo.
And to make the casting of Tony Jay even more impressing, all the dialogue you
hear was recorded during his audition, as he gave two readings, where the
filmmakers decided to use his "Masterpiece Theater voice" out of the
two.
So at first when we see him, he just comes across as a
sketchy greedy old man. But when he clarifies what Gaston wants from him, thinking that his plan is despicable with a face of shame, especially when
knowing that Maurice is harmless, he suddenly bursts out laughing clenching the
gold coin in his hand exclaiming that he "loves" the idea for how
twisted it is. And later on in the film when we see D'Arque approach Belle's
house telling her that he's going to take Maurice to the asylum, but will take
"good of care of him", he smiles just as wickedly as he did before,
when he reveals to Belle his carriage to take Maurice away and the angry lynch
mob that Gaston successfully persuaded to go along with his plan. These two
little moments expose D'Arque to be a sadistic madman for how much he smiles
and laughs at the misfortunes of others, where he more than likely enjoys
watching his patients suffer, not caring if they're insane or not, which would
make him the craziest man in the whole asylum despite that he runs the place.
So with that in mind, think about the pain that Maurice will suffer if he gets
thrown-in only ten times worse since the guy running the place is no different
than the average madman inside the place. We never see the asylum, or see
D'Arque attend to his patients, but we can imagine how cruel and dark the place
is based on what we know of the asylums in that the era, and the actions and
presence of the man who runs it.
Once Belle proves that her Father is sane with the magic
mirror, Gaston looks at the image in disbelief that the old man was telling the
truth, and that his plan has failed. But when Belle tries to tell the
villagers that the Beast "is kind and gentle" with such deep feelings
for him, Gaston suspects that she has feelings for the monster, which causes
Belle to angrily call him the real one. When Gaston hears it, he realizes that
the time that Belle has spent away from the village was with the Beast which
she has developed a close connection to, thus causes him to snap, and use the
Beast's hideous looks to make the villagers believe that he's a savage creature
that will eat their children and terrorize their village, and must be stopped.
And what's amusing about Gaston's use of propaganda towards the Beast is while
he's pretending to act like the fearless hero to the villagers, this is the
point of the film where he himself is acting like the true monster that he is
by singing and expressing his anger and hatered toward the creature while
expressing joy of scaring the villagers, as the Beast himself in the mirror
looks sad and innocent. Plus instead of riding a horse that looks as pretty and
gorgeous as he is, it's the complete opposite. The horse looks like
something that the headless horseman would ride, for how vicious the animal
acts with his red eyes, and dark fur, as Gaston rides the horse leading
the villagers to the castle holding the magic mirror wearing a black cape, telling them that they will come back with the Beast's head. And the
interesting part about the horse is, we never see it, until this point in the
movie. As for the song itself, it's personally my favorite song in the movie
that has an energizing beat that makes the stakes of the Beast’s life feel
high, is powerfully sung by White and a choir of angry villagers, and is heavy
with atmosphere.
I also love the fight with the villagers and the enchanted
objects that follows right after the song, that's comical and colorful, but in
many ways violent, scary, and even disturbing at times. I mean we have a candle
stick nearly melting to death by a hot burning torch held by Lefou (the only
scene when he ever looks intimidating); a duster either violently being torn apart,
or raped; a kitchen full of knives and a maniacal laughing stove surrounded by
flames; and for me the most disturbing and questionable thing of all in this
battle, the baker getting eaten by a chest. Holy cow, did the baker just die?
If so, then is that chest actually a person cursed by the spell, or a pet, or
just an object that came to life? Cause if that's a person then that would be considered cannibalism. In many respects some of the other abuse that the villagers suffer not only looks
painful, but seems like that they are being killed as well, especially the guy who gets
crushed by the wardrobe. And if you look at some of the backgrounds, you'll not
only see villagers who are either knocked-out, or lying on the floor dead, but
you'll see some broken furniture lying about, indicating that some of the
servants died in the fight. It's a
pretty messed-up and gruesome fight when really you think about it, despite
coming across as comical and slap-sticky.
Though the villagers are driven out of the Castle after the
battle, Gaston is the only outsider to remain inside since he ran out of the
battle to search for the Beast as soon as it began, that eventually leads to
the climatic showdown between Gaston and the Beast as the two fight on the roof
of the Castle in a tense battle. When the fight begins, the Beast is so
heartbroken and hopeless after Belle’s departure, that he decides to die since
he will remain a Beast forever due to the shortage amount of time for the curse
to be broken, which gives Gaston the opportunity to do whatever he likes to
him. And he definitely shows no mercy when he attacks the Beast. He fires an
arrow at him, knocks him out the window, kicks him around, and uses a statue as
a makeshift club to bash his brains out. And as he's abusing the Beast, he's
constantly laughing with absolute delight of seeing the Beast in pain, and
insulting the down and out creature. But when the Beast sees Belle, realizing
that she does care, he fights back, that shocks Gaston, but doesn't prevent him
from trying to finish his task. All throughout the fight, his thirst for the
Beast's blood, and lust for Belle's attractive looks, never lets up, he just
becomes more and more angry and violent to rid the creature to take Belle for
his own. And the more determined he is to get what he wants, the more he loses
his attractive looks and charm, revealing the true beast within him, which is
what makes him an upgrade compared to the two other antagonists that I
mentioned earlier, because when they get angry, they still look good, when with
Gaston on the other hand, he loses all of that completely. But while acting as
savage and heartless as his foe earlier was in the film, when the Beast
threatens to drop Gaston down the cliff, Gaston loses all of dignity and pleas for
his life to be spared like a little frighten child, which is a side of Gaston
that we never saw until this point in the film. The Beast lets him go realizing
that he's not as cold and evil as Gaston is, but instead of Gaston running off,
he literally stabs the Beast in the back which slowly kills him just as the
Beast and Belle have a nice little romantic moment together.
But Gaston's joy for his victory doesn't last, when he loses
balance and falls off the cliff leading to his doom, while screaming wildly
that doesn't come close to his deep and booming speaking voice (even when being
threatened by death). The interesting thing about Gaston's demise is if you
freeze frame the image of his face when he falls, you'll see two tiny skulls in
his eyes indicating that he is going to die since fans of the film were unsure
if Gaston died or somehow survived the fall. But let's be honest people, judging by the height and the
way the scene of him falling is played out, as well as containing the knowledge
of other Disney villains dying by the forces of gravity, it is more than clear that
Gaston truly did die with or without knowing that there are skulls in his eyes.
Though I will admit that learning about the skulls in his eyes was a complete surprise for me, because
when I freeze-framed the scene on my VHS when I was a kid to see his reaction
as he falls, there wasn't any skulls in his eyes, that is until later releases of the
film because of (once again) fans being so unsure about his fate, that's a pointless change, but still a cool addition to the film. At
least better than the new song sequence "Human Again" that we now
have to deal with when watching this film. And by the way, when I placed Scar
from "The Lion King" on the list and talked about that his death was
originally what Gaston was going to suffer, incase if you're wondering how exactly
that scene was going to play out, well after Gaston falls, he survives the fall
but breaks his legs and gets eaten by the wolves that surround him. Gaston was also originally
going to commit suicide after stabbing the Beast in the leg and side since he
knew Belle would never love him at this point, and madly laughs as he falls,
which was considered too dark for Disney, and in my opinion stupid. I know
Gaston was mad and everything, and that if he can't have her the Beast can't,
but deciding to kill himself afterwards all because of a girl, when he can get
almost any other girl in the world is pretty ludicrous, which makes me glad
that the film stuck with the ending that they went with, and saved one of
Gaston's demise for another film.
"It's over Beast! BELLE IS MINE!"
-Gaston
Gaston may not be the first good looking jerk to become villainous by Disney, but he's still the best one! His transition from an egoistical ass, to a blood-hungry monster feels organic, along with seeing his
handsome looks slowly fade away. The lengths he goes to to get what he wants
are despicable. Bright's performance, singing, and masculine voice give the
character a lot of personality. And the abuse that gives to his sidekick is a
riot. Gaston may be perfect on the outside, but on the inside he is the film's true
Beast.
"It's over Beast! BELLE IS MINE!"
-Gaston
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