Cinderella is the first feature-length motion picture that Disney produced since Bambi that wasn’t a package film. It tells the story of a gorgeous pin-up model who talks to animals and is resigned to doing menial chores around the house at the behest of her vain step-mother and -sisters since the passing of her dad. When the local royal family puts out an invitation for all the women in the country to attend a lavish ball in an effort to marry its lone prince off, Cinderella is prevented from attending. Then something about a fairy godmother and glass slippers and stroke of midnight and pumpkin carriages and wishes and dreams and general superficiality. This particular movie was adapted from a folk tale written by Charles Perrault in 1697 (Wikipedia’s my friend), but the narrative has been around for much longer.
I’m a little disheartened that Disney had to resort to using talking fluffy animals to work out several key plot points. While talking animals are present in virtually every folk tale narrative, it just seems a little too convenient that animals can come to the aid of beautiful people in times of need. The focus was a little too heavily pushed from the animals’ points of view; in fact, this could’ve been called The Adventures of Jaq and GusGus: The Movie. The problem seems to lie in Cinderella’s lack of any real personality. She just sits there on the dirty-ass floor of the chateau and accepts her punishment without ever taking steps to resolve her own problems. Hey, I got a solution to everything for you: Just leave!
Your kids will probably like Cinderella, even though its fundamental lack of girl power and hopeless romance in its theme could be debated when taken in a modern context. The movie holds up fairly well with some solid animation and nicely done modeling, the overall arc is pretty fluid, and the sound and music are both as enchanting as ever. At the very least, it’s not a package film with wildly different emotional tones!
ThomFiles 
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