Summary: When Cinderella's cruel stepmother prevents her from attending the Royal Ball, she gets some unexpected help from some lovable mice and her fairy godmother. - Imdb.com
Length: 74 minutes
Rating: G
Date of Original Release: 1950
Directors: Clyde Geronimi, Wilfred Jackson, Hamilton Luske
Writers: Charles Perrault; Bill Peet, Erdman Penner, Ted Sears, Winston Hibler, Homer Brightman, Harry Reeves, Ken Anderson, Joe Rinaldi
Art Director:
Music: Mack David, Al Hoffman, Jerry Livingston
Cast
CINDERELLA - Ilene Woods
FAIRY GODMOTHER - Verna Felton
LADY TREMAINE - Eleanor Audley
BRUNO / GUS / JACQUES - James MacDonald
ANASTASIA - Lucille Bliss
DRIZELLA - Rhoda Williams
PRINCE CHARMING - William Phipps (singing voice: Mike Douglas)
KING / GRAND DUKE - Luis Van Rooten
LUCIFER - June Foray
DOORMAN - Don Barclay
Plot & Commentary
We open our Cinderella book to a faraway kingdom—“peaceful, prosperous, and rich in romance and tradition.” A rich gentleman lives in a mansion with his daughter, Cinderella [annoying because her name is supposed to be just Ella at this point], and has remarried in order to give his child a mother. She’s a sharp-looking woman with two bratty-looking girls Cinderella’s age. When the father dies, the stepmother shows her black heart: she’s jealous of her stepdaughter’s charm vs. her own offspring’s awkwardness. The family fortune is blown on everything the brats desire, and Cinderella is “abused, humiliated, and forced to become a servant in her own house. And yet, through it all, Cinderella remained ever gentle and kind, for with each dawn she found new hope that someday her dreams of happiness would come true.” How sweet.
Bluebirds wearing hats and shoes fly to the mansion’s topmost tower and open the window curtains. Inside Cinderella is asleep. They chirp at her to wake her up, which she takes with a measure of grace most of us would be incapable of (I know Megan wouldn't). “Yes, I know it’s a lovely morning, but it was a lovely dream, too.” It turns out that Cinderella speaks bird, and she and the bluebirds conduct a conversation about dreams. This starts her off singing “A dream is a wish your heart makes when you're fast asleep…” which draws the whole bird neighborhood into her bedroom to listen. I'm impressed because I am incapable of any kind of speech besides grunts (and sometimes not even that) for at least twenty minutes after I wake up. A few sleepy mice crawl out for the concert—also wearing clothes. “If you keep on believing, the dream that you wish will come true.” I followed this formula faithfully for twelve years and I still never got a horse. LIES, ALL LIES.
The castle clock dongs. “Oh, that clock! Old killjoy.” I like Cinderella a lot so far. She has much more personality than I remember. “Even he orders me around!” The mice are offended by this, for her. The morning begins. The birds make her bed. The female mice kick the men out of the room to help her bathe and dress. I’m watching this in a stupor; I can’t even bring myself to roll my eyes. I mean, I remember the birds and the mice but—seriously? I must say: the female mice voices crack me up. Cinderella puts on her 4th hairstyle within five minutes and slips into a pair of ballet flats. See, she was fashionable even as a downstairs maid.
Mice scurry in to alert Cinderelly that there’s a new mouse in the house. They actually speak squeaky English and inform her that it’s a HE—to which she starts taking out a tiny mouse shirt and accessories. Cinderella makes me think of a Nancy Drew – Pollyanna crossover. She’s got a great sense of humor and seems very normal… and then we catch her making hats for mice. Jaq tells her that HE’s in a trap and she dashes to the rescue—as best she can, I mean, because the tower stairs are eternal.
Jaq goes into the trap to calm down the trapped mouse. I love Jaq. He’s cheerful, skinny, high-energy, a fast talker, and has prominent front teeth and ears. He is my 6 year old cousin in cartoon mouse form. The other mouse is plump and has a dopey way of talking. Cinderella dresses the fat mouse in a shirt that rides up, a hat, and shoes. He’s apparently gone through life nameless, because she decides to christen him Octavius. He looks horrified (maybe that's just my face). “But for short, we’ll call you Gus.” No one ever said she wasn’t creative. I shudder for her poor future children. She goes downstairs and tells Jaq to keep an eye on the newbie.
JAQ: Zuk zuk! Look, y’ever see a cat cat?
GUS: Catcat?
JAQ: Yep! Cat cat! Lucifey! Thatsa him! Meeeany! Sneeeeeaky! Jump at you. Bite at
you! Ha! Big, big, big as a house! MEERAOW!! RAOW! RAOW!
He pretends to be the fierce cat and Gus falls off the stairstep.
Cinderella emerges into a beautiful hallway with three doors lining it, from which come the dulcet sounds of unladylike snores. Megan, I didn't know you lived here! Ha ha ha. She opens one door. Someone is asleep in the bed; beside it is a beribboned and bevelveted bed on which a fat black cat is asleep: FOLKS, WE HAVE ANOTHER CRAZY CAT LADY. Cinderella beckons him and he rolls over and ignores her. Cinderella: “LUCIFER! Come HERE!” He isn’t happy, but he obeys. He saunters over to her and stretches luxuriously right at her feet, clawing up the hardwood. She shuts the door, launching him forward and out of his dignity. “I’m sorry if Your Highness objects to an early breakfast. It’s certainly not my idea to feed you first.” I love Cinderella’s scorn for this cat. The mice observe them from a hidden hole in the wall and Gus wants to take on Lucifer with his bare hands. Thankfully Jaq is there to restrain the idiot.
An old brown dog is asleep in the kitchen, dreaming and whimpering. She wakes him up. “Dreaming again. Chasing Lucifer?” She pets him by grabbing his head right behind the ears, which is how I greet my dog too. It’s the little things that please me, like the animators getting right the way you greet your dog. “Catch him this time?” Bruno dog-smiles happily. “That’s bad!” He looks shocked. Lucifer cackles. “What if they heard you upstairs? You know the orders! So if you don’t want to lose a nice warm bed, you’d better get rid of those dreams. Know how?” I bet you a hundred dollars she’s about to start singing. “Just learn to like cats.” Bruno reacts as though someone just spiked his lemonade with mushroom oil. “No, I mean it! Lucifer has his good points too.” Then she can’t think of any. While Bruno is laughing at this, Lucifer revengefully positions himself so that he’s laying beneath Bruno’s head, then claws him. Bruno snarls. Cinderella didn’t see the setup, so she thinks the innocent hound was attacking the cat from hell. She scolds Bruno and sends him outside, telling them both that the farmer and the cowman should be friends. Bruno crawls out with his tail tucked between his legs, and Lucifer sulkily swirls his milk.
She puts on wooden shoes (wooden shoes!) and goes outside to feed the chickens. The mice race to the kitchen to join the feast but are brought to a fast halt when they spy Lucifer lounging in the kitchen doorway. They dash back into their hole, dragging Gus, who I am strongly tempted to just call Duh from now on. Jaq: “Carefee!” He hatches a plan: the classic diversion. They draw straws using their tails, which is actually quite clever. Jaq draws himself. Gus pumps his hand in congratulation; the other mice emotionally prep for his funeral. With their hats off, these mice look like Whoville Whos. Jaq approaches his quarry while the others watch. This movie is the king of music gags. Lucifer is dunking his finger and dropping drops of milk, one at a time, onto his tongue. Who among the readership is going to fess up to having done this before? (Megan, raise your hand.) Jaq kicks Lucifer, who falls face-first into the milk bowl. Heh heh. The chase begins. Jaq succeeds in getting safely to the holes in the opposite wall and keeps Lucifer occupied while the others make a break for the yard.
Cinderella tosses the mice some corn and Gus goes to war against the chickens for it. Cinderella dumps a pile taller than he is in front of him and he begins to greedily collect pieces. The other mice have grabbed an average of two corn kernels each. They all hurry back to the hole. One mice drops a kernel and is experienced enough to know better than to go back for it. Gus, who has a stack of corn precariously stacked from palms to chin, sees it and tries to add it to his collection. HOW GREEDY. Not surprisingly, his attempts only send the other kernels shooting out of his hands. This has almost happened to me so many times at Walmart. You know those days—you go in for one thing so you don't bother to grab a basket… The cat and Jaq both watch Gus try to restack his pile.
Unfortunately (or, fortunately, depending on if Lucifer succeeds and how much I still hate Gus at the end of this scene) the cat is not distracted by Jaq’s attempts to draw his attention away from Gus. The fat mouse loses his tower of food AGAIN and tries to collect them AGAIN. I HATE this mouse. He comes nose to nose with Lucifer and the cat gets him by the tail. Jaq drops a broom on Lucifer and Gus gets away. He climbs up the tablecloth onto the tea set that Cinderella has prepared for the family’s breakfasts. Has girlfriend gotten to eat breakfast at all? Bells on the kitchen wall start ringing and the entitled three start hollering for Cinderella. They shout her name repeatedly until I want to storm upstairs and slap them all on both sides of the face.
Lucifer watches in consternation as the tea tray is carried upstairs. He follows and tries to swipe the teacup Gus is hiding under, but fails when Cinderella loses a shoe on the stairs (FORESHADOWING MUCH? “I always was a little clumsy like that,” she’ll tell the reporters) and goes back for it.
Cinderella enters each bedroom with a cheerful greeting and gets only sour replies. Does this happen every day? I hope the prince has a good therapist on staff. Everyone gives her laundry to do. As she makes her way back downstairs, there’s a scream and a crash. Lucifer bounds happily to Anastasia’s door and catches Gus as he comes running out from under it.
Anastasia flings open her door screaming for her mother. Cinderella stares in astonishment as she gets blamed for whatever happened. Anastasia runs to her mother’s room. Drizella follows. Boy, are these women ugly. Cinderella hears the word mouse and immediately turns on Lucifer. She frees Gus, who is such a moron I can’t say it enough, and scolds Lucifer for following his feline instincts. Then she’s called into her stepmother’s room.
DRIZELLA: Hm!
ANASTASIA: Are you gonna get it!
Cinderella enters the room slooooowly. Her stepmother is ugly too, but she speaks and moves with such refinement that it’s almost like watching a snake. She’s still sitting in bed, which is incredibly insulting. Cinderella pauses at the foot of the bed. Aside: I like the play with shadows in this film.
CINDERELLA: Oh please, you don’t think that I—
STEPMOTHER: Hold your tongue! Now. It seems we have time on our hands.
CINDERELLA: But I was only trying to—
STEPMOTHER: Silence! Time for vicious practical jokes. Perhaps we can put it to better use.
Now, let me see. There’s the large carpet in the main hall. Clean it! And the windows, upstairs
and down. Wash them! Oh, yes, and the tapestries, and the draperies.
CINDERELLA: But I just finished—
STEPMOTHER: Do them again! And don’t forget the garden, scrub the terrace, sweep the
halls and stairs, clean the chimneys. And of course there’s the mending and the sewing and the
laundry.
The stepmother has a constant sneer on her face that makes me hate her even more than the powertrip and the unfairness do. Lucifer hears all this with approval, and when she stops he’s irritated. “Oh yes. And one more thing,” she says, and he looks pleased. “See that Lucifer gets his bath.” At least someone else will be unhappy today.
A crown comes crashing out of a palace window, disturbing a group of eavesdropping doves. A portly, balding king shouts, “My son has been avoiding his responsibilities long enough! It’s high time he married and settled down!” A monocled duke crawls out from behind a shield in the midst of the room’s wreckage and reminds the king to be patient. The king disagrees: he’s lonely and wants grandchildren, and if he leaves his son to the business of romance he’ll never hear the pitter-patter of little feet again. He starts blubbering onto the duke’s shoulder. The duke starts to tell him that love—and the king is enraged. “Love! Bah! Just a boy meeting a girl under the right conditions. So, we’re arranging the conditions.” His son is coming home tonight, they’ll throw a ball to celebrate his return, and all the eligible ladies in the kingdom will be there. He starts roaring about how it’s going to be TONIGHT and IT CAN’T POSSIBLY FAIL and ALL THE TRIMMINGS. This character might be up for a bi-polar assessment.
Back at the crumbling mansion, which doesn’t look out of repair to me, the fortune thieves are having a music lesson. To set the first note, Stepmother sings, “The pear-shaped toad” and Anastasia goes to town on her flute, while Drizella caws “Sing, sweet nightingale” and Lucifer and I are in accord for the only time in our lives, with both of us cringing in sincere misery. He escapes and hears a lovely voice singing the same song. Cinderella’s mopping the front hall. She trills away, fixing her hair in the bubble reflections and slinging her rag to and fro. Then—the bubbles pop. “Oh, LUCIFER!” The cat has run around the whole room and left dirty pawprints all over the floor. Next time don’t check yourself out for so long, Cinderella. He scampers away. “You mean old thing! I’m just going to have to teach you a lesson!” She grabs a broom and goes after him and just as I’m thinking AWW YEAH, there’s a knock at the door.
It’s a letter from the king. The mice pop out of a hole in the stairs—the maze they’ve made through this house boggles my mind—and ask excitedly what it says. Cinderella looks up as Drizella drags out an AAAWWWWHHH in the room upstairs. “Maybe I should interrupt the, uh… music lesson?” she says with a little smile. I chuckle. Let’s be friends, Cinderella.
Drizella is flapping her hands like they’re bird wings, which also makes me laugh—at her, not with her, in this case. The sisters start fighting and use Anastasia’s flute as a bludgeon. Their mother chides them on self-control and loses her temper when Cinderella knocks, slamming the piano keys—which really is unfair, seeing as the piano never did anything but suffer in the first place. They read the letter excitedly.
STEPMOTHER: Every eligible maiden is to attend!
DRIZELLA: Why, that’s us!
ANASTASIA: And I’m so eligible!
Jaq and Gus, hearing this, make As If gestures and laugh in silence. Cinderella is thrilled—this means she can go to!
DRIZELLA: Her! Dancing with the prince!
ANASTASIA: “I’d be honored, Your Highness! Would you mind holding my broom?”
They almost fall over with laughter. She’s all ‘Let me show you how regally dignified I can be’ and reminds them that it’s by royal command. Her stepmother is forced to acquiesce. “Well, I see no reason why you can’t go. If you get all your work done… and if you can find something suitable to wear.” Cinderella shoots out of the room like her feet have wings. Her stepsisters are horrified.
DRIZELLA: MOTHER! Do you realize what you just SAID?!?!
STEPMOTHER: Of course. I said IF.
DRIZELLA: Oh. IF.
They all smirk together. What kind of a name is Drizella anyway?
This puts a damper on watching the next scene, in which Cinderella pulls a dress out of her trunk and shows it to the mice. It’s not really that pretty. But it was her mother’s, so I won’t pass judgment. She’s going to modernize it. As she’s making happy plans, she’s called to work by the rest of the evil family. It baffles me that she can actually hear them all the way up there. Well, they are a bunch of loudmouths. She resignedly leaves her room. Jaq feels sorry for Poor Cinderelly.
JAQ: Every time she has a minute, that’s the time when they begin it. “Cinderelly! Cinderelly!”
EVIL FAMILY: CINDEREEEEEELLLA!
The mice sing peevishly about how their sweet human friend is misused. Jaq tells the others that she’ll never get to go to the ball—“You’ll see. They’ll fix her.” A clever little female mouse stands up and proclaims: “We can do it, we can do it! We can help our Cinderelly. We can make her dress so pretty—there’s nothing to it really.” Then a squeaky chorus starts up as the mice and the birds grab thread and scissors and remake Cinderella’s dress. It’s one of the sweetest gestures cartoon creatures have ever made, and it makes me love this loyal troupe of mice a whole lot.
Jaq wants to help sew but is ordered off by the same female mouse, whom I hope he marries (these things happen in Disney movies), to find trimmings. He and Gus skitter down to a room where the ladies of the house are piling laundry into Cinderella’s arms.
STEPMOTHER: When you are through, and before you begin your regular chores, I have a few
little things.
CINDERELLA: Very well.
The sisters toss aside a sash and chain of beads, angry that they never get the good things in life, and stomp out. The mice run eagerly to collect the sash and don’t notice that Lucifer is napping in the room until it’s too late. He chases them into a hole and they pop out of another. Gus again stupidly opens his mouth and lets words come out—like “BEADS, OOOHH, PRETTY BEADS, BEADS [CHUCKLE CHUCKLE]” and Lucifer runs to sit on the necklace.
The pair tries another diversionary tactic: Jaq will pretend to be collecting buttons off of a shirt and Gus will get the necklace. Lucifer drags the necklace over to where Jaq is dismantling a piece of clothing which Cinderella will probably have to mend later. The cat makes a swipe for Jaq and Jaq tiddlywinks him right in the nose with a button. I love this mouse. Lucifer chases him into the pile of clothes. Gus takes off with the necklace but then he RUNS INTO THE WALL and the entire necklace shatters.
The two mice try to collect the beads (which makes me smile, because Gus loads them into his hat and Jaq strings them onto Gus’s tail) while Lucifer slinks up to them. The mice get away in the nick of time.
A shrill rendition of “A Dream is a Wish Your Heart Makes” is being conducted in the tower bedroom as the mice and the birds reconstruct the dress. It is SO PINK. They’re very happy workers.
Nightime and a bell donging at the castle: attendees unload in front of it. It’s a gorgeous castle front. A carriage pulls up at the entrance to the mansion. Cinderella, still in her housemaid’s clothes and carrying the broom which I’m almost sure is superglued to her hand, alerts the others. They pretend to be surprised to hear that she’s not going.
STEPMOTHER: Not going! Oh, what a shame. But of course there will be other times—
CINDERELLA: Yes. Good night.
She opens the door to her room and goes to the window, where she can see the whitely glowing castle. “Oh, well. What’s a royal ball? After all, I suppose it would be frightfully… dull, and—and boring, and completely… completely wonderful.” She looks completely dejected. I'm sad for her, because while, yes, it's just a ball, you get the impression that this is the first good thing to come her way since her stepmother took over her life, and now she's been cheated out of this too. Life is rough.
A yellow glow grows behind her. It’s a candle, and two birds are opening panels to reveal the remade dress. “Surprise! Surprise!” shriek the mice. (Gus: “… Happy birthday!” Jaq can’t withhold his disgust: “No, no, no, no!”) Cinderella is elated. “How can I ever… Thank you so much!” This is a case of what goes around comes around. I hope there are more to come in regard to the stepfamily.
The trio of cheats marches out in hideous dresses. Cinderella catches up with them. She’s wearing the dress and has a Snow White bow in her hair. I’m not sold on this look but she looks prettier than them, at least. The sisters are furious.
STEPMOTHER: Now, now, girls. After all, we did make a bargain. Didn’t we Cinderella?And
I never go back on my word.
Cinderella’s smile fades. The mice, watching, know something is up.
STEPMOTHER: Hmm. How very clever. These beads. They give it just the right touch. Don’t
you think so, Drizella?
DRIZELLA: No I don’t, I think she’s—OH! Why, you little thief!
The two girls attack the dress, going after their beads and sash but not stopping there. Cinderella can’t do anything to stop them. When it’s completely in tatters, the stepmother WHO I HATE tells them that’s quite enough—don’t want to get over-excited—and ushers them out. They leave Cinderella standing in the hall.
She bursts into tears and runs into the back garden. She throws herself at the ground in front of a bench and sobs. “It’s just no use. No use at all. I can’t believe. Not anymore. There’s nothing left to believe in. Nothing.” The animal menagerie gathers and watches sadly, then with confusion as stars of light start to float around in the air. The sparks collect themselves into the shape of a plump old woman wearing a blue cloak with an enormous magenta bow at the neck. She says kindly, “Nothing, my dear? Now you don’t really mean that.” Cinderella most certainly does. “Nonsense, child! If you’d lost all your faith, I couldn’t be here! And here I am!” Cinderella looks up, bewildered (and rightfully so).
WOMAN: Come now, dry those tears. You can’t go to the ball looking like that!
CINDERELLA: The ball? Oh, but I’m not—
WOMAN: Of course you are! But we have to hurry. Because even miracles take a little time.
CINDERELLA: Miracles?
WOMAN: Mm-hmm. Watch!
She’s lost track of her magic wand, which reveals to Cinderella, who has access to backstory we don’t, that this woman is her fairy godmother. The woman sets the wand to work, singing a nonsense song that turns a pumpkin into a gleaming carriage while the animals watch in fear. Without fail, my favorite part of this song is when the choir bursts out singing “Salagadoola menchika boola.” I can just picture Walt Disney saying to this group of people, “You’re going to do background vocals for a nice song called Sing Sweet Nightingale, very lovely. And then we’re going to mix it up a bit.”
Jaq calls the carriage wonderfee and finds himself turned into a silver horse. The fairy godmother does the same to two of his compatriots, but misses Gus. She shoots another stream of magic at him right as Lucifer pounces. Lucifer finds himself on a horse’s back and Gus finally gets his own, whinnying shrilly and sending the terrorized cat bounding out of the garden. He trots over to the other three and all laugh raucously. I always liked that part.
FAIRY GODMOTHER: Serves him right, I’d say. Now, um, where were we? Oh, goodness,
yes. You can’t go to the ball without a—
Cinderella, holding her shredded dress, waits breathlessly (for the third time).
FAIRY GODMOTHER:—a horse.
CINDERELLA: A-a-a-another one?
Girl is a good sport. The FG turns the mansion’s horse into a coachman. Bruno is made into the footman as the finishing touch. Cinderella tries to explain about her dress. If this movie was set today, she’d be good to go as-is. The FG tells her she’s wasting time.
FAIRY GODMOTHER: Don’t try to thank me!
CINDERELLA: Oh, I wasn’t! I mean, I do—but… don’t you think my dress—
FAIRY GODMOTHER: Yeeeeeeees, it’s lovely, dear, lovaggGOOD HEAVENS, child, you
can’t go in that!
Relieved, she smiles and shakes her head.
The FG mutters about size and eye color and simple but daring too, and up swirls the magic and dresses Cinderella in a sparkling gray gown with gloves above her elbows and a black choker around her neck. Her hair is swept up and has a headband in it, and she’s lost her ears but she’s got diamond earrings. She’s wearing shoes made of glass. She’s radiant.
CINDERELLA: Oh, it’s a beautiful dress! Did you ever see such a beautiful dress?
I love Cinderella’s dress. Nothing makes me madder (well, maybe a few things) than Disney merchandisers of today who have made her dress blue and her hair corn-yellow. She looks completely beautiful in the movie. The FG tells her to enjoy it while it lasts. “On the stroke of twelve, the spell will be broken, and everything will be as it was before.” That sucks. Cinderella: “Oh, I understand. But… it’s more than I ever hoped for.” Good point. Who cares about a midnight curfew when five minutes ago you weren’t even going? “Bless you, my child,” says the FG affectionately, and sends her on her way. The carriage races over the hill and through the town.
In the palace ballroom, the prince is being introduced to one young lady at a time. There is quite a line. From a balcony over the room, the king and the duke watch each bow/curtsey anxiously. The king growls, “Eh! The boy isn’t cooperating!” Since I don’t think we ever learn the prince’s name, I’m going to call him The Boy from here forward. The duke’s daughter is presented; she approaches the prince and he stifles a yawn.
Cinderella enters the palace uncertainly. The line of guards watches her pass. I always thought they were judging her for being late but now I think they're checking her out. She starts climbing the grand staircase. That is kind of mean. She’s going to be sweating like a cow when she gets to the top. If you look closely at the screen, the guards line even the stairs, and the ones just halfway up are teeny.
Drizella and Anastasia Tremaine are announced. They’re tripping over the other’s skirt hems and shoving each other. Seeing them, The Boy rolls his eyes heavenward. The king recoils. He declares that he gives up. The duke, rolling his monocle like a yo-yo, pulls out the I Told You So speech that he’s been mentally perfecting all evening. “Well, if I may say so, Your Majesty, I did try to warn you, but you, sire, are incurably romantic. Heh heh! No doubt you saw the whole pretty picture in detail.” The king covers his ears and glares at him. The duke breezes airily on as everything he describes comes to pass while he narrates. “The young prince, bowing to the assembly. Suddenly, he stops. He looks up. For, lo, there she stands.” The Boy looks past the Uglies and sees Cinderella wandering around in the dark by herself. He pushes between them and makes his way to her. “There she stands: the girl of his dreams! Who she is or whence she came, he knows not, nor does he care.” The king watches his son with interest. “For his heart tells him that here, here is the maid predestined to be his bride.” He touches her hand and she whirls around. He bows, and she curtseys. The king rubs his eyes and looks delighted. “Ho ho ho ho ho! A pretty plot for fairy tales, sire! But in real life, oh no! No! It was foredoomed to failure.” The king scowls and yanks the monocle out of the duke’s hand. “FAILURE, EH! HA HA! TAKE A LOOK AT THAT, YOU POMPOUS WINDBAG!”
Through the monocle, they watch the prince lead the young lady into the room. The king shouts for the waltz. He whistles for the lights and almost falls off the balcony. Haha. Music starts and the couple begins to dance. The king decides that since everything is working out perfectly, it doesn’t need his supervision and he’s going to get a good night’s sleep. It will need the duke’s supervision, however. If anything goes wrong, the king will have his head.
Our dear bi-polar king dances jovially down a hallway lined with stiff-postured attendants, singing la-di-da’s to the tune of the waltz. The Jeeves at the end of the line is grabbed and whirled around, and when he is released he pops right back into place and posture as though never disturbed. I find this hilarious every time.
In the ballroom, the Tremaines are trying to figure out who the newcomer is. The Boy and Cinderella dance past them and out onto the terrace. The duke prevents Lady Tremaine from following with one tug of a curtain cord.
Cinderella and the Prince sing “So This is Love,” one of the sweetest love songs in the Disney canon, as they twirl through the palace gardens and smile at each other.
So this is love, hmm mmm mm mmm, so this is love
So this is what makes life divine
I’m all aglow and now I know
The key to all heaven is mine
My heart has wings and I can fly
I’ll touch every star in the sky
So this is the miracle that I’ve been dreaming of
So this is love, hmm mmm mm mmm, so this is love
They lean in to kiss right as the clock begins to strike. CINDERELLA: Oh my goodness!
THE PRINCE: What’s the matter?
CINDERELLA: It’s midnight! [leaps to her feet]
THE PRINCE: Yes… so it is, but why—
CINDERELLA: Goodbye!
THE PRINCE: No, no wait! You can’t go now, it’s only— [he grabs her hand]
CINDERELLA: Oh, I must! Please! Please, I must!
THE PRINCE: But why?
CINDERELLA: Well, I, I—well, the prince! I haven’t met the prince!
THE PRINCE: The prince! But—didn’t you know that—
The clock clangs again. Oh, midnight! Why do you always have to go ruin everything?
CINDERELLA: Goodbye!
THE PRINCE: Wait. Come back. Oh, please come back! I don’t even know your name, how
will I find you?! Wait! Please, wait!
These Disney men have got to stop falling in love at first sight before getting even the most basic information about the women they’re losing their hearts to. It gets them in a world of trouble. Cinderella bursts through the curtains and into the ballroom. She waves goodbye to the duke, who waves back before he realizes what’s happening. The prince bursts through and is immediately swarmed by a horde of eligible and neglected young ladies. He doesn’t try nearly hard enough to follow her, in my opinion. Cinderella zooms down the grand staircase at such speed that she loses one of her shoes. She turns to go back for it, but the duke is hot on her heels (one bare)(probably blistered, too, from all that dancing and rubbing against glass), hollering “Mademoiselle! Senorita!” She makes it to the coach and her anxious friends, who take off at the speed of light. The duke: “Stop that coach! Close those gates! FOLLOW THAT COACH! OPEN THOSE GATES!” Black and red riders follow the white coach out of the castle grounds. The art in this movie is so beautiful. It’s like it came straight out of an old fairytale book.
The magic wears off completely and everyone turns back into what they were just a few hours ago. They scramble out of the way as the riders charge past, pulverizing the pumpkin. Cinderella apologizes for forgetting the time, and tries to put into words how wonderful it all was. The mice see that the remaining glass slipper is still on her foot. I am so sure. She thanks the sky, so much, for everything.
Lights go out at the castle. The clock strikes three. The duke is outside the king’s chamber, practicing how to break the news, while the king dreams of grandchildren. The duke enters. “Proposed already, has he!” shouts the king, who immediately starts making wedding plans and knights the duke.
“Sire, she got away.” Of the many things that would be unwise to say when a bi-polar king has a sword at your shoulder, that one takes the cake, Duke. The king turns purple. He starts screaming TRAITOR and TREASON and SABOTAGE and A LIKELY STORY while the duke attempts to remind him of his blood pressure.
And so begins the famous jumping on the bed scene, in which the duke and the king seesaw-trampoline up and down, the king swinging his sword, the duke babbling about the shoe he found. Let's just state the obvious: if I had a bed that would bounce me high enough to grab a chandelier 20 feet above me, I would do it ALL DAY.
DUKE: Sire! He loves her! He won’t rest ’til he finds her! He’s determined to marry her!
KING: What? What did you say?
DUKE: The prince, sire! Swears he’ll marry none but the girl who fits this slipper!
The happy king slices the chandelier chain and everyone and everything plummets to the ground with a crash. They crawl out of the new cavern in the mattress. The Duke: “But sire! This slipper could fit any number of girls!” JUST THE POINT I WAS ABOUT TO MAKE. King, jovial once more: “That’s his problem! He’s given his word—we’ll hold him to it!” The duke is informed that he will be spearheading Operation If the Shoe Fits.
A declaration is posted. At the mansion, Lady Tremaine hollers for Cinderella. I’m ashamed to say I kind of like her poppy-red dress. Cinderella’s broom has been re-affixed to her hand. Lady Tremaine wants to know where her daughters are. The slugs are still in bed. She orders breakfast brought up immediately. Jaq and Gus watch curiously.
JAQ: Wow! Wonder wassa matter!
GUS: Duuhh… what’s the matter with her!
JAQ: I dunno! Let’s find out! Come on!
I have a theory that the actor voicing Jaq had his lines recorded and then they sped them up. Like, x200. The pair pops into another one of their multitudinous household holes.
Lady Tremaine wakes up her daughters. She’s all in a hurry because the Grand Duke will be there any minute. The mice watch from beneath candles in a candelabra. I’d love to know how they managed that one.
STEPMOTHER: He’s been hunting all night!
DRIZELLA: Hunting!
STEPMOTHER: For that girl! The one who lost her slipper at the ball last night!
At this point Cinderella enters the room.
STEPMOTHER: They say he’s madly in love with her!
ANASTASIA: The Duke is?
STEPMOTHER: No, no! The prince!
Cinderella gasps, “The prince!” and drops the tray. Her stepmother tells her to clean up the mess and help the other two get dressed. “What for?” sulks Drizella. “If he’s in love with that girl, why should we even bother,” grumps Anastastia. They pull the covers back over their heads. I have to admit that their logic is sound. Lady Tremaine’s definitely isn’t. She thinks they can trick the duke into thinking one of them was wearing the glass slipper. PLEASE. Maybe the duke would buy it, but it’s not like the prince didn’t have eyes in his head. Cinderella’s face was the primary reason he fell in love with her last night, because they obviously didn’t do much talking. Men! The next time you fall in love, make sure you get her name!!!
Lady Tremaine tells them that whoever the slipper fits will be the prince’s bride. “His bride,” breathes Cinderella. “HIS BRIDE!” scream the sisters. They rush around the room loading her up with laundry while she stares at nothing in a happy stupor.
ANASTASIA: What’s the matter with her?!
DRIZELLA: Wake up, STUPID!
ANASTASIA: We’ve gotta get dressed!
Cinderella dumps the laundry in Anastasia’s arms. “Yes. We must get dressed. It would never do for the Duke to see me like this,” she says dreamily, and floats out of the room. The sisters are aghast. Lady Tremaine watches with narrowed eyes. Cinderella so this is loves her way down the hall and up the stairs. Stepmother and mice follow.
Cinderella sings to her reflection while brushing her hair. Her dressing table is really pretty—remnants of a life lived a long time ago, I’m sure. The mice try to alert her. I’m fairly certain that as a child I joined them in screaming BEHIND YOU!!! Cinderella. Lucifer taught you that there are narcissism has consequences. I thought we had moved past this. She turns around too late—her stepmother locks the door and pockets the key. Cinderella wails, “No, please! Oh, you can’t do this, you just can’t! Let me out! You must let me out! You can’t keep me in here! Oh, please!” She sobs against the door while her valiant mice friends determine that they gotta get that key.
The duke dozes in his carriage. When it pulls up he almost drops the shoe. That is the kind of thing where you can feel it take ten years off all you internal organs. Inside, the Tremaine girls flurry around. Their mother tells them this is their last chance—“Don’t fail me.” The duke enters and shudders at the sight of the two of them. They start to fight over who actually owns the shoe. The duke sleepily reads the declaration (side thought, it's kind of nice that he spent the whole night going to other houses and let Cinderella get her beauty sleep). Jaq dives into the pocket where the key is. He almost has it out and in Gus’s hands, but Lady Tremaine smiles at the upstairs door and pats her pocket to reassure herself.
Anastasia tries on the slipper. The arch and heel don’t even make it in. She says it’s just a little snug today. Always up for a challenge, the footman roll up his sleeves and spits on his hands, then goes to work on getting the shoe to fit. The duke falls asleep.
The mice manage to get the key out and so begins the long climb up the stairs. I remember that for a long time in my childhood this was why I didn’t like to watch this movie—because the stair-climbing process was grueling and boring. Watching it now, it takes about twelve seconds. Gus nearly passes out when they get to the base of the tower stairs. I sympathise with him, so much. The starts and ends of every college school year are flashing before my eyes. Jaq tells Gus, “Come on! Just up there!” Bless him.
She sees them through the keyhole.
JAQ: Us a comin’, Cinderelly! Us a comin’! Us’ll getcha out!
CINDERELLA: You got the key!
It’s like watching the cavalry arrive. Cinderella’s tears turn momentarily into happy ones, but before Gus and the key can slide under the door… LUCIFER. The cat from hell pounces on Gus+key and traps them under a bowl. Nothing will shift him. The mice forces come at him with teeth, forks, candles, and ceramics, but he fights them off with ease. Good thing Cinderella can speak bird, because she sends them to get Bruno. The dog proves worrisomely difficult to wake.
Drizella’s turn. “Of all the stupid little idiots!” She pushes the footman away and crams her foot into the shoe. The odd flexibility of her foot intrigues me. I hope it means that she has some strange foot disease that will soon prove fatal. The fit doesn’t hold, though, and the shoe goes pinging off her foot and flying through the air. The duke catches it like he’s sliding into home.
Bruno comes charging to the rescue and scares away Lucifer. The mice can’t pry Gus off of the key. “No, no, no, no, no!” he says stubbornly, eyes closed. This is how I respond when woken up by others. Jaq manages to get him to help shove the key under the door.
The duke makes his departure.
DUKE: You are the only ladies of the household, I hope—I presume?
LADY TREMAINE: There’s no one else, Your Grace.
Then, just as he’s turning away and our hearts are crashing to the floor, they come surging up again at the sound of a voice: “Your Grace! Your Grace! Please, wait! May I try it on?” The duke looks appreciatively at Cinderella’s feet. The Tremaines try to prevent him, but he tosses them a scornful “Madam! My orders were EVERY maiden,” and moves with relief to Cinderella’s side. He beckons for the footman to bring the slipper. As the little man scurries past Lady Tremaine, she sticks out her cane and trips him. The footman trips and the shoes flies through the air to the floor by Cinderella’s chair. It shatters in a second.
The duke sprouts about 50 white hairs and starts planning his own funeral. Cinderella, unfazed, says “But perhaps, if it would help—” NO, NO, NO, he moans. I am so tired of people interrupting this girl. She doesn’t miss much and she’s usually right. She’ll make a good queen. If they would just LET her.
DUKE: Nothing can help now, nothing!!!
CINDERELLA: But you see… I have the other slipper.
She pulls it out of her pocket. He slides it onto her foot and wedding bells start to ring.
The Boy and his bride run out of the palace to their carriage. It’s twelve noon, in case you wanted to know. I bet that was their own little private joke. I wish we could have seen the reunion of the happy couple. My big complaint with the early princess movies is that they’re all about the heroine falling in love with a prince or what have you, but there is hardly any screen time devoted to letting us see them interact with each other. Little birds hold up Cinderella’s veil, of course. She loses a shoe on the stairs and the king runs down to put it back on her foot. The bride and groom climb into their coach and drive away, waving to the townsfolk. The mice, dressed in tiny blue jackets and plumed hats, throw and/or eat rice. The choir assures us that if you keep on believing, the dream that you wish will come true. The Prince and Cinderella kiss as the carriage rolls away.
And they lived happily ever after.
It’s over!
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