Tale as Old as Time

This week I had the opportunity to re-watch the live action Beauty and the Beast movie, and a few things stuck out to me that I had never noticed before. 

First, a rose - in all my previous encounters with this story, I had always wondered at the amount of aggression and anger over the theft of a simple rose. I mean sure, it is theft, but it's also just a flower, isn't it?! Maybe it seems like basic common sense to you, but the rose specifically was the greatest symbol of the Beast's damnation, his curse. I think it just goes to show that you never know what someone else is dealing with, and something that might seem so small to one may very well be a giant tipping point for another. May we be gentle with one another

Second, see something, say something, do something - Another thing that I had never fully considered was why the servants of the household were affected by the Beast's punishment. I guess I had always assumed that it was simply a matter of proximity, but watching the the live action movie again made me think of it all in a new light. In the movie, Belle asks Mrs. Potts outright why they were affected given that they hadn't done anything. Mrs. Potts tells her in no uncertain terms that that was the very reason they were covered by the curse. 

"You're quite right there, dear. You see, when the master lost his mother, and his cruel father took that sweet innocent lad and twisted him up to be just like him... we did nothing."

Servant, master, or anything else, we all bear a kind of responsibility to each other. It doesn't matter our relationship to each other, when we have a knowledge that someone is being harmed, especially an innocent child, don't we bear an ethical obligation to speak up, to do something, look out for them? May we look out for one another.

Finally, hidden in plain sight - it makes sense in the story that the village people wouldn't remember the Beast/Prince as part of the curse, but watching the movie this time though really made me think about the furry of the villagers once they did learn about his presence. Thing is, the Beast had always been there, their knowledge of him didn't change that fact in the slightest, much less make him more of a danger or threat to them. It also reminded me of the fury of the Christian community over the 2017 live action film, over what they felt was a blatant attempt of a secular community pushing a pagan and homosexual agenda. I wonder, do they realize that people who look and think unlike them have always existed; their greater awareness of these individuals now doesn't change that fact at all. Furthermore, their existence, their presence in the community doesn't by nature mean that anyone is pushing an agenda or their way of life on anyone else. May we be kind to one another. 

I love finding new gems in stories I've enjoyed before, and this one was certainly no exception!