Sleeping Beauty

Name: Sleeping Beauty
Director: Clyde Geronimi
Released: 1959

Clyde Geronimi

1959

Synopsis

A beautiful princess born in a faraway kingdom is destined by a terrible curse to prick her finger on the spindle of a spinning wheel and fall into a deep sleep that can only be awakened by true love's first kiss. Determined to protect her, her parents ask three fairies to raise her in hiding. But the evil Maleficent is just as determined to seal the princess's fate.

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Cast

Mary CostaPrincess Aurora (voice)
Bill ShirleyPrince Phillip (voice)
Eleanor AudleyMaleficent (voice)
Verna FeltonFlora / Queen Leah (voice)
Barbara LuddyMerryweather (voice)
Barbara Jo AllenFauna (voice)
Taylor HolmesKing Stefan (voice)
Bill ThompsonKing Hubert (voice)
Marvin MillerNarrator (voice) (uncredited)
Candy CandidoMaleficent’s Goon (voice)

Recommendations

100
Chicago Reader
The masterpiece of the Disney Studios' postwar style. The animation has been stripped down, in accordance with economic imperatives, but what the images lose in shading and detail they gain in strength and fluidity.
100
New York Daily News
It is a picture that will charm the young and tickle adults, since the old fairy tale has been transferred to the screen by a Disney who kept his tongue in his cheek throughout the film's animation. It is a beautiful and amusing cartoon.
88
LarsenOnFilm
Deep, dark forests; thorny thickets; spiraling castle stairs – every detail seems to envelop us. And then there is Maleficent, voiced by Eleanor Audley and undoubtedly one of the great Disney villainesses. Her transformation into a roaring dragon in the finale is so triumphant you almost want her to win.
83
The A.V. Club
The elaborate, gothic-inspired designs look great, and the supporting characters—most notably the three good fairies and the Joan Crawford-like villain Maleficent—liven up the proceedings despite the bland hero and heroine.
80
The Dissolve
Sleeping Beauty is the most beautiful movie the Disney’s feature animation department has ever made.
80
The New York Times
A crisply stylized fairyland, where the colors are rich, the sounds are luscious and magic sparkles spurt charmingly from wands.
80
Time Out
An epic brilliance conjures up impossible monumental castles, shadows and monstrosities, with exciting action marvellously orchestrated across the CinemaScope frame.
75
Slant Magazine
Just as the film’s gorgeous backdrops suggest characters trapped in suspended animation, the many colorful balls of light that frequently circle their heads hauntingly convey the filmmakers’ idea of fate and love locked in a cosmic struggle.

Sleeping Beauty

Synopsis

Your Movie Library

Cast

Recommendations

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