What if Don Bluth stayed at Disney?/Beauty and the Beast

Beauty and the Beast is a 1991 American animated musical romantic fantasy film produced by Walt Disney Feature Animation and Amblin Entertaiment, released by Walt Disney Pictures, produced by Don Hahn, and directed by Don Bluth, Gary Trousdale and Kirk Wise. The TBDth Disney animated feature film and the TBD released during the Disney Renaissance period, it is based on the 1756 French fairy tale of the same name by Jeanne-Marie Leprince de Beaumont (who was only credited in the French dub), and ideas from the 1946 French film of the same name directed by Jean Cocteau. Beauty and the Beast focuses on the relationship between the Beast (voice of Robby Benson), a prince who is magically transformed into a monster and his servants into household objects as punishment for his arrogance, and Belle (voice of Paige O'Hara), a young woman whom he imprisons in his castle. To break the curse, Beast must learn to love Belle and earn her love in return before the last petal falls from an enchanted rose or else the Beast will remain a monster forever. The film also features the voices of Richard White, Jerry Orbach, David Ogden Stiers, and Angela Lansbury.

Walt Disney first attempted to adapt Beauty and the Beast into an animated film during the 1930s and 1950s, but was unsuccessful. Following the successes of An American Tale (1986), The Land Before Time (1988) and The Little Mermaid (1989), Walt Disney Pictures decided to adapt the fairy tale, which Richard Purdum originally conceived as a non-musical. Disney chairman Jeffrey Katzenberg eventually dismissed Purdum's idea and ordered that the film be a musical similar to The Little Mermaid instead. The film was directed by Gary Trousdale, Kirk Wise (in their directorial debut) and Don Bluth, with a screenplay by Linda Woolverton and the story was supervised by Roger Allers. Lyricist Howard Ashman and composer Alan Menken wrote the film's songs. Ashman, who additionally served as the film's executive producer along with Steven Spielberg, died of AIDS-related complications six months before the film's release, and the film is thus dedicated to his memory.

Beauty and the Beast premiered as an unfinished film at the New York Film Festival on September 29, 1991, followed by its theatrical release as a completed film at the El Capitan Theatre on November 13. The film grossed $331 million at the box office worldwide on a $25 million budget and received widespread critical acclaim for its romantic narrative, animation (particularly the ballroom scene), characters and musical numbers. Beauty and the Beast won the Golden Globe Award for Best Motion Picture – Musical or Comedy, the first animated film to ever win that category. It also became the first animated film to be nominated for the Academy Award for Best Picture at the 64th Academy Awards, where it won the Academy Award for Best Original Score and Best Original Song for its title song and received additional nominations for Best Original Song and Best Sound. In April 1994, Beauty and the Beast became Disney's first animated film to be adapted into a Broadway musical, which ran until 2007.

An IMAX version of the film was released in 2002, and included "Human Again", a new five-minute musical sequence that had been cut from the film prior to its release, but was included in the 1994 musical. That same year, the film was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress for being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant". After the success of the 3D re-releases of The Swan Princess and The Lion King, the film was reissued in 3D in 2012. A live-action adaptation of the film directed by Bill Condon was released on March 17, 2017.

Plot
In the prologue, as told through stain-glass windows, a selfish French prince is visited by an old beggar woman who offers to give him a rose if he provides her with shelter, but the prince refused on account of her hideous appearance and also blows her off again when she warns him not to judge people by looks. The woman is revealed to be a magical enchantress who curses the prince by turning him into a hideous-looking beast and also curses his castle and its inhabitants. The rose is revealed to be enchanted and it will bloom until his 21st birthday and wilt away, which will cement the transformation unless the Beast finds some woman to love and earn her love in return.

A decade later, in a small town, a beautiful bookworm girl named Belle is seen as strange by the townsfolks. The popular town hunter, Gaston lusts after her, but Belle tries to avoid him because of his arrogance. Belle's dad, Maurice is also an outcast among the townsfolk due to his erratic inventions. When Maurice leaves to go to a fair, he ends up getting lost and stumbles upon the Beast's castle where he is greeted by the castle employees who have transformed into anthropomorphic household objects: Cogsworth, the uptight butler who ended up being cursed as a mantle clock; Lumiere, a kind-hearted maître d’ who ended up becoming a candelabra; Mrs. Potts, the housekeeper who was changed into a teapot, along, her son Chip and his brothers, now teacups, along with a whole bunch of others. With the exception of Cogsworth, the enchanted servants provide hospitality to Maurice, but the Beast comes to lock him up in the dungeon for trespassing into his castle.

After Belle turns down Gaston's marriage proposal (made ludicrous by the fact that he organized a wedding just outside her house, foolishly expecting her to accept out of the blue), Maurice's horse comes back and takes Belle to the castle where she soon finds Maurice in the dungeon, but she soon meets the Beast. In exchange for her dad's freedom, Belle offers to be the Beast's prisoner in his stead. The Beast agrees and lets Maurice go and he and his servants plan to make Belle try to fall for him in order to revoke the curse, which is hampered when the Beast's nasty temper makes Belle spurn coming to dinner with him. Back at the village at Gaston's tavern, Gaston is still reeling from Belle's rejection, but his spirits are lifted when his lackey, LeFou, and the townspeople sing about how no man measures up to him. Maurice bursts in and frantically seeks assistance to save Belle from the Beast at the castle, which earns him nothing more than ridicule and rejection by the townsfolk, who simply dismiss him as "Crazy old Maurice".

Belle curiously decides to explore around the castle where she meets the servants and at her request, they give her some dinner despite the Beast's orders against it. She soon enters the West Wing, which is the one section of the castle the Beast ordered her not to, and she happens upon the enchanted rose. But before she touches it, the Beast arrives and frightens her out of the West Wing and out of the castle. Belle tries to escape to the forest, but she is confronted by a pack of wolves (who earlier tried to kill Maurice). Before she is eaten by them, however, the Beast intervenes and saves her, but is wounded by the wolves in the process. She returns with him to the castle where their relationship begins to slowly improve as the Beast begins acting more selfless, even giving Belle access to a library where she can read all of the books she wants. Meanwhile, inspired by Maurice's 'crazy' story about the Beast, Gaston bribes the head warden of the local insane asylum, Monsieur D'Arque, to incarcerate Maurice unless Belle concurs to wed him. When they go to Belle's cottage, they find it empty as Maurice just left before they arrive, so he forces LeFou to stay at the house until they return.

After sharing a romantic dance, the Beast lets Belle use a magic mirror to see her father and discover that he's lost in the woods. Seeing her worried, the Beast decides to let Belle leave the castle to save her father. The servants are horrified when Cogsworth tells them this news, fearing that their one chance to be human again was squandered. When Belle gets Maurice back home, they soon find that Chip has stowed away into Belle's bag. They are soon interrupted by the villagers, led by Gaston, who arrived to send Maurice to the asylum. After rejecting Gaston again, Belle proves that her father is telling the truth by showing everyone the Beast with the magic mirror, which the Beast let her take with her. Seeing that Belle has feelings for the Beast, Gaston twists the truth that the Beast is a monstrous creature and convinces the villagers to attack him, and they lock Belle and Maurice in the cottage den to prevent them from interfering. Luckily, Belle and Maurice are soon freed by Chip, who uses Maurice's invention that he was going to take to the fair earlier.

At the castle, the servants discover the mob trying to storm the castle and soon get the jump on them when they break open the castle doors. While the servants battle and chase off the entire townsfolk, Gaston soon finds the depressed Beast in the West Wing. They have a fight outside in the rain, where Gaston taunts the Beast for his feelings to Belle. When he sees Belle has returned to the castle, he finds the strength to defend himself and threatens to drop Gaston off the rooftops, but he becomes merciful and relents. As the Beast attempts to reunite with Belle, Gaston stabs Beast in the back, but this causes him to topples from the balcony to his death.

The Beast dies in Belle's arms before the last petal falls. Belle tearfully professes her love to the Beast, and the spell is undone, reviving the Beast and restoring his human form along with all his servants and his castle. The Prince and Belle host a ball for the kingdom, where they dance happily.