Family Matters Goes to Disney World!

[Fade to the opening of The West Wing.]

Oan [v/o]: Previously on The West Wing.

Belle: What's in the West Wi-

Beast: It's forbidden!!

Oan [v/o]: And now, furries.

Beast: 

Jerk [v/o]: So, does every version of Beauty and the Beast have Beast win Belle over by giving her stuff?

Oan [v/o]: It's a fairy tale. The text here is also subtext. It's a symbolic act of trust. The Beast is giving her the key to his safe and all his material wealth. Frankly, it's still a bigger gesture of trust and respect than just showing her where the library is.

Jerk [v/o]: Yeah, because women only want money and not respect or culture or a genuine interest in their personality. Blah, blah, blah.

Oan [v/o]: Okay, fair enough.

Beast: 

Jerk [v/o]: Uh, step two?

Jerk: Child logic?

Oan: Child logic.

Beast: 

Jerk [v/o]: Wait, didn't she get there by horse?

Oan [v/o]: Well, what about the horse?

Jerk [v/o]: Tell you what. I'll refrain from making a Nintendo Power Glove joke if you tell me why she can't just go home on the horse she rode in on.

Oan [v/o]: [Not sure how to answer] Um.... the …. the, the glove is … more magical. And the glove causes this to happen.

Jerk [v/o]: The movie just gasped in itself, because … art?

Oan [v/o]: … Because it's a direct reference to this scene from Blood of a Poet.

Jerk [v/o]: So, Cocteau just quoted himself? Man, I wasn't kidding when I called him self-indulgent. You go me!

Oan [v/o]: Well, what's wrong with trying to make a cohesive body of work? It's a motif, not a meme.

Jerk [v/o]: I love the birthing glove. It's so bad.

Oan [v/o]: That was a meme.

Jerk [v/o]: [from a distance] Deal with it!

Oan [v/o]: Oh, have a heart. This is a lovely little moment we're coming up to.

Belle: 

Jerk [v/o]: Is she actually crying diamonds?

Belle's father: 

Belle: 

Jerk [v/o]: [as Father] This is all Satan's fault! [as Belle] It's okay, you can keep them. [as Father] Awesome!

Oan [v/o]: Oh, come on! That's a lovely little gesture.

Jerk [v/o]: What is she going to use the tear diamonds to buy some blood diamonds and then save up for sweat diamonds so she can form a band?

Oan [v/o]: [pause] Oh, oh, now I get it, umm …

Jerk [v/o]: It's a joke you have to think about. I know.

Oan [v/o]: Anyway, her riches are gifts to her from the Beast, which symbolize what she's gained emotionally from their relationship, which is why this happens.

Jerk [v/o]: Okay, that was cool.

Belle's Father: 

Oan [v/o]: Another metaphor. Because the sisters are shallow and selfish, they can only see the Beast's grace as ugly and monstrous. The same thing happens when they try to use the mirror.

Jerk: Gasp! Monkey!

Oan: [sarcastic] Oh Joy.

Jerk: Is that the same sister who said she wanted a monkey? Oh my god, this movie is deep. I'm sorry I ever doubted you, art movie man.

Oan: Good, I finally taught you culture.

Jerk: It wasn't the beauty, it was monkey killed the beast.

Oan [v/o]: Moving on! The sisters ask Avenant and their brother to use Magnifique to ride to the castle and steal the Beast's treasure.

Jerk [v/o]: Steal treasure which they know from firsthand experience they cannot use.

Oan [v/o]: …. Uuu-u-u-u-u-uh, yeah okay fine. Now the scene where Belle reunites with the Beast is intercut with the men breaking into the Beast's vault of treasures and it's one of my favorite scenes in the film and a beautiful spin on the original story's ending.

Jerk [v/o]: [giggling] Oh, I'm sorry, the Beast's face is the most hilarious death mask I've seen, and I've seen some damn funny ones. [as Belle] Oh, my Beast, I'm so sorry I left you. Derr-r-r-r-r-r-r-r!

Oan [v/o]: MOVING ON!! As the Beast lays dying and Avenant breaks into the vault, something incredible happens.

Jerk [v/o]: I don't know. I don't think anything can beat that derp face of.... the.....

Belle: 

Prince: 

Jerk [v/o]: W-w-w-h-h-h-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-at?!!

Oan: Child logi-

Jerk: If you say “child logic”, I swear to god, I will give the nearest child an anesthetizing pommeling.

Jerk [v/o]: Seriously, what the shit just happened?!

Prince: 

Jerk [v/o]: Can those spirits come back and explain how the fuck that curse works?

Belle: 

Jerk [v/o]: No shit. Was the prince Avenant the whole time? Did that arrow have magic body-switching powers? Did they both die at the same time and Quantum Leap into each other? Did they both hold a fortune cookie or some bullshit and wish they could be each other's person for the life...guh, Rah.

Jerk: Wait a minute, wait a minute. I gotta try an experiment. [Jerk shots Spazzmaster and TricksterBelle and they collapse to the ground. TricksterBelle wakes up.]

TricksterBelle: [with Spazzmaster's voice] I'm okay!

Prince: 

Belle: 

Jerk [v/o]: Man, even Belle doesn't know what the fuck just happened. He's just rushing by without us.

Pirnce: 

Jerk [v/o]: Hey! You can't just leave without an explanation. I demand answers! What, don't get raptured now! I refuse to be left behind with Kirk Cameron or Nicolas Cage! Hey! You! Get off of that cloud! I am the audience, you are the movie! I OUTRAGE YOU!! EXPLAIN YOURSELF, EXPLA-A-A-A-A-A-I-I-

Oan: Whoa, whoa. Chill out. I got this.

Oan [v/o]: Cocteau had Jean Marais play The Beast and Avenant for a very good reason. Belle's love has always been for the same man. In the original story, as Belle slept in The Beast's castle, she dreamt of a handsome prince asking her why she could not love The Beast. Of course, she was dreaming of The Beast in his human form. So here, it takes the form of the man that she didn't know she loved, the ideal surrealist story, the subconscious made real. In Disney terms, a dream is a wish your heart makes. And the way that the wish comes true comes, once again, from Cocteau's interest in classical myth and a very different Beauty and the Beast story, Diana and Actaeon. In Ovid's Metamorphosis, a man named Actaeon spied Diana, goddess of the hunt, bathing in a stream. She saw him and, as punishment for his trespassing, turned him into a stag. Remember how I said that Beast was originally going to be more deer-like than cat-like? That was why. Combining that myth with the ending of La Belle et la Bete creates a complex metaphor for how love, the symbolic beauty, can both create beasts and save them, which is explicitly stated in the movie.

Prince: 

Oan: And so La Belle reveals both beauty and beast. So, those are my thoughts. Jerk, what do you think?

Jerk: Well... It's not just that the film has a monkey, it's that it doesn't overuse the monkey: a potent lesson for filmmakers everywhere.

Oan: WILL YOU PLEASE TAKE THIS SERIOUSLY?!!!

Jerk: Alright, you want my real opinion? Here's my real opinion!

Jerk [v/o]: I enjoyed some of Cocteau's unconventional Cocteauean stylistic flourishes and individual bits of dialogue, but some things are conventional for a reason because they work.

When Jean's film ends, I just feel numb,

He under cut the transformation, made it dumb.

But Disney made it in sublime,

A worthy tribute to the tale as old as time

I know we're supposed to view this through the mind of a child, but is that not just an excuse for lazy writing? Cocteau's Belle was well-played, but not particularly well-written. Cocteau's Beast was well-written, but not particularly well-played and the relationship between them just isn't as believable as Disney's. All he's offering her is material stuff.

Oan [v/o]: He did that in the Disney film, too.

Jerk [v/o]: Yeah, but here that's ALL he's offering her, aside from not eating her alive.

[At the Lego Store at Dowtown Disney]

Jerk:

In Cocteau's film, the lady Belle

Just out of pity for the Beast in love she fell.

In Disney's film, they grew and learned,

And thus their love between La Belle and Beast was earned.

Oan: You're taking this WAY too literally. Cocteau's film isn't just Beast meets girl. It's a journey through the greater subconscious. And that's something you don't see in Hollywood or even the biggest films with all these arbitrary rules, silly as those rules are.

Jerk: Are you saying Hollywood doesn't have enough plot holes?

Oan: I'm saying that they like to pretend that they don't exist.

Oan [v/o]:

The blending thoughts, and dueling fears,

It's not about the people it's about ideas.

A dream of life, before you wake,

It's fiction calling itself fiction give or take.

Jerk [v/o]:

Why would they steal a treasure,

That will turn to dog shit in their hands?

Oan [v/o]:

Try to look past mere pleasure.

See, they symbolize short-sighted greed and its demands.

Jerk:

I'm very lost.

Oan:

I know you are.

Jerk:

This plot has holes.

Oan:

Just try to think.

Jerk:

She's crying diamonds, is her head made out of coal?

Oan:

You just don't get it.

Both:

This [brilliant / stupid] film,

Is [not / such] a chore,

Oan:

It's just a logic of a dream and nothing more.

Jerk:

I get eight hours and that for free each time I snore.

Oan:

It's just the logic of a dream and nothing more.

Jerk [v/o]: On the other hand, your version had a monkey.

Jerk: Let's call it a draw. [Oan quickly fills up with rage that he nearly wraps his hands around Jerk's neck.]

Oan [v/o]: [about had it] Okay, seriously. Cut the music! This is something that has pissed me off for a long-ass time! A story isn't a one-to-one reflection of human behavior. It's a chemical reaction that happens when you mix one idea of humanity with another idea of humanity. And that's what Cocteau's film is. Of course it's tough to accept the fuzzy dream logic. You're in your home, but it's also a castle. You're wearing rags in one moment and the next moment you're in jewels and satin. A beast gives you jewels and treasures, but he's also giving you trust and friendship. You're with a man who's your suitor but he's also a beast because you both fear and love him, pity and respect him. It's using metaphor as text, not subtext. And that's a way to tell a story that no one uses anymore. And the cinema is poorer for it.

Jerk [v/o]: Are we?! Look, I'm all forward absurd random weirdness just for the sake of a joke. That's why I love the monkey so much. But if you're trying to actually make a point about something, why would you want to confuse people and muddy that point? Say what you will, I sincerely believe understanding what an audience would want to see is tremendously underrated as an art form in of itself. If there was a precise     formula to make everyone love a film, then everyone would employ it every time. Even the directors of Disney's Beauty and the Beast are 1 for 3 in that area. It's a matter of balancing what you want to tell the audience and what they, without even knowing it, want you to say.

Oan: But that's the problem. Hollywood films only say what they think you want them to say. That's not artistry, that's flattery.

Oan [v/o]: Everything they do is a calculated reaffirmation of the status quo to avoid offending any focus groups. And that makes you feel good for two hours. Fine! Nothing lost, nothing gained. You leave the theater with a feeling of mild satisfaction like every other damn movie out there. Because you're speaking to a committee, not a person. Real people have flaws and biases and ideas that don't make sense, but committees, all those flaws are neatly airbrushed away.

Oan: Goddangit! When I watch a movie, I want to know that I'm talking to a human being!

Jerk: Oh, boo-hoo! Another tortured artist wishing he wasn't so alone!

Jerk [v/o]: Literally, anyone can make a deeply personal film with enough money and resources, but I'd     rather hear an artist talk to me than at me.

Oan [v/o]: Jean Cocteau is talking to you! You're just not listening!

Jerk [v/o]: I DON'T SPEAK FRENCH! WHAT'S YOUR REASON NOT TO LISTEN?!

Oan [v/o]: YEAH! WHY SHOULDN'T I LISTEN TO A MULTI-MILLION-DOLLAR PIZZA HUT COMMERCIAL?!!

Jerk [v/o]: WHY SHOULD I HAVE TO LISTEN TO A SNOBBY AMATEUR BABBLE ON ABOUT HOW MUCH IT “SUCKS TO     BE HIM?”

Oan [v/o]: PHILISTINE!!

Jerk [v/o]: FRAUD!!!

Both: WHY CAN'T YOU JUST …. look …. past … the surface?

[They both sit down and ponder]

Oan: Damn. Maybe I do just like it because it's French.

Jerk: Maybe I just like it because it's Disney.

Oan: There’s a reason it’s a tale as old as time… to teach the most important lesson a child can learn, empathy, how to love the flawed.

Jerk: We’ve both been superficial, ignoring our own flaws and nitpicking the others.

Oan: I'm sorry I've been a beast.

Jerk: We've both been each other's’ beasts in our own beauties.

Oan: Hey, Disney's version has heart in all the right places.

Jerk: And Cocteau's version is creative in all the right ways.

Oan: Agree to disagree?

Jerk: Agreed.

[They both shake hands and stand up]

Jerk: Well, that was fun.

Oan: Very.

Jerk: So, um. I look forward to seeing this online and if you ever want to do another Disney sing-along, just let me know.

Oan: Sure thing. Um, Disney sing-along?

Jerk: Yeah, for someone who hates Disney, you’re really good at singing Disney songs.

Oan: [confused] Thank you. This… was… yeah.

Jerk: Yeah, Disney songs, four of them, in fact. Yeah.

Oan: Umm, I’m going to ride rides.

Jerk: Cool, go have fun for once in your life.

[At Main Street Plaza, Oan goes up to a tourist taking a picture of Sleeping Beauty castle.]

Oan: This reminds me so much of Schloss Neuschwanstein.

Tourist: Was that the bad guy from Muppets Most Wanted?

[At a store, Oan goes to a t-shirt rack and pulls out a Beauty and the Beast shirt.]

[At the Sleeping Beauty carousel, Oan starts a conversation with an older woman in line about the music playing.]

Oan: You know this is some of Tchaikovsky's best work?

Woman: Don't you know Lana del Rey when you hear it? [At another store Oan gazes at a stained glass wall above the cash register and a window containing silhouettes wearing Mickey Mouse ears and walks away. Fade to Oan walking and pondering outside at the parking lot.]

Andrew Dickman: Hey! [punches Oan in the face] That's for saying “Cocteau” in front of my kids. Cock ain't got no toes, idiot.

[Inside Jerk’s hotel room, we hear Oan repeatedly and hurriedly knocking on his door. Jerk opens the door.]

Oan: Hi.

Jerk: [confused] Hi.

Oan: Can I step in?

Jerk: Sure, sure, yeah.

Oan: Okay, um [he rightfully does; pause] I didn’t realize that I was singing … Disney songs the whole time.

Jerk: Is that a fact?

Oan: Yeah, it makes no sense to me either. I didn’t realize how ubiquitous it all was, you know? I didn’t realize how… engraved it was. I spent the whole day at the park trying to make sense of it and I couldn’t. I just couldn’t. I mean, it’s not all that bad that they stole fairy tales. I mean, they did  steal Sleeping Beauty twice and Alice in Wonderland twice. And they’re remaking The Jungle Book, Cinderella, and…

Jerk: [looking at his phone, shocked] ...Beauty and the Beast.

Oan: What?

Jerk: They’re doing a live-action Beauty and the Beast with Bill Condon, the director of Twilight Breaking Dawn.

Vampire: [quickly] Cardiac arrest. [dies]

Oan: How could they let this happen? [Angrily grabbing the curtains and banging the windows] WHY ARE YOU LETTING THIS HAPPEN?!! HAVE YOU HAVE SUCH BLIND DEVOTION TO A MOUSE?!!

Jerk: Well, I wouldn’t say blind devotion.

Oan: The Mouse infected us as children. Brainwashed us all into zombies.

Jerk: No! Well, yes, but...

Oan: We're not safe till it's ears are mounted on my Facebook wall! I say we kill the Mouse!

We've been wasting all our lives,

Throwing money to the wind.

We've been spending our life savings buying all these stupid pins.

We've been going under debt from shopping at the Disney Store.

Now it's time to show resistance, Jerk,

It's time to say no more.

[Cut to a darkly lit room where Kyle is sorting out various weapons like a butcher knife, an Adventureland rifle, and, yes, a rat trap.]

There's a monstrous

Conglomerate

That's circling like a vulture

And won't rest until all culture's in its grip

They've got Marvel

And Star Wars

And ABC and Muppets

And now even Maker Studios and Blip

Kenneth Grahame

A. A. Milne

P. L. Travers

All consumed

And entombed in this house

When they're done,

Call Tom Hanks

And I'll save Mr. Banks

What a crock!

Cut the schlock!

Kill the Mouse!

[Stabs the rat trap with the knife]

[Cut to Ven, bored and disappointed, on her couch scrolling on her phone]

Ven: Well. My singing bit came and went. Nothing to do.

[Cut to Oan and Jerk marching, Oan holding and Adventureland rifle and Jerk holding a worried look]

Oan:

We get stung

When we're young

And they keep us hooked until we die.

It's worse than the tobacco industry.

Jerk:

Come on Kyle,

Give a smile.

Don't you have a hashtag Disneyside?

Oan:

'Why, certainly. I spell it with a 'C.

It's a mouse

It's a rat,

It's a vermin

He's the right

Parasite to delouse.

Grad your torch,

Mount your hate,

Time to exterminate!

Make the rodent meet it's fate! [Ven picks up her ringing phone and calls]

Jerk: He thought he was Belle and I was Gasto- Yeah, Ven!

Ven: [disappointed] Yo.

Jerk: We have an emergency! He has gone Oswald, repeat, he has gone Oswald!

Ven: Oswald the Lucky Rabbit or Lee Harvey Oswald?

Jerk: BOTH!

Ven: Can I sing?

Jerk: No.

[Jerk hangs up. Ven metaphorically gives the finger to him.]

Oan:

M-I-C

K-E-Y (Why?)

Because you ruin everything

And so assassination we espouse.

Call Judge Doom

Get some Dip

Have the rodent take a sip,

And let producers back on Blip

Let's kill the Mouse!

Ven: Well, nothing to do. Might as well search on IMDB.

Jingle: [singing] What you do instead of things.

Ven: [sudden change of surprise] Putain de merde!

Oan:

When you wish

 'Pon a star,

Mickey shows up in your living room

And buys your very soul like you are Faust

It's a trap

It's a crime

Mickey's running out of time

We're gonna clean up Anaheim

And kill the ...!

Ven: Ky-y-y-y-y-yle!! [Oan looks directly to the camera] They remade Beauty and the Beast! [Oan looks confused] The French version! [Oan looks fascinated]

Ven [v/o]: Yep, Vincent Cassel as the Beast, Lea Seydoux as Belle, directed by... that guy who did the movie version Silent Hill, but I won't hold it up against it, and it’s already come out in Europe. No idea if America will ever see it, but there's still that Warner Brothers project with Emma Watson that Guillermo del Toro dropped out of that’s still going ahead and Disney's doing some bullshit and whatever. But hey, a new version of La Belle et la Bête. Ven: Isn’t that cool? A whole new generation growing up with this story.

Oan: This changes everything. [runs off]

Ven: Kyle? *sigh* You forgot me again.

Oan: I was so wrong.

Jerk: The French can remake old stories just like the Americans can.

Oan: Anyone can remake anything. And you know what? They should.

Jerk: It’s a tale as old as time.

Oan: And stories gain power through their retelling.

Jerk: Disney doesn’t own Beauty and the Beast.

Oan: Neither does Cocteau.

Both: Stories are owned by no one. [laugh]

Oan: I almost killed a fictional character.

Jerk: Almost.

Oan: With a wooden gun.

Jerk: A green…

Oan: Green gun.

Jerk: Yeah, green. You can chromakey any color on, but it’s…

Oan: Yeah, a-duh-duh-duh. Wanna end this in true Disney fashion? With a dance?

Jerk: Actually, let’s end it en francais. [They hold hands, kneel down slowly and raise up on their tiptoes like the ending of Cocteau’s film.]

Oan: Yeah, we can’t fly.

Jerk: Yeah, um, Disney ending?

Oan: Sure. Hey, Ven.

[Ven wakes up]

Oan: Wanna sing the last song?

[Ven grows overjoyed]

[The song starts as the credits roll.]

Ven:

Vincent Cassel's film,

David Pownall's play,

Golan-Globus too

Tried to make it new

With Miss De Morney.

David Lister, twice,

Meat Loaf videos,

Twilight Breaking Dawn,

Perlman, come on, Ron

Disney's and Cocteau's

Jean Cocteau once said,

And we say again,

“Film won't be an art

til they make its parts

Cheap as ink and pen.”

David Bowie's song,

Also Stevie Nicks,

Books around the world,

“Beastly” with that girl

From the Spring Break flick.

Films with Kevin James,

Some Australian show,

TV's Kreuk and Ryan

Monday nights at nine,

Disney and Cocteau.

Even the X-men,

It will never end.

Disney and Cocteau

Oan: [offscreen] Hey, Ven. You shall never sing in this town again!! [Ven laughs]

[Chez Apocalypse and Channel Awesome logos]

[Cut to Jerk and Oan by Clopin's Music Box]

Jerk: Tune in next time when we compare Disney's Hunchback of Notre Dame to Charles Laughton's.

[Cut to black with Caption: One Week Later; cut back]

Oan: Laughton wins. Jerk: [ashamed] I know.