Lady Althea (Joyce Taylor) travels to greet her fiancée, Duke Eduardo (Mark Damon) only to find he has been cursed to turn into a beast at night. The Duke, with the help of Baron Orsini, Althea, and her father, must find a cure for his condition before Prince Bruno (Michael Pate) reveals the secret and takes the thrown.
This fantasy production’s greatest flaw is its title, as it prepares the viewer for the classic fairytale, to which this has only the slightest connection. This Beauty and the Beast is a werewolf story (minus the nasty killing part), placed in the middle ages, and constructed for family viewing. Eduardo is not an angry monster; he’s unchanged by day, and only takes on the physical attributes of a classic cinema werewolf (hair, fangs, claws, but still humanoid) at night. He is always in complete control and never does anything that isn’t noble. Except for an emphasis on love, and some torch-wielding townspeople, you won’t find much you recognize from any of the myriad versions of the folk story.
You will get a brightly colored, rather slow movie which couldn’t offend anyone. The acting is middle of the road, and the dialog is nothing your will remember after the credits. The sets—castles and fairytale streets—look fake, but are colorful and attractive. There’s a nice moral at the end for children, which may even touch adults who are in a non-cynical state of mind.
Producer Robert E. Kent, whose output was uneven at best, worked on this the same year as the more famous Jack the Giant Killer and it is easy to see the connection. The two could be considered companion pictures, having the same look, and aiming for the same audience.
While I may be pushing the G-rated nature of the movie, it isn’t all pabulum for kids. The assumption that the the duke may have sold his soul to Satan and now spends his nights practicing black masses introduces a welcome sinister edge. There’s also an attempted murder and a story of a man walled-up as a penalty for not bowing to the crown. There’s enough here to take this out of the children-only category. This isn’t Beauty and the Beast, but it is passable family entertainment.
Horror fans should note that the beast makeup was created by the legendary Jack P. Pierce. Decades earlier he had invented the look for the Universal monsters Frankenstein, Dracula, The Mummy, and The Wolf Man. The beast resembles The Wolf Man, though with a more questionable wig. Pierce is the most important makeup artist in the history of film, but his later years were not golden, and he ended his career working on B-movies and TV shows.