Beauty and the Beast (1946)

Jean Cocteau's retelling of the classic fairytale is eerily, richly beautiful, with sets modelled on the gloriously detailed engravings of Gustave Doré. The set design alone is worth the price of admission. Jean Marais has a stunning turn as the prince cursed to take the form of a beast, but Josette Day is prone to overacting as Belle, and her character's development is too rushed to be entirely believable.

Perhaps most notable is Cocteau's unusual spin on the story's conclusion:

My story would concern itself mainly with the unconscious obstinacy with which women pursue the same type of man, and expose the naiveté of the old fairy tales that would have us believe that this type reaches its ideal in conventional good looks. My aim would be to make the Beast so human, so sympathetic, so superior to men, that his transformation into Prince Charming would come as a terrible blow to Beauty, condemning her to a humdrum marriage and a future that I summed up in that last sentence of all fairy tales: "And they had many children."

It works: La Bête's transformation gives more cause for disappointment than celebration; the ending as a whole is ambiguous and at best bittersweet.