Favorite Disney Princess Songs

[pap64]

Well, they were going to cut Part of Your World from The Little Mermaid. Show's what studio exec's know.

And all because Katzy saw a kid too much sugar on his blood drop his pop corn during the screening of it.

[darth_deetoo]

Yeah, absolutely ridiculous. I feel that some of the big musical numbers are the defining moments of Disney movies, and some of the greatest moments in movies full stop. Imagine Little Mermaid without Part of Your World, Beauty and the Beast without Belle or BATB, Aladdin without A Whole New World or Pocahontas without Colours of the Wind.

[Touchstone84]

Yeah, It is really hard to imagine 'The Little Mermaid' without 'Part of You World', or missing any of the other songs, since it is the intervowen musical numbers that truly makes it unique amongst cel animated feature films. This being a rather safe statement made retrospectively, of course.

[darth_deetoo]

I'm not quite sure where you get unique from, it doesn't do anything differently with the way the musical numbers are interwoven with the story than any other good musical does, such as Beauty and the Beast, or The Lion King or any others I could pick.

[Touchstone84]

I just don't find the narrative in 'The Little Mermaid' IMO to be as strong as those found in 'Beauty and the Beast' and 'The Lion King', both of whom I could easily envision without any musical numbers whatsoever.

[DisneyGirl22]

my top favorite princess song is Once Upon A Dream. The others are all pretty much tied for second place.
The song Im always surprised to catch myself humming is Beauty and the Beast. Im just not a fan of the movie, not a fan of Belle. Not sure why, I just never really was, but I still want to get a hold of the movie and give it another chance. I just know I saw it when I was much younger and didnt like it.

My favorite soundtrack period is the Lion King. Christmas after it came out, I was maybe 10? 9? I got the lion king blanket set, all the toys, a tent, sleeping bag and the tape. I killed that tape listening to it over and over and over. I havent seen the movie in years but all the time I catch myself singing songs from that movie. Thats one I especially cant wait to get on dvd.

[darth_deetoo]

I just don't find the narrative in 'The Little Mermaid' IMO to be as strong as those found in 'Beauty and the Beast' and 'The Lion King', both of whom I could easily envision without any musical numbers whatsoever.

I disagree with you there. I feel Beauty and the Beast moves forward much more through the music than The Little Mermaid does. The songs in The Little Mermaid don't really drive the story forward. In The Little Mermaid, I think the songs convey mood more than story. Ariel's yearning for the surface world, Sebastian's attempts to teach Ariel the error of her ways, Ursula's scheming, and the romance of Kiss the Girl.

Whereas in Beauty and the Beast, the songs all move the plot forward. Belle introduces the heroine and tells us her place in the town, and also introduces Gaston. Be Our Guest is really just a fun musical piece, probably more in line with the music from The Little Mermaid. Gaston shows us the plotting and scheming of the villain. Something There conveys the passing of time and the the blossoming romance between Belle and the Beast. Human Again conveys the hopes and dreams of the palace servants. Beauty and the Beast establishes the romance. And finally, The Mob Song sets up Gaston's manipulation of the townsfolk and their invasion of the castle. You couldn't take any of those songs out of Beauty and the Beast without leaving a huge hole in the plot. I think the very reason Beauty and the Beast performed so well on stage was because it was written like a stage musical.

As much as I like The Little Mermaid, and love the songs, I don't think any of the songs are absolutely essential to telling the story.

[Disney Duster]

Darth_deeto, you just proved Beauty and the Beast is just like The Little Mermaid in terms of reliance on music!

I shall dissect your post! I shall quote what you said yourself about both movie's songs, then write how they prove that The Little Mermaid's songs are much like Beauty and the Beast's!

Belle introduces the heroine and tells us her place in the town, and also introduces Gaston.

Ariel's yearning for the surface world

Yes, Belle introduces the characters, but it also has to do with Belle expressing what she wants, a different life, just like Ariel's song expresses what she wants, a different life. Belle reprise is only expressing what the heroine wants, as well. I'll admit, the first Beauty and the Beast song does have an advantage over The Little Mermaid in it's character intoducing, but what about the other songs?

Be Our Guest is really just a fun musical piece, probably more in line with the music from The Little Mermaid.

Sebastian's attempts to teach Ariel the error of her ways

I'd say Be Our Guest is close to the equivalent of Under the Sea, except Under the Sea is slightly more advancing in plot because it is Sebastian's attempt to keep Ariel away from humans and actually do the job King Triton wanted him to do (watch over Ariel, supervise her, keep her away from the surface).

Gaston shows us the plotting and scheming of the villain.

Ursula's scheming

Yes, Gaston's song includes the villain talking about himself and a little of his plot to get Belle. Poor Unfortunate Souls is a little about the villain (I admit that in the past I've been a nasty), and a lot about her plot to get Ariel. It is much more advancing because the whole song is the way Ursula gets Ariel to make the deal, all quick and flashy. She does a song and dance to keep Ariel in awe while she signs away her soul.

Something There conveys the passing of time and the the blossoming romance between Belle and the Beast.

the romance of Kiss the Girl

Yes, Kiss the Girl is just a shortened version of Something There. Eric and Ariel spent lots of time together before the song, but Kiss the Girl starts the actual romance, gets Eric to almost kiss Ariel, and really advances the plot by urging Ursula to take her own magical action in making sure Ariel loses the deal.

Human Again conveys the hopes and dreams of the palace servants.

You mean like how Ariel expressed her hopes and dreams to be part of that world, or Belle already expressed her dreams of adventure in a different place?

Beauty and the Beast establishes the romance.

Again, Kiss the Girl, only Kiss the Girl advanced the plot! What with being kissed being integral to Ariel's freedom, and the closeness of getting that kiss urging Ursula to take matters into her own tentacles.

And finally, The Mob Song sets up Gaston's manipulation of the townsfolk and their invasion of the castle.

This one does advance the plot a lot. However, it's very much like Poor Unfortunate Souls in that the villain is urging someone to do something. The Mob Song gets the villagers to do what Gaston wants, and Poor Unfortunate Souls gets Ariel to do what Ursula wants.

There! See, Mermaid's songs are as advancing, if not more so, than Beauty and the Beast's!

[pap64]

So can we all agree that nearly all of the Disney films (as well as film musicals) follow a general set of song archetypes that are used to move the plot forward?

[darth_deetoo]

You make some good points there. I think the difference between them is, that you could easily take the songs out of The Little Mermaid without losing the flow of the narrative. Part of Your World, although a wonderful song, doesn't actually tell us anything new. I'll give you that Under the Sea and Poor Unfortunate Souls are similar to Be Our Guest and Gaston.

I don't really see that Kiss The Girl advances the plot in anyway. It's just a romantic song, we've already established that she needs him to kiss her from the narrative beforehand.

Don't get me wrong, I love The Little Mermaid. It's my second favourite Disney film, but I think they'd refined the animated musical a little more by the time they did Beauty and the Beast.

[Touchstone84]

So can we all agree that nearly all of the Disney films (as well as film musicals) follow a general set of song archetypes that are used to move the plot forward?

Aye mate!

[Touchstone84]

I just don't find the narrative in 'The Little Mermaid' IMO to be as strong as those found in 'Beauty and the Beast' and 'The Lion King', both of whom I could easily envision without any musical numbers whatsoever.

I disagree with you there. I feel Beauty and the Beast moves forward much more through the music than The Little Mermaid does. The songs in The Little Mermaid don't really drive the story forward. In The Little Mermaid, I think the songs convey mood more than story. Ariel's yearning for the surface world, Sebastian's attempts to teach Ariel the error of her ways, Ursula's scheming, and the romance of Kiss the Girl.

Whereas in Beauty and the Beast, the songs all move the plot forward. Belle introduces the heroine and tells us her place in the town, and also introduces Gaston. Be Our Guest is really just a fun musical piece, probably more in line with the music from The Little Mermaid. Gaston shows us the plotting and scheming of the villain. Something There conveys the passing of time and the the blossoming romance between Belle and the Beast. Human Again conveys the hopes and dreams of the palace servants. Beauty and the Beast establishes the romance. And finally, The Mob Song sets up Gaston's manipulation of the townsfolk and their invasion of the castle. You couldn't take any of those songs out of Beauty and the Beast without leaving a huge hole in the plot. I think the very reason Beauty and the Beast performed so well on stage was because it was written like a stage musical.

As much as I like The Little Mermaid, and love the songs, I don't think any of the songs are absolutely essential to telling the story.

Perhaps I should clarify what I meant with the tricky word ’envision’ in my original post. I simply don’t mean to cut away the musical numbers as they do exist today, but rather imagine how it could have looked if the filmmakers would have chosen to abandon the musical concept altogether during production stage. What I said was that I find the musical score and songs in TLM to be so well integrated with the film as a whole that I can’t think of it in any other way. This is not meant in any way, shape or form as negative criticism of neither film mentioned (I am a fan of them all). For your information: I do enjoy ‘Beauty and the Beast’ more than ‘The Little Mermaid’.

[darth_deetoo]

Still not really getting what you mean to be honest. You could argue that you could remove the musical numbers from any Disney animation, and still tell the same story - I think in doing so, you'd also be removing what makes them Disney animation. Of course you could have a Beauty and the Beast story without the music, it's been done. There's nothing in The Little Mermaid that couldn't be done without music, but they wouldn't be the Disney films we know and love. But my point was, that if you take the films as they stand, you couldn't remove the songs from Beauty and the Beast and still understand the film, so much of it is conveyed from the film.

With The Little Mermaid, you could potentially remove all the songs except maybe Poor Unfortunate Souls, and there are still enough scenes in there that you would understand the rest of the plot.

[Disney's Divinity]

I don't think that's necessarily true. I'm not sure I could understand why Ariel cries over Triton breaking her human "treasures" or why she would want to sign away her soul without watching "Part of That World" or "Part of Your World (Reprise)," whereas I could easily understand Belle's dislike of the provincial, little town and her decision to switch places with her father in the Beast's prison without ever seeing "Belle" or "Belle (Reprise)." They're enjoyable, yes, but not necessary. "Under the Sea" and "Les Poissons" are probably the only "filler" songs in The Little Mermaid. "Kiss the Girl" may not be the most spectacular moment of the movie, but it sets up the romance that fuels Ursula's decision to become Vanessa (thus setting up the climax).

And, on a personal level, I think music sits better with The Little Mermaid simply because the entire plot revolves around the beauty and value of Ariel's voice. Not to mention that mermaids often go hand in hand with music in mythology. Either way, though, both movies are musicals and I wouldn't have wanted it any other way to be honest.

[darth_deetoo]

An argument with someone who has Belle as their avatar and sig and someone who has Ariel as theirs, about the artistic merits of Beauty and the Beast and The Little Mermaid is going nowhere. This is just going to go around and around in circles, and I think we just have to agree to disagree. I like both films, but I think Beauty and the Beast is by far the superior film, and the superior musical.

[jeremy88]

Okay fine...let me break it down for you two hehe since you guys are both biased because of the avatars hehe(that was a joke).

Let's start with Beauty and the Beast as a musical.

Belle- Now this song is the opening song for Beauty and the Beast, The towns people all have their say on what they think of Belle. What this song generally does is build up Belle's character so we get to know her and what she'sn all about. This song is very much along the lines of Part of Your World except the other characters are building up Belle's Character, instead of Belle telling the audience herself.

Belle(Reprise)- The reprise of Belle shows the protagonist Belle explaining what her life is really about and what she want's in life. This is somewhat similar to the Part of your World(reprise).

Be Our Guest- Be out Guest, this song really is a good song, but it doesn't really do anything that involves the whole point of the storyline. Okay so we have a bunch of house hold appliances and dishes singing about how Belle is their guest, and how a guest should be treated. I do like this song though

Gaston- The song Gaston, is basically the opposite of Belle it full on tell's about the antagonist's character Gaston about what he does and what he's all about, along with the other characters explaining and taking part in this song.

Something There- This is one of the films key songs, this number definitely does it's job developing Beast and Belle's liking for each other, and how they actually can manage to cooperate with one another, and how getting to know the other person is actually better then judging them at first meeting!

Human Again- So this is an added song, but I think it fits perfectly with the film. It is explained by the house hold appliances and other house...neccessities...that they can actually become HUMAN AGAIN! with Much Excitement!

Beauty and the Beast- Everyone's favorite love song Beauty and the Beast, this one culminates Something There, it shows how Beast and Belle were able to "fall in love" with each other and how ironic it is, because no one knew this was going to happen and it was a big surprise. It's the Tale as old as time...basically...

The Mob Song- Eh, this song annoys me. I'm not even going to go into detail other then it's a song about an angry mob off to kill the beast...no significance here.

Now let's continue with The Little Mermaid.

Fathoms Below- The opening song for The Little Mermaid, it doesn't do much here other then start off the story by telling the audience about Merpeople and their King.

Daughters of Triton- Another song that isn't important to the story. We do learn of Ariel's sisters and how they got their intersting "A" names. No real significance here.

Part of That World- Okay so now we get to the main point of the story, here it is explained by Ariel how she want's to be apart of human life and how interesting she thinks it is with her collection, she's kind of the odd merchick out and her "big mean father" isn't helping. This one, like Belle, builds up the main characters character.

Part of Your World(reprise)- Part of That World has been switched over to Part of Your World. Ariel saves Prince Eric, and she now has that as some like to say "school girl crush". There's nothing wrong with that, since most Disney Fairytales have an overrall rushed love story anyway. Back the point, this one explaines how she has a goal, and it adds to her reason as to why she wants to become human.

Under the Sea- Now we have this. What this one does is basically completely contradict Part of that World and it is sung by Sebastion on how to persuade Ariel to say Under the Sea. Though Im sure he's more concerned about staying out of trouble with King Triton.

Poor Unfortunate Souls- Ursula...the films Antagonist gets to have her number with this one. Here we have Ursula starting off buy explaining to Ariel, who she is and what she can do(the first part builds Ursula's Character more). The Second Half of Poor Unfortunate Souls, is directly pointed to Ariel to persuade her on why she should become human and its okay to go with out your voice. This is song is probably one of the stronger ones in The Little Mermaid, it both builds the villains character and moves along the storyline. (It kills two birds with one stone basically)

Le Poissons- This is a random song sung by Chef Louis, it doesn't really do anything other then tell how you can skewer innocent fish and stuff them with bread.

Kiss the Girl- One of those love songs extremely forced with romance. This is a harder one to look at, you can say that it does nothing to the storyline, yet it does help build a stronger love connection between Ariel and Eric, and show's Eric why he should go along with Ariel. So I think that's key to helping Eric's eventual culmination to forget about that mystery chick with the hot voice. Oh yeah...forgot to mention...it does make Ursula go to plan B. So I guess this one does advance the storyline.

Poor Unfortunate Souls(reprise)- This is the song that Vanessa/Ursula sings right? I never know what to call it lol. Anyways this one is a very short song, but it does help immensly move the story along with Ursula's plan. Thank God for Scuttle other wise The Little Mermaid would have went down the drain!

Alright there ya have it. An analyzation of the songs in Beauty and the Beast and The Little Mermaid.

With that I concur that Beauty and the Beast is the better Film, While the Little Mermaid is the better Musical, with stronger songs that both build everyones character while moving along the storyline at a smoother pace.

I won't go into detail why Beauty and the Beast is the better film. It's quite obviouse actually with a thicker storyline and deeper characters and a better sense of suspense? anticipation?. But besides the point I love both Beauty and the Beast and The Little Mermaid and there both really enjoyable movies.

-Jeremy:)

[darth_deetoo]

I think you're talking absolute rubbish, Beauty and the Beast is a far superior musical, and I'm sure Alan Menken and Howard Ashman would have shared those sentiments.

I state again, you could remove all the music, except perhaps Poor Unfortunate Souls from The Little Mermaid, and it would still make sense.

If you removed the music from Beauty and the Beast, you would be left with huge plot holes.

But I've got nothing else to say on this.

I know I'm right and Beauty and the Beast is the best Disney movie ever made.

[Chernabog_Rocks]

I agree with Disney's Divinity about the plot in Little Mermaid centering around Ariels voice. I think the songs in Little Mermaid are essential to it, because the movie does revolve around Ariels voice, and Sebastiens songs revolve more around him conducting plays/musicals all the time (or so I assume). But for Beauty and the Beast, I do agree slightly with Darth_Deeto. I think without the song Something There, it wouldn't be as good if the whole scene played out without them singing and instead was just talking or awkward silence Of course in Disney I think all of the songs do play a major or minor role in the movie, whether it's giving us insight into what a character is like or telling us more about them, or moving the plot along, of course there's also the odd song that is used for foreshadowing (like Best of Friends in Fox and The Hound). Anyways, I've always liked the following (in order of what pops into my head first)

1. Beauty and The Beast
2. Whole New World
3. Part of Your World (Reprise)
4. Where Do I Go From Here
5. Sing Sweet Nightengale

Another song that seems to pop into my head for no reason is "I Wonder" from Sleeping Beauty, not sure why but I've been singing it in my head the last couple of days.

[darth_deetoo]

BTW, in case you didn't pick up on it - my last post was tongue in cheek.

I don't really see much point debating this any further. For me, Beauty and the Beast is the better film in all respects, but..... I love The Little Mermaid.

These two films are two of my favourite films, animated or otherwise, so I really don't see the point in arguing which is better.

Probably the reason I'm such a vocal supporter of Beauty and the Beast is because it was the film which got me interested in animation as an adult and reintroduced me to Disney. It was the first Disney film I watched as an adult, and it is high on the list of my favourite films of all time.

And Belle is gorgeous!

[jeremy88]

Thank God your last post was tongue an cheek lol. I was about to be like...."okay, there is no point in discussing with Darth_Deeto" lol)

Lets put it this way.

In Disney movies(applying to the ones with major musical numbers, that are considered animated musicals) You need the songs. Other wise you'll have flat 2-dimensional characters(no pun intended) that have no point in the overrall storyline, not to mention major plot-holes, so it doesnt just apply to BATB, TLM it go's for Aladdin, TLK, Pocahontas, Mulan, THBND, and like...other major musicals circa late 80's and on through the 90's. They need their songs.

In like..critical eyes, you can nit pick and pin point the differences and how which one is better then the other. (but of course even the most professional critic can very much differ from anothers opinion this goes back to "everyones a critic")

But since were both fans and enjoy both movies, in this case, there is no point in arguing which is the better film or musical. So yeah Darth_Deeto, its good to be fans