“The madwoman has received your grace.”

– Nannina

Just before leaving home for a business trip, a father asks his three daughters what he can bring them as a return gift. The eldest two ask for silly, extravagant things. A monkey! A parrot! The youngest simply wishes the most beautiful flower which the father finds in an enchanted garden, guarded by a terrible beast. And will pay for with his life unless he gives his youngest away to the beast, to die in his place.

– Can such miracles really happen? – You and I are living proof.

#Cocteau and Clément's La Belle et la Bête is of course based on Gabrielle-Suzanne Barbot de Villeneuve's fairy-tale, which on its turn was based on the classic myth of Cupid and Psyche.

With their mother bedridden, Elisabeth (Nicole Stéphane) nurtures her snowball-fight-injured brother Paul (Edouard Dermithe) back to health.

“Their heritage of instability, extravagant caprice, and natural elegance was their paternal portion.”

– Jean Cocteau, Les enfants terribles (1929)

Withdrawn in their family home, they form a strong manipulative bond, drawing others into their games.

– Does he crawl on four legs? What does he eat and drink?

– I've given him water to drink on occasion. He would never eat me.

#Cocteau's Orpheus – here the mythological poet and musician is personified by Jean Marais – accompanies a fallen young poet transported to the Underworld by car. The car radio plays fragments of poetry, interrupted by #MorseCode. When back in this world, #Orphée obsesses over the lines of radical poetry he heard and returns to the car's radio to retrieve them.

“Sleeping or dreaming, the dreamer must accept his dreams.”

– The Princess

Morse code and other industrial sounds serve as a soundscape for Cocteau's characters. They swerve in and out of it, sometimes fully aware of them (#Orpheus himself is attuned to the #poetry to be found in emergency radio broadcasts), by times passing through like a mirage.