Sleeping Beauty
Tags: good versus evil, fantasy

Plot synopsis:
After many childless years, King Stefan and Queen Leah happily welcome the birth of their daughter, the Princess Aurora. They proclaim a holiday for their subjects to pay homage to the princess, and at the gathering for her christening she is betrothed to Prince Phillip, the young son of Stefan's friend King Hubert, so that their kingdoms will always be united.
Among the guests are three good fairies called Flora, Fauna, and Merryweather, who have come to bless the child with gifts, beauty and song. Before Merryweather is able to give her blessing, the evil fairy Maleficent appears, only to be told she was unwanted. Maleficent turns to leave, but when Queen Leah asks if she's offended, the evil fairy curses the princess, proclaiming that Aurora will grow in grace and beauty, but before the sun sets on her sixteenth birthday, she will prick her finger on the spindle of a spinning wheel and die. King Stefan and Queen Leah are horrified and beg the three good fairies to break the curse. Unfortunately, they are not strong enough to break it, but Merryweather uses her blessing to weaken the curse so that instead of dying, Aurora will fall into a death-like sleep from which she can only be awakened by true love's kiss. King Stefan, still fearful for his daughter's life, orders all spinning wheels in the kingdom to be burned. The fairies do not believe that will be enough to keep Aurora safe, and so they spirit baby Aurora away to a woodcutter's cottage in the forest until the day of her sixteenth birthday.
Years later, Aurora, renamed Briar Rose, has grown into a beautiful teenage girl. On the day of her sixteenth birthday, the three fairies ask Rose to gather berries in the forest so they can prepare a surprise party for her. Rose is friends with the animals of the forest and sings them a song, Once Upon a Dream. While singing in the forest, Rose attracts the attention of Prince Phillip, now a handsome young man. He races to find the owner of the beautiful voice and is instantly struck by Rose's grace and beauty. Rose at first is frightened at the sudden appearance of the stranger, but Philip soon puts her at ease. They instantly fall in love, unaware of being betrothed years ago. Rose asks Phillip to come to her cottage that evening.
While she is out, Flora and Merryweather argue about the color of Aurora's ballgown. They fight, attracting the attention of Maleficent's raven and revealing the location of Aurora. Back at home, Briar Rose is thrilled to tell her guardians she met a man and fell in love. The fairies tell Aurora the truth about her heritage, that she is a princess and already betrothed, and tell her she must never see the man she met again. Heartbroken, she leaves the room. Meanwhile, Phillip tells his father of a peasant girl he met and wishes to marry in spite of his prearranged marriage to Princess Aurora. King Hubert fails to convince him otherwise, leaving Hubert in equal disappointment.
The fairies take Aurora back to the castle and leave her alone in a room to wait for her birthday celebrations where she will finally get to see her parents. Maleficent then appears and magically lures Aurora away from the fairies and tricks the princess into touching an enchanted spinning wheel. Aurora pricks her finger, completing the curse. The good fairies place Aurora on a bed in the highest tower and place a powerful spell on all the people in the kingdom, causing them to fall in a deep sleep until the spell on their princess is broken. While doing so, they overhear a conversation between the two kings. From King Hubert's conversation with King Stefan, the fairies realize that Prince Phillip is the man with whom Aurora has fallen in love. They rush to find him, but he is kidnapped by Maleficent who is waiting for him at the cottage in the woods. She shows Phillip the peasant girl he fell in love with is the now-sleeping princess. She tells him she plans to keep him locked away until he's an old man on the verge of death, then release him to meet his love, who will not have aged a single day.
The fairies find and release the prince, arming him with the magical Sword of Truth and the Shield of Virtue. Maleficent tries to stop Phillip by surrounding Aurora's castle with thorns but fails. She then transforms into a gigantic dragon to battle the prince herself. Ultimately, Phillip throws the sword, blessed by the fairies' magic, directly into Maleficent's heart, causing her to fall to her death.
Phillip awakens Aurora with a kiss, breaking the spell and thereby wakes everyone in the palace. The royal couple descends to the ballroom, where Aurora is happily reunited with her parents, while King Hubert is confused of how the two young royals met. Flora and Merryweather resume their argument over the color of Aurora's ball gown, magically changing it from blue to pink while the happy couple waltzes. The last color to appear is pink. Princess Aurora and Prince Phillip live happily ever after.

Review: Very cute. I remember the Jetlag productions with fondness, and Sleeping Beauty was one of the ones that I had vivid memories of. Re-watching it as part of my quest to re-visit the Jetlag, Golden Films and Burbank animations, my memories were mostly correct. The animation is quite good here, the backgrounds are colourful and the character designs especially that for Odelia are an improvement over those of Alice in Wonderland for example. The music score has many lovely whimsical moments, and I loved two of the three songs, Follow Your Heart especially is very sweet. The story is always charming in its tone, and the dialogue likewise without feeling overly-simplistic(again like Alice in Wonderland). Most of the characters are likable too, the best two being Primrose and Princess Felicity, both endearing and never annoying characters. That is not to say that this Sleeping Beauty is perfect though. Just Keep On Going is actually a good catchy song, but would've worked a million times better without the narration(which completely drowned out the last part) on top of it. I didn't care also for the character of Prince Richard, for me one of the Jetlag's silliest and more empty characters. Finally, the voice work while again far more emotive than Alice in Wonderland is inconsistent, the best cases were Aura and Amoratta, whose voices are fresh and charming, Felicity is suitably soothing and Primrose's high pitched voice worked for me. Odelia also wasn't too bad, the character herself is well animated and the dialogue is good, but there were times when the voice didn't quite fit the character, coming across as too nice. I didn't care for Melody, whose voice was more annoying than beautiful, or for Richard whose voice was just as bland as the character. Overall though, a cute Jetlag animation. 7/10 Bethany Cox