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The Scarlet Flower 1952 Soviet Animated Movie: Why You Should Ask For Permission Before Taking Things That Don't Belong To You?

Tuesday, October 11, 2016
The Scarlet Flower (#ad) (Аленький цветочек, Alenkiy Tsvetochek in Russian) is a 1952 Soviet animated film that is loosely based on the fairy tale story of Beauty and the Beast.

If you know said fairytale or even the Disney version, there might be no need to consider the scenes discussed here as possible spoilers for the movie. This is about an incident that happens in the film and that seems like it could be classified as a plothole of sorts.

the scarlet flower, 1952 soviet animated movie, film

Is there a plot hole in The Scarlet Flower movie?

Stefan, the father of the female main character, arrives on an island where he soon finds the scarlet flower that his youngest daughter wants.

Naturally, he goes and gets the flower, and, of course, immediately gets into trouble for it as the island and flower belong to the Beast. It was wrong of Stefan to try and take the flower even if he has a good reason for doing so. But I wonder if he can really be blamed for what he did.

Was Stefan being invited to steal the scarlet flower?

Prior to him finding the item in question, Stefan was exploring and walking around the house. Doors readily opened as he walked by, allowing him to pass through until he got to where The Scarlet Flower was.

Doesn’t that seem like an invitation to you? It’s like he was being invited to come and see the flower and even try and obtain it. After all, if the Beast didn’t want anyone touching or even being near his flower, then why would he let Stefan find it?

Why didn’t Stefan ask for permission before taking something that doesn’t belong to him?

Of course, Stefan was at fault too. He could and should have asked for permission before picking the flower.

After all, he knew there was an unseen host somewhere and that the entire place was magical what with the food suddenly showing up in front of him and the floating music and the like.

But, then again, this is a fairytale story so perhaps these kinds of things are to be expected since, obviously, Stefan needed to take the flower so that he could get in trouble and so that his daughter, Nastenka, the ‘Beauty’ in the film, could eventually meet up with the Beast.


*Notes:
- Image with added text was modified by Freya Yuki (CC:BY-SA) based on the image by MizuSasori (CC:BY-SA) from deviantArt
- Red flowers in the image are meant to symbolize the scarlet flower while the figure in said pic is meant to represent Nastenka
- YouTube video features a scene from said film

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