The plot of Cocteau's film revolves around Belle's father, who is sentenced to death for picking a rose from the Beast's garden.

[3] While scrubbing the floor at home, Belle is interrupted by her brother's friend Avenant, who tells her she deserves better and suggests they get married.

Belle rejects Avenant, as she wishes to stay home and take care of her father, who has suffered much since his ships were lost at sea and the family fortune along with them.

On entering the castle, he is guided by an enchanted candelabra that leads him to a laden dinner table where he falls asleep.

He gives Belle two magical items: a glove that can transport her wherever she wishes and a golden key that unlocks Diana's Pavilion, the source of the Beast's true riches.

He tells Belle that he gives her these precious items to show his trust in her, and says that if she does not return at the end of the week, he will die of grief.

Jealous of Belle's rich life at the castle, Adelaide and Felicie steal her golden key and devise a plan to turn Ludovic and Avenant against the Beast.

Distraught, Belle returns to the castle using the magic glove and finds the Beast in the courtyard, near death from a broken heart.

The set designs and cinematography were intended to evoke the illustrations and engravings of Gustave Doré and, in the farmhouse scenes, the paintings of Jan Vermeer.

In addition, Jean Cocteau thought that the audience would think that the head of a deer would be ridiculous for a dangerous, ferocious beast.

In Vincent Pinel's Century of Cinema, he writes (page 207), "With the complexity of the set designer Christian Bérard, the cinematographer Henri Alekan, and his "technical director" René Clément, Jean Cocteau filmed Beauty and the Beast (1946).

Upon the film's December 1947 New York City release, critic Bosley Crowther called the film a "priceless fabric of subtle images...a fabric of gorgeous visual metaphors, of undulating movements and rhythmic pace, of hypnotic sounds and music, of casually congealing ideas"; according to Crowther, "the dialogue, in French, is spare and simple, with the story largely told in pantomime, and the music of Georges Auric accompanies the dreamy, fitful moods.

The settings are likewise expressive, many of the exteriors having been filmed for rare architectural vignettes at Raray, one of the most beautiful palaces and parks in all France.

"[8] A 2002 Village Voice review found the film's "visual opulence" "both appealing and problematic", writing "Full of baroque interiors, elegant costumes, and overwrought jewelry (even tears turn to diamonds), the film is all surface, and undermines its own don't-trust-a-pretty-face and anti-greed themes at every turn.