History YMMV / Cinderella

** For many viewers, this film has thoroughly displaced the original fairy tale in any form. Whenever a new adaptation appears with a Cinderella whose looks and costumes are very different from Disney's, there tends to be disgruntled confusion about why Cinderella isn't blonde (neither Perrault's version nor the Grimms' ever mentions her hair color) or why her ball dress isn't blue (both Perrault and the Grimms describe the dress as gold and silver – and even in this film, it's actually silver, with only product tie-ins making it blue).

*** Derision of Cinderella as weak for not leaving also carries ''massive'' Unfortunate Implications at the end of the day; she's a young woman being physically, mentally, and ''financially'' abused and isolated by her wealthy, influential family; and needing some outside help and resources to finally escape them is not something a real-life person in a similar situation should be ashamed of.

* MisBlamed: Fans of the {{Grimmifi|cation}}ed version of ''Cinderella'' tend to accuse Disney of toning the story down by skipping over the gory scenes. Actually, the version Disney chose to adapt is the version written by Creator/CharlesPerrault, which didn't have any gore to begin with. The Grimm's version was also written over a century after Perrault's.

* AdaptationDisplacement: The Grimm brothers and the Charles Perrault version (which Disney adapted) are the most known versions of the tale. The Perrault version was published centuries before the Grimm brothers were even born. It's debatable, but the "original version" is thought to be either from Ancient Greece or Ancient China.

* {{Squick}}: Anastasia squeezing her foot into the slipper looks quite disconcertingly like foot-binding.

* AlternativeCharacterInterpretation: Cinderella's father barely has a presence in most versions of the tale, and as such his inaction can be interpreted in many ways that has varied between adaptations. The Perrault version states that Cinderella dares not tell her father because he is completely under the stepmother's thumb and wouldn't believe her, suggesting that he's unaware how badly she's being treated. The Grimm version has the father refer to Cinderella as a servant, implying he is indifferent to her. Some retellings have interpreted him in a more sympathetic light, usually by turning him into a HenpeckedHusband who is afraid of the stepmother or a busy man who is always traveling. The most popular one is to just [[DeathByAdaptation kill him off]], since it resolves this question and isolates Cinderella completely.

* AlternativeCharacterInterpretation: Cinderella's father barely has a presence in most versions of the tale, and as such his inaction can be interpreted in many ways that has varied between adaptations. The Perrault version states that Cinderella dares not tell her father because he is completely under the stepmother's thumb and wouldn't believe her, suggesting that he's unaware how badly she's being treated. The Grimm version has the father refer to Cinderella as a servant, implying he is indifferent to her. Most retellings have interpreted him in a more sympathetic light, usually by turning him into a HenpeckedHusband who is afraid of the stepmother or a busy man who is always traveling. Another popular one is to just [[DeathByAdaptation kill him off]], since it resolves this question and isolates Cinderella completely.

* AdaptationDisplacement: The Grimm brothers and the Charles Perrault version (which Disney adapted) are the most known versions of the tale. The Perrault version was published centuries before the Grimms brothers were even born. It's debatable, but the "original version" is thought to be either from Ancient Greece or Ancient China.

* AdaptationDisplacement: The Grimms brothers and the Charles Perrault version (which Disney adapted) are the most known versions of the tale. The Perrault version was published centuries before the Grimms brothers were even born. It's debatable, but the "original version" is thought to be either from Ancient Greece or Ancient China.

** To a small but still noticeable extent, Cinderella herself. Some like her for being an [[AllLovingHeroine all-loving]] NiceGirl who -- despite coming from an awful home -- always looks on the bright side of things. Others, however, hate her for being a bland VanillaProtagonist with no personality outside of being a nice girl with an awful home life.

* LauncherOfAThousandShips: Though not quite the shipping magnet as newer Disney royalty such as [[WesternAnimation/Frozen2013 Elsa]] or [[WesternAnimation/TheLittleMermaid1989 Ariel]], Cinderella gets treated this way a lot (especially when compared to the other two 'classic' princesses). A good portion of this is thanks to the [[WesternAnimation/CinderellaIIIATwistInTime third film]]. It's one of the best received Disney made-for-video sequels. Fans really took to Cinderella's {{Xenafication}} and more in-depth characterization, which boosted her popularity and subsequently how shippable she is.

* EnsembleDarkHorse: The Grand Duke is well liked for being a side character. It's because he's the source of some of the films funniest moments as well as having a great deal of common sense, such as pointing out how the slipper might fit girls other than Cinderella, plus he's probably the first character outside of Cinderella's animal friends to treat her with kindness and defend her from Lady Tremaine.

** Some viewers hold it up as a true Disney classic and recognise it as the studio's return to form after the troubling World War II years. Others find it bland and unmemorable -- it has notably less of a cult base than ''WesternAnimation/AliceInWonderland'', ''WesternAnimation/SleepingBeauty'' or ''WesternAnimation/LadyAndTheTramp''.

** The biggest one is Lady Tremaine. Fans are split on whether or not she's one of the [[LoveToHate best]] or [[TheScrappy worst]] Disney villains. Some fans find her to be an entertaining villain and an accurate depiction of an AbusiveParent while others hate her for abusing her Cinderella and (debatably) her own daughters and just want her off the screen. It doesn't help that [[NeverLiveItDown most of the bile she gets is from the scene where she breaks Cinderella's glass slipper]].

** As suggest above, it's probably a vainly veiled excuse because she suspects/knows Jaq will screw it up.

** This version was {{Bowdlerize}}d from the original version... except this is actually specifically stated to be based off the Perrault version -- ''not'' the Grimms brothers version. (Which itself is not the "Original" version either - Perrault published his tale in the 1690s -- the Grimms brothers collected theirs in the 19th century.)

!! General

*** Among the criticisms of her character are the fact Cinderella doesn't stand up for herself. Actually, she does - on multiple occasions, Cinderella stands up to her step-family only to be shot down. She also regularly sasses Lucifer, at one point even chasing him down after he [[KickTheDog trashed the floor she worked so hard on cleaning]].
*** Cinderella's own EstablishingCharacterMoment does not mention marriage or the prince at all - just that she is rebelling by being kind and continuing to dream ''despite'' the obvious as day abuse she is being subjected to. She doesn't get rewarded by fighting her way out... she is rewarded because she was kind to the mice and birds.

* EnsembleDarkhorse: The Grand Duke is well liked for being a side character. It's because he's the source of some of the films funniest moments as well as having a great deal of common sense, such as pointing out how the slipper might fit girls other than Cinderella, plus he's probably the first character outside of Cinderella's animal friends to treat her with kindness and defend her from Lady Tremaine.

** A few people have interpreted the “Leave the sewing to the women” line as the female mouse not wanting Jaq to help out of fear he’ll screw up, since a male mouse is seen on the sewing team in a later shot.

** To a small but still noticeable extent, Cinderella herself. Some like her for being an [[AllLovingHeroine all-loving]] NiceGirl who - despite coming from an awful home - always looks on the bright side of things. Others, however, hate her for being a bland VanillaProtagonist with no personality outside of being a nice girl with an awful home life.

** Some viewers hold it up as a true Disney classic and recognise it as the studio's return to form after the troubling World War II years. Others find it bland and unmemorable - it has notably less of a cult base than ''WesternAnimation/AliceInWonderland'', ''WesternAnimation/SleepingBeauty'' or ''WesternAnimation/LadyAndTheTramp''.

** This version was {{Bowdlerized}} from the original version... except this is actually specifically stated to be based off the Perrault version - ''not'' the Grimms brothers version. (Which itself is not the "Original" version either - Perrault published his tale in the 1690s - the Grimms brothers collected theirs in the 19th century.)
** Cinderella proves her identity by putting on the glass slipper...except not really. In the film, it's clear that fitting the slipper is just a formality; what proves her identity is that she produces the ''other'' glass slipper when the first one breaks. Furthermore, the Grand Duke recognizes her.

!![[{{Film/Cinderella}} Other versions]]

* HoYay: As Cinderella's animal friends are listening to her rhapsodize about the Prince after the ball, Gus snuggles up against Jaq, who dreamily wraps his arm around him, but then realizes what he's doing and pulls away in "no homo"-style irritation.

** The Fairy Godmother's entire appearance after the stepsisters destroy Cinderella's dress. Specifically when they first meet, the Fairy Godmother strokes Cinderella's hair as she cries.

** Cinderella plans to wear a pink dress to the ball, but ends up wearing a white one. Although it's shades of white in the film, it's coloured blue in merchandise. This is hilarious when one thinks of the [[WesternAnimation/SleepingBeauty next Disney Princess]] - whose fairy godmothers had a war over whether her dress should be blue or pink. And the one who changes her dress from pink in this film is voiced by Verna Felton - who voices the fairy that wants to keep Aurora's dress pink.

* ValuesDissonance: Many modern readers of the book and viewers of the film complain about Cinderella being passive and being a submissive servant to her stepfamily. However, these complaints greatly ignore the context of the time period the story's set in, where there were not a lot of options for women. If Cinderella told off her stepfamily for their treatment of her or ran away, she would have wound up on the streets and most likely end up in an even ''worse'' situation, such as forced prostitution. Plus, you'd imagine critics would find Cinderella too unsympathetic to like or root for. Staying with her stepfamily and putting up with the abuse was the LesserOfTwoEvils for Cinderella until the events of the story [[TakeAThirdOption gave her the chance to escape her abusers while not ending up homeless]].

** The Fairy Godmother makes a bit of a production out of giving Cinderella what she needs for the ball. Is she just a bit of a CloudCuckooLander (as the 2015 remake seems to think)? Or is she intentionally making the scene entertaining to cheer Cinderella up from the horrible thing her stepsisters did to her?

** Cinderella's dog is named Bruno. 71 years later, there would be [[WesternAnimation/Encanto another Disney movie with a character who goes by that name]] and a certain hugely popular song from said film about not talking about him.

** Cinderella is often held up as a weak character who [[WinsByDoingAbsolutelyNothing sits back and waits for the prince to rescue her]]... largely because of the ''perception'' she is. See WhatMeasureIsANonBadass below.

* WhatMeasureIsANonBadass: Cinderella is generally used as the UrExample of the "weak, passive" DamselInDistress PrincessClassic that gets bashed in this feminist era. [[WesternAnimation/SnowWhiteAndTheSevenDwarfs Snow White]] and [[WesternAnimation/SleepingBeauty Aurora]] tend to get more leeway since Snow White ''does'' flee from her abusive home life in her movie while Aurora was cursed with an enchanted sleep throughout most of hers, in addition to both films featuring some action sequences, even if they were performed by other characters, whereas the closest thing ''Cinderella'' has to one is the confrontations between Lucifer and the mice. And while ''WesternAnimation/CinderellaIIIATwistInTime'' does make her more action-oriented, it can be argued that the sequel is expanding on character traits that were already there in the first film - namely Cinderella's SilkHidingSteel persona. Walt Disney himself felt that Cinderella was a strong character in her own way - noting that she ''didn't'' wait for her prince, "she went right over and got him".

** The biggest one is Lady Tremaine. Fans are split on whether or not she's one of the [[LoveToHate best]] or [[TheScrappy worst]] Disney villains. Some fans find her to be an entertaining villain and an accurate depiction of an AbusiveParent while others hate her for abusing her Cinderella and (debatably) her own daughters and just want her off the screen. It doesn't help that [[NeverLiveItDown most of the bile she gets is from the infamous scene where she breaks Cinderella's glass slipper]].