have a theory that belle from beauty and the beast is actually in an insane asylum and it's all a hallucination! I'll tell you why... If you listen to the opening song she doesnt like the town she lives in.. she also finds the people around her to be insignificant.. all of the people talking in the song are from belle's point of view.. she says that everyday they do the same thing.. That's how she knows what they are going to say.. most of them dont even interact with her.. but everyday they do the same exact thing..the whole song talks about how she is a " beauty but a funny girl".. she's not telling jokes.. funny wouldve been a term for crazy.. why? Because what were asylums called in the 18th-19th century ( this is her time line given)? Looney bins.. but why is she crazy? It cant be because she reads? The town has a bookstore which means that reading is quite common in the community and is encouraged.. if it weren't then they wouldnt have a bookstore.. however I do believe that it is the reason she was sent to the asylum and that's why she thinks this is what everyone is thinking about her.. Belle is 16yrs old, in 18th-19th century Paris, and at that time she should have been married by now.. it wouldve been the normal thing to do and probably what girls her age were into and dreamt about.. this is also why no body has a problem with gaston wanting to marry her.. gaston is like 30, and wants to marry a teenager, at that time it was normal.. I think her parents thought she had mental issues because she didn't want to be married and only wanted to read her books.. reading is her escape to a more adventurous life.. she is probably from a well off family and is sent to the institution to be cured.. they show the entire town but you never see the insane asylum that comes to get her father.. she walks through the whole town..no asylum.. I think the bookstore owner is her physiologist and if she repeats everyday, doing the same thing including reading the same book 3 times in a row then she's been there for 3 days already.. the bookstore owner is the only one not in the loop, and the only one to actually hold a conversation with her.. he also couldn't be doing the same thing everyday because the conversation holds an element of time past.. Her father is more than likely not her real father.. the towns people know him as crazy old maurice.. the inventor.. so they must have known him for years.. but doesnt know that he has a 16yr old daughter.. the townspeople also know belle well enough that they have formed the opinion that she is peculiar and not like them.. yet doesnt know shes the inventor's daughter until she mentions it to gaston.. her "father" is more than likely a patient who has been at the facility a long time.. he was more than likely an inventor and thought to be eccentric and his family had him committed.. I believe that the asylum must be on the country side and they probably had horses.. horses were used as therapy animals way before dogs ever were.. they probably have him take care of them so that he is calm and busy so he won't keep inventing things that blow up.. when we are first introduced to him, he blows himself up with his invention.. he also says that it's his only reason why the things he creates dont work.. because he works with the animals his housing wouldve been separate from the others, like his house is in the film and he wouldve taken them on rides through the forest that surrounded them.. since belle cant venture out with him, she views him as going on a journey to sell his invention.. his long time dream... belle most likely reminds him of his daughter and they bond over reading and the endless possibilities it creates.. she has no problem viewing him as her father because hes older and he understands her and encourages her appetite for reading unlike her real parents.. when he leaves on the horse one day he goes on a different path then what he usually takes and stumbles upon a detached part of the hospital.. and what's in this building.. the most extreme and derailed patients.. why? Back in that time asylums were too over crowded with not enough staff.. so it would make sense that they would isolate the patients that were the hardest to control and not really deal with them.. and you couldn't have these patients around less violent ones because it would cause huge problems for everyone.. the wolves that attack her father are some of these ignored deranged people.. they are shown twice and both times it's the same ones and the same amount.. and while they fear the beast they still attack him too.. I think the beast is also a patient but is held in this special unit because hes a psychopath and dangerous.. but why so dangerous you might ask.. When the beast is introduced it says 10year ago he was cursed into being the beast.. or forced to become him.. and he has until his 21st birthday to find love.. that makes him 11 when this happens.. so because an 11 year old prince was a asshole to a witch she cursed him?? Not likely? The witch is his mom.. she had him committed because he was a psychopath and didnt show empathy to anyone or thing and he will be released at 21 because that's when he is considered an adult and the institution cant keep him past this point.. the whole part about the witch turning beautiful and putting a curse on him is how he viewed his mom.. she didnt matter to him until she sent him away and then he realized how much he cared for her, eventhough it was too late.. he had till 21 to learn how to love others or else he would always be an unlovable person.. Hes been put away and forgotten.. people fear him and he probably murdered someone to be honest and why he is labeled beast.. children are viewed as innocent so if he was a child murderer then they probably thought it was the work of the devil.. who is also referred to as a beast.. Gaston is probably another patient in the facility that likes her and hits on her alot.... Lumiere and the clock are what she probably used to find her way around that part of the hospital..this is the 18th-19th century and theres no electricity.. so she would've use a candle holder, the clock she probably grabbed so she knew when she had to be back..its why the clock is much more serious.. its plausible that she couldve left and nobody notice she was missing.. and when she realized this she stopped needing the clock and doesnt really acknowledge it anymore and the clock also starts to soften as a character. . The orderly you see that comes to retrieve her father in the movie is probably the doctor at the facility and why maurice is afraid of him.. also gaston tells belle that the asylum will do experiments on her father if he has him committed.. this wouldnt have been public knowledge, only in-house knowledge, because if it were it wouldve gotten shut down.. people dont willingly send other people to be experimented on and tortured.. Mrs. pots is likely the nurse of the beast or the only one willing to deal with him, so she basically the only person who checks on those patients.. she probably has been his nurse from day 1... she is always helping and encouraging him.. she is the most invested in making sure he knows love and changes before his time is up.. he always listens to her and she has a huge influence on how he behaves.. she is also the ONLY one to be athoratative with him.. he respects her and allows her to be this influence on him. Him dying is him being released from the hospital.. gaston attacks him because belle want to go with him and if they got married then she could leave with him.. belle's words of I love you is what broke his inability to love.. because even murderers and those we deem as beasts just want to be loved..