Beauty and the Beast

Disney classics are simple films with enough heart and charm that has lasted with fans both old and new for decades. In our modern day Disney, their trend to making live action adaptations of those classics signal lack of original ideas and ask the question: Why fix something that isn't broken? The majority of these Disney remakes are failures (Maleficient, Alice in Wonderland, and Cinderella) while others have succeeded (The Jungle Book and 101 Dalmatians (1996)). The next piece of our childhood entry for that treatment is Beauty and the Beast, one of my Disney favorites. Looking at the overly commercialized trailers, the visuals and cast looked nice but would also contain the risk of following what happened with the Cinderella remake: making the experience longer by adding things that improved some details while creating unintentional flaws that would ruin the experience. While knowing this adaptation wouldn't match up to the 1991 original masterpiece that was nominated for a Best Picture award (when Best Animated Feature wasn't created yet), it would most likely make the older audience members feel like a kid. I went into the heavily crowded theater ready to see what it would present to me and I left with an bigger appreciation for the original while having enjoyed a little bit of what was shown despite the problems it unintentionally set.

Please note I will do my best to limit my comparisons to the 1991 animated movie from this point on.

Plot: The story follows an inventors daughter who becomes a prisoner of a cursed prince in order to save her father after his actions got him in trouble. Basically any Disney fan who has seen the animated movie knows what's going to happen since this follows the story beat by beat. There are new scenes added in to help expand on some minor details such as new details about the curse. There are some unintentional problems created with a few of these additions such as one that is used only and never brought up again. The visuals shown throughout the story are very impressive and gorgeous enough to overlook the flaws and enjoy the experience in the large set pieces. One of the issues here is how much time passes throughout the film due to some events being rushed as well as a weird ordering of these events. The movie also highlights the differences the animation styles used as the original had traditional well made drawings while this adaptation uses CGI and that contrast affects the movements of the castle servants. All of that aside, the retelling of this story will make audiences recall their memories of witnessing the classic charm Disney Renaissance movies are famous for. Sometimes there might be a dark moment or two where the movie might overstep only a little bit for a family movie, but there's enough visuals and songs to compensate for that. Overall the plot Beauty and the Beast follows beat by beat of the 1991 original that has added new scenes to flesh out the characters and mythos as well as never forgetting about the charm it provides to family entertainment.

Characters: The characters to focus on in Beauty and the Beast are Gaston (Luke Evans), LeFou (Josh Gad), Beast (Dan Stevens), and Belle (Emma Watson). Gaston is an admired but narcissistic former soldier who's fixated on Belle's hand in marriage. Luke Evans does an excellent job with his portrayal of that proud macho stereotype and you can tell he's having fun being so full of himself as well as being devious to get what he wants. LeFou is Gaston's flamboyant homosexual sidekick who admires the him and wants to be acknowledged by him for going along with his schemes. Josh Gad not only does a great job but is highly entertaining in every scene he's in and is quick to remind you on his scene stealing ability. For those of you concerned about LeFou being gay, you have nothing to worry about since it doesn't really affect the plot, there is only one tiny 20 second moment, and he's given a little more depth in his admiration of Gaston. Beast is a spoiled prince afflicted with a transformation curse where he must learn to love and earn it in return before the last petal of an enchanted rose falls in order to free himself, his castle, and his servants from the enchantresses spell. Dan Stevens provides a great performance with his role, the characters design looks slightly different but in a good way, and the addition details in this adaptation helps flesh him out a little more. Belle is a young, spirited inventors daughter who becomes a prisoner of Beast in order to save her father. Emma Watson's performance, unfortunately, is very lackluster in her emotionally delivery most of the time. The actress has been type cast as a certain bookworm character for eight films that it initially appeared to be a good casting choice but since the weight of this role is another reason audience members enjoy the original, there's no room to be lazy with connecting to audience members in this adaptation. Her character shares much better chemistry with her father than the Beast and while the former shares great scenes, the latter leaves much to be desired mainly due to Watson's minimum emotional effort to make the audience care about the relationship, which isn't helped by the directing since the director did two of the Twilight movies. To be honest, my favorite scene with her character is when Beast hits her with a large snowball in their snowball fight. Honorable mentions go to Maurice (Kevin Kline) and Cogsworth (Ian McKellan) for their wonderful performances as well as displaying a heartfelt charm and gruff but funny comedic presence resepectively. Overall the cast and characters in Beauty and the Beast work really well in delivering welcome entertaining comedy, heartfelt emotion, and a likable charm (for the most part).

Songs: The songs in Beauty and the Beast are another reason the original is a classic and in this adaptation the effort put into these pieces are very impressive. Personal favorites from the original are presented in an entertaining manner in this adaptation such as "Be Our Guest" and "Gaston". One factor to keep in mind is that Emma Watson, who has the least amount of singing experience, had help from an autotune machine for her songs and it's hard not to notice. The songs from the original are in this adaptation with a few new pieces added and they are pretty nice. They are all elevated into becoming full blown broadway musical styles. Overall the songs in Beauty and the Beast deliver what audiences expect from the classic original.

Overall Consensus: Beauty and the Beast carries the Disney magic fans would expect from it while telling the original animated movie story beat by beat, using gorgeous visuals, some enjoyable songs, and some great casting choices to entertain the whole family. ⭑⭑⭑

Reasons to watch it: You like Emma Watson, Luke Evans, Josh Gad, and/or Dan Stevens. You like the 1991 original Beauty and the Beast and want to see how this adaptation treats the material. You like Disney live action adaptations. You like movies that have songs involved. You only care about the visuals and/or songs with Beauty and the Beast. You want to watch an entertaining family movie that will deliver the Disney magic you grew up with. You want to see a shot for shot remake of a classic.

Reasons to avoid it: You don't like any of the aforementioned actors. You don't like Beauty and the Beast. You don't like Disney live action adaptations. You don't like movies that have songs involved. You don't like movies that are a shot for shot remake of original classics.

Coming up next: March Mayhem has experienced an old retired superhero's last mission, a dangerous encounter with gorilla warfare, and a trip into the Beasts castle. At this point, with three entries out of the way, the next entry will very likely hit me harder with nostalgia than Beauty and the Beast. Will this upcoming movie be a good reboot launching point for potential movie series? Will it honor the spirit of the source material better than the most recent tv seasons ever did? I will find out next weekend as March Mayhem will conclude with Power Rangers!!!