Beauty and The Beast

So there are a good amount of movies that I need to review right now and I'm incredibly behind on all of them. This is actually the most recent film that I saw and I probably shouldn't be reviewing this one first, but this film is fascinating to me and there is a lot to talk about. It also doesn't help that it's the most current of the films that I'm reviewing and those are always more fun anyway.

So when I was a kid Beauty and the Beast was not my favorite of the Disney classic cartoons, but more recently I have revisited it in both the cartoon form and the musical on stage and it has begun to climb the ranks of my favorite Disney films so this remake could not have come at a better time.

This has been a remake I've been tracking for a long time because the cast is so strongly picked out. From Emma Watson, Ewan McGregor, Ian Mckellen, Luke Evans, Josh Gad, Kevin Kline, and so many more, this is a stacked cast the truth is, it had a lot riding on it.

On top of that, the fad of Disney remaking all their classic cartoons into live action films has had it's ups and downs from the great ones like Cinderella and The Jungle Book, to the not so great ones like Malificent and everything involving Alice and Wonderland. This was a film I think everyone was looking forward to.

Beauty and the Beast follows the story of Belle (played by Emma Watson), a young woman living in a small village in France with her father Maurice (played by Kevin Kline). Belle longs for adventure and "so much more than the provincial life" she has had in this village. The entire village thinks she is odd but the town hero Gaston (played by Luke Evans) sees Belle as the best bride for him and he and his side kick Lefou (played by Josh Gad) will stop at nothing to get her to marry Gaston.

Belle eventually finds her way to a magical castle and is eventually taken prisoner by the head of the castle, a mysterious Beast (played by Dan Stevens) who first imprisons her father for stealing a rose from his castle grounds. The castle is populated by the former staff who were transformed into household items like a clock, a candelabra, a tea pot, a harpsicord, and a dresser. The staff want desperately to become human again and that can only happen if the spell is broken.

The whole movie follows pretty closely to the original cartoon film and teaches the lesson that beauty comes from within and Stockholm syndrome is very, very real... or something like that, as Belle comes to know her captor and eventually becomes the key to lifting the curse set on this magical castle.

And right off the bat, I'll say, this was a good movie. I had a lot of fun with this movie. A lot of that is due to the fact that this is the most faithful live action remake of the Disney Cartoons they've done so far and there's a reason for that. Despite any criticisms of Stockholm Syndrome, the story of Beauty and the Beast is just a magical and beautiful fairy tale and you definitely get that feel in this film. Because it's so true to the original, it remains that beautiful story.

But I want to say again, this was a good movie. I am going to have a lot of things to say about this movie that might seem negative. I'm also going to try and not compare this to this original but that is impossible because it is so close to the original, and they did this on purpose. On top of that I just watched the original a couple weeks ago so there are going to be comparisons. But just remember, I really liked this film.

This movie also benefits incredibly by the soundtrack by Alan Menken already laid down in the original movie that was brought back and all they had to do was add some songs and make sure they're good... and they are.

This has to be one of my favorite original songs that have come out of a movie musical in recent times. And this is also one of my favorite musicals that have come out recently.

Here's the unfortunate thing though. Because the music is so good, there are a lot of times where the score and soundtrack kind of out shine the singers. Dan Stevens is the outlier in this situation because his voice does match the grandious score, but that's not always the case.

Because the casting was such a big deal, I'm going to look at most of the cast individually and give my thoughts on their performance and their singing, because it is definitely worth talking about.

I'm going to start with Emma Watson as Belle. And I'm just going to say it... I don't think Emma Watson was the right choice for Belle. And this is for a couple of reasons.

The first is her singing. I hate to criticize her for that so much, but the truth is Emma Watson is not a great singer. She can hold a tune sure but a lot of her songs just feel lifeless at times. Once the nostalgia that you're listening to the phenomenal music of the original score wears of and you actually start listening to her, she's really not that great.

And you know how I mentioned that the score outshines the singers, Emma Watson is a great example of that.

Doug Walker did a great video a couple weeks ago when this movie came out talking about when it is necessary to dub an actor's singing in a film and it really encapsulates my thoughts.

But it's not just the singing. Watson uses her British accent which usually I would never complain about. And before you say it, I understand that yeah it doesn't make sense that in a village in France, there's maybe one person who actually has a French accent. Even the cartoon didn't follow the rule. But Watson's accent is more an example of his stringent and wooden acting that doesn't totally exemplify the tone Page O'Hara set up so well in the original. If Watson wanted to make Belle different than the cartoon, that's fine. But do more, show more emotion than a quizzical eyebrow raise that worked for Hermonine but not here. And because everything is so wooden and so stringently British with her, she doesn't have any charm to distract from the bad singing she's providing.

I'm looking forward to more of Emma Watson's work because regardless of my thoughts here, this is going to get her more work. However, I think everyone was quick to point how great of casting this could have been that they didn't analyze how good it actually was.

I talked about the beauty, I need to talk about The Beast.

The Beast was actually one of my favorite parts of the movie and a lot of the credit of that goes to Dan Stevens. The CGI for the beast can at times not look that great but it was a lot better than I thought it was going to be.

But it's Dan Steven's voice and performance that not only harkens back to the original, but it makes the character sympathetic and relatable. He actually receives more character development than Belle and by the end you actually feel the character change for the better.

And here's the difficult thing. Even in the cartoon, when the Beast transforms (...spoilers?) it was kind of strange when you saw this man in the place of a character you've gotten to know pretty well show up. And while they kind of joke about that at the end, it still is a little bit weird. However, I felt with the opening scene showing the actually events that led to the curse and the casting of Dan Stevens, it worked better and even again harkened back to the cartoon. Overall, the Beast was just a great mixture of nostalgia and good performing on the part of Dan Stevens.

Luke Evans plays Gaston in the film and I have to say this had to have been the hardest character to lock down because of the expectations set by the original.

I mean look at that? That's not exactly possible unless you are The Rock and even then you have to find an actor who is that ripped and can act as well as Luke Evans. I don't know if it can be done.

I really like what Luke Evans did with the character though. He probably knew that he couldn't achieve the levels of hyperbolic fitness shown in the cartoon so he made up for that in what he could achieve and he does a pretty good job. Another surprise was how good of a singer Luke Evans is. Again, it doesn't exactly fit with your original thoughts from the cartoon but for what Luke Evans was trying to do, it works really well. The one downside and the disadvantage this movie finds itself in is that it's both trying to totally recreate the original while trying to make its own movies both from the limitations live action can make and the desire to make something creative. I felt because the movie was handcuffed to the story, Gaston needed to go in a certain direction that worked perfectly for a larger over the top buff guy like in the cartoon but didn't exactly work for Luke Evans. In the beginning he seems like a jerk but not evil. So when he wants to go and kill the beast, it doesn't exactly feel right.

The thing I've always liked about Gaston is that in any other story, he would be the protagonist. But that's the point, looks don't make the person. I feel like this movie could have developed Gaston a little bit more and I don't think it totally did. Again, I really liked Luke Evans and he was a lot of fun, but his contribution is really only skin deep. With all the moments they flash back to him, I wish they would have done more with his character.

I want to talk really quickly about Lefou. A few weeks before the movie came out, they decided to drop a little nugget saying that Lefou was the first openly gay character in a Disney movie. This got so many people angry that this movie was banned in Russia for "promoting homosexuality".

But here's the reality of the situation. Lefou is every stereotypical gay character from the 90's in this movie and he really didn't need to be. If you watch the original cartoon and you watch it under the information that Lefou is actually gay, it makes a lot of sense. Lefou always was in love with Gaston and it's not really something that needs to be announced and it didn't need to be over played the way Josh Gad played it.

I like Josh Gad. I get the feeling that Disney is milking every bit of him until he can provide no more. The issue is that he plays Lefou so stereotypically gay in this movie but that whole thing about him being the first openly gay character is just not true.

If Lefou was openly gay, there would be moments in the film where it's obvious that he's interested in men and makes that apparent to those around him. He doesn't need to act feminine or accidentally dance with another man at the end, he can just be gay. That's what being openly gay means.

And here's the thing, at the end of the day, this should not have been a story. Is it really a huge win for the gay community if Gaston's henchman is gay? Is it really an affront to our morals if a character in a movie is gay? The answer to both questions should be no. This should not have been a story, it shouldn't have been such a big deal. This is not the first gay character that has shown up in a movie. The fact that it's a Disney movie should not matter.

So yeah, I didn't hate Lefou, I think overall, Josh Gad does a decent job playing the character, but I think the "controversy" over this character was overblown and really unnecessary.

Then you've got the staff of the castle and when I first saw the picture of these guys, I was not exactly impressed. I mean if you look at that photo, they don't really look that interesting. However, the important part is seeing them in action.

I really liked the CGI used for these characters and it was only helped by the actors utilized for these characters. You've got the iconic Lumiere (played beautifully by Ewan Mcgregor), Cogworth, (played by Ian Mckellen), Mrs. Potts (played by Emma Thompson). Stanley Tucci plays a harpsicord, Audra Mcdonald plays a dresser, and Gugu Mbatha-Raw plays Plumette the duster that Lumiere is in love with.

I really liked all these characters and they played off each other very well.

If I had to choose my favorite it would be Ewan Mcgregor as Lumiere. Now this may be due to the fact that Mcgregor is one of the few people in this movie that has a record of being able to sing and he exhibits it very well. Including Dan Stevens, Audra McDonald and Luke Evans at times, Mcgregor was one of the few that I felt was keeping up with the soundtrack that was already really good in the cartoon but seemed to be enhanced now in the live action movie.

Be Our Guest was a lot of fun and the voice of Mcgregor only added a lot to the film. I do wish him and the rest of the staff had been utilized a little more and in a way that made their characters have a little bit more depth, however, I felt for just a fun Disney romp, they did a really good job.

There are a couple of other characters in the film that are a lot of fun. Most namely Kevin Kline as Maurice. I don't think he was utilized to the levels that he should have been used but he was able to make the character something different and not just a carbon copy of the animated film.

And that's the biggest problem with the movie.

Beauty and the Beast is a great nostalgia trip. It does a decent job at being a shot for shot remake of the original and reminding you heavily that that was a thing. In fact instead of watching the original first then checking this out, I almost wish I would have watched this first and then gone back to the original. The problem is that because it couldn't be a perfect shot for shot remake of the original, there's a lot of emotions and non-verbals that are missing either because the original was animated and they give expressions that cannot be done in live action, or they don't take the time to really address why these moments are important and give the characters time to really analyze and develop from the things that they do.

But I will say one of my favorite parts of the film was when it was different than the original and decided to get creative.

A lot of these moments were because the movie couldn't always be a carbon copy of the animated so they decide to change it up. The opening sequence done in live action as opposed to looking at stain glass windows was really interesting, the aesthetic choices of the castle, the furniture, and just the entire environment was really interesting to me and part of the film that I really like. Even the Beast is different because the movie couldn't knock down the beast for exactly what he looked like in the animated film so they decided to make him look a little bit different, and because of that they get this Guillermo Del Toro looking Beast that I really enjoyed.

Like I said when I talked about Dan Steven's performance and the Beast in general, I liked the mixture of old and new when it came to the Beast and that's the feeling I had for the entire movie. There's a lot that I liked because it harkened back to the original but it wasn't the original, it literally could not possibly be the original, the original is the original.

Beauty and the Beast is not a perfect movie by any means. It had a lot of limitations, some of them were limitations that they worked around, some of them were created by them not being different enough to create something new.

I've seen this movie twice now and I'm still looking at the things that I liked and the things I didn't like but overall I think that I have pretty strong feelings towards this movie and will probably want to watch it again if not purchase it for my own collection. If you haven't seen it, I recommend checking it out and let me know your thoughts as well.

So what are those thoughts? Comment and Discuss Below! You can also send me your thoughts on Twitter @cmhaugen24 as well as send me your requests for movies I should review in the future. If you follow me on Twitter, you can get updates on future movie news and reviews coming out of this blog.

I'll leave you with this. Here's a Deadpool parody of the Gaston song that came out right after the movie. It's a fun time. Enjoy!