Beauty and the Beast (2017)

Anything is possible when you are making a live action remake to bring the fantasy come to life, especially when you have a budget that contains 255 million dollars towards the filmmaking and the production design alongside the computer generated effects. Visually, it's obviously gorgeous and vivid with beautiful glossy colors and details for high-definition. During the first act of the film, I thought it was going to be a familiar cardboard cutout/beat-for-beat rehash of the original 1991 animated classic, until it progresses to the second act and all the way to the end. When it was over, I was so surprised in a delightful manner. I was so amazed on how entertaining it was, thanks to Bill Condon's impressive direction for a variety of moods: comedy, tenderness, happiness, and heartfelt emotion. Sure, the whole enterprise seems familiar, but there is another way to remake a movie than just making it an entirely different story: by adding more elements, making a few big changes, and add a lot more details to the story. That is exactly what this beautiful surprise of a remake did and I don't want to spoil anything from the story, but here are some examples that I found: It has more songs in the soundtrack, including the marvelous "evermore", there have been a solid amount of tweaks here and there, different dialogue, the pacing that was differently yet cleverly manipulated wonderfully by Bill Condon (the director), and even more astonishing: depth. That gives this remake more deviation. Alan Menken remade the score and he did a great job with the emotional score. The cast did a phenomenal job with there roles; Emma Watson did a very nice job as Belle, and it's hard to believe that she can sing, and it's lovely. Dan Stevens as the beast is perfect casting; he can be unkind and fierce, and during the second and third act he is sympathetic and somber, he even has a touch of amusing eccentric comedy to develop some charm to the character. When Dan Steven's Beast sings "evermore", it kind of reminded me of Josh Groban because his baritone voice sounds strongly emotional. Both Belle and Beast have a heartbreaking backstory and some interesting information about themselves. The chemistry between the two was handled very well with authentic precision (something that a modern audience will be pleased by), that is when they have got some character development and it's pleasing to watch indeed. Ewan McGregor did a great job as Lumiere; he is actually pretty funny because he has some amusing voice performances alongside his dialogue to deliver clever comedy. In the original cartoon, Lumiere was singing "be our guest" in tune and talk-singing, and here, Ewan reflected that so he did a very nice job. Nathan Mack as Chip is really charming. Josh Gad was amusing as the flamboyant LeFou. Luke Evans is amazing as the arrogant Gaston; He seems to deliver more force to his harsh delivery to make his personality so vicious. He thinks that darkness, war, and death are his happy thoughts to make him pleasantly happy. He is a darkly menacing brute that is more vile here than in the original cartoon. To conclude: Even though the original is still a masterpiece, this live-action remake is a surprisingly clever retelling of the tale as old as time for a the modern audience. Highly Recommended.

The story of Beauty and the Beast, in general, has some problems. But the original animated version has a certain charm to its characters that appears to be severely lacking in this new adaptation. This movie also has huge problems with its pacing and with the flat performances of its lead actors. This movie skips or shortens many scenes that provide opportunity for the audience to get to know the characters in the story and to empathize with them, particularly the enchanted characters and their plight. This movie just seemed to want to rush through any scenes so it could get to the next pointless song. I am not a fan of musicals, but there are a few that I like. And the original movie had some decent pacing with regard to the songs. Even I have to admit Provincial Life is memorable. However, this movie leaves too little room for story in order to stuff itself to overflowing with song after song after song, none of which were particularly inspiring nor memorable and many of which were simply pointless filler. The performances, what little there was between the glut of pointless songs, were mostly lackluster. Watson was flat and unemotional. Kline, who is normally a welcome

This adaptation of the 1990's animated Beauty and the Beast was well done. The way Emma Watson portrayed Belle was spectacular, she gave the character a more realistic tone. No sane person would walk into an abandoned castle and not be freaked out by a hairy beast and moving and talking furniture. The costumes were absolutely incredible and beautifully made; Emma Watson didn't wear a lot of make-up at any point in the movie which made her look natural and not at all fake. I enjoyed how they answered the question about Belle's mother from the first movie and liked that story line. The only notes I had were that the auto tune on Emma Watson's voice was incredibly obvious and distracting. As well as in the Be Our Guest song the candlestick (not sure how to spell his name) dabs mid-song and it infuriates me every time I see it, for it is out of place and time.