Beauty and the Beast Review

                There’s no need to start this movie review with a summary. Unless you’ve been living under a rock your whole life, you know the story of Beauty and the Beast. The new film uses the same general plotline from the classic cartoon. However, there are a few new twists in this retelling (some of which are more surprising than others), but I won’t spoil them for you. I wouldn’t say that any of the new plot elements are bad per say; it may just take multiple viewings to get used to them. The core story is still the same and as great as ever. The filmmakers knew enough not to mess with what they know works. As Cogsworth says in the cartoon, “If it’s not baroque, don’t fix it.”

            The film gives us the high-quality production values we’ve come to expect from big-budget Disney movies. The sets and costumes are Oscar worthy. We get some nice camerawork, though I still don’t like the overuse of shallow-focus shots in movies these days. The CG may not be as photorealistic as last year’s remake of The Jungle Book, but it’s still pretty good. I personally would have designed some of the object characters differently, but that’s just a minor critique. The 3D is average with a few cool effects here and there. Overall, the film looks beautiful. The most visually spectacular part of the movie is the jaw-dropping “Be Our Guest” sequence.

            The cast is solid. Some people may find it hard to see Emma Watson as anyone but Hermione Granger from the Harry Potter movies, but I accepted her as Belle without any trouble. Luke Evans (Gaston), Josh Gad (LeFou), and Kevin Kline (Maurice) aren’t as exaggerated as those characters usually are, but they aren’t bland either. The actors voicing the CG characters are spot-on. They include Dan Stevens (Beast), Ewan McGregor (Lumiere), Ian McKellen (Cogsworth), Emma Thompson (Mrs. Potts), Audra McDonald (Wardrobe), and Stanley Tucci (a new harpsichord character named Cadenza). They all did their own singing, and quite well too.

            There are a few new songs written for the movie. They’re fine, but none of them will become classics. I still wish they had used some of the songs written for the stage version of Beauty and the Beast. I’m surprised they didn’t include the delightful song “Human Again,” which was cut from the cartoon and reinstated in the special edition. At least they kept the six songs from the original movie. Initially, Disney was going to have this film be a non-musical like the recent Cinderella movie, but director Bill Condon reminded them that the music was too iconic to cut. I’m glad he did so, because the movie wouldn’t have been as good without those wonderful tunes.

            This film finds a balance between staying true to the original, yet not making it an exact copy. There’s no way to please everybody when you’re re-tooling something that’s this well-loved. I’ve heard various opinions about little things people didn’t like about the movie. I admit that there were moments that kind of bugged me. However, we mustn’t make mountains out of molehills like people did with the film’s infamous “gay moment” (which is mild and easy to ignore). There’s still plenty to admire about this film. It will never replace the cartoon, but it doesn’t have to. We just get a new telling of a beautiful tale as old as time, and that’s good enough.

My Rating: 8/10