Beauty and the Beast (2017)

It is not very often that you get to see an all time classic movie twice for the first time, but this live action version of Beauty and the Beast gives us a new spin on this all time Disney favorite. 

If you have been living under a rock and never seen the original animated Beauty and the Beast… The basic plot follows a girl, Belle, who doesn’t fit in her small town and feels like she is out of place. When her father gets lost in the woods he runs into a cursed prince who has been turned into a Beast. Belle takes her father’s place as the Beast’s prisoner and slowly starts to see past his outward appearance to who is truly is inside.

The new version of Beauty and the Beast doesn’t deviate much from the original story line, but they add enough new details to enrich the characters you are familiar with and deepen the story you know by heart. Where this movie really shines, like it’s predecessor, is the musical numbers. They are very close remakes that will fill you with nostalgia and if you aren’t careful will lead to you singing along. I really enjoyed the acting in this film, lead by Emma Watson as Belle, having the characters in live action really added to their depth and drew me into this amazing story.    

People will inevitably compare this version to the animated movie that came out in 1991. Personally I liked the animation version better because the live action fell short in a couple key areas. First, the singing in this version was not as strong as the original. These actors did a great job, but couldn’t compare to the original soundtrack that we are so familiar with. Some parts of songs even sounded auto tuned to compensate for some of the tougher notes. The other detractor for me was the character design. Although it is challenging to make a walking and talking candlestick look and feel real, the original animated version looked cleaner. With the emphasis on realism in this film, I felt like we lost the facial features of the actors and characters entirely.

Overall, Beauty and the Beast was an awesome nostalgia trip that highlighted how good the original, a best picture nominee, actually was. This live action version was as close as you could come to that, and for their valiant effort I can say I was happy from start to finish.