The live-action “Beauty and the Beast” was released on March 17, 2017 and made over $170 million opening weekend.
The movie pretty much follows the plot of Disney’s 1991 movie. A curse on the castle, Belle taking her father’s place, an eventual love story and what an emotional finale. But, there are additions. There are new songs (Days in the Sun, How Does a Moment Last Forever?, among others) and much more of a backstory for both Belle and the Beast’s characters, making the live-action version especially intriguing for longtime fans.
The movie stars Emma Watson, most well-known for playing Hermione in the “Harry Potter” series as Belle and Dan Stevens known for his character Matthew Crawley in “Downton Abbey,” as the Beast. It also features “The Girl on the Train’s,” Luke Evans as Gaston, “Frozen’s,” Josh Gad as LeFou, Ian McKellen from the “Lord of the Rings” series, as Cogsworth and “Love Actually’s,” Emma Thompson as Mrs. Potts.
The movie was directed by Bill Condon, who is known for writing and directing movies such as “Dreamgirls” and “Gods and Monsters,” directing the third and fourth movies of the “Twilight” series and writing the screenplay for “Chicago.” The music was composed by Alan Menkin, who is known for composing music for a variety of Disney movies, including “Aladdin,” “Tangled,” “The Little Mermaid” and the original “Beauty and the Beast.”
The setting and the scenery of the movie are beautiful and the special effects are very well-done. Being that the movie calls for inanimate objects to be alive and have human-like qualities, the household object characters did this very well. They were able to look like the objects they were while still being characters the audience would root for. Especially in 3D, the settings of the castle, the village and the woods were amazing and really pulled the audience into the story.
The movie also developed a backstory for the Beast (Stevens) that made him more relatable and human and gave him motive. It expanded on Belle’s (Watson) relationship with her father, her childhood, what happened to her mom and gave her a talent for inventing. It expanded on the roles and personalities of other characters, including Belle’s father Maurice (Kevin Kline) and the household objects as well. Overall, the movie did a really good job giving a deeper characterization to these familiar characters.
The additions of the new musical numbers helped further develop the backstories and added some more fun to the movie. While it was clear that the leads weren’t used to singing, especially in a musical theater style, the staging of the performances was very well-done.
Overall, Beauty and the Beast was a really good movie.
“I thought it was going to ruin the original but it didn’t,” sophomore elementary education major, Emily Hill said. “It was amazing and I think everyone should go see it.”
