Beauty and the Beast

Be our guest.

There are those who claim that Beauty and the Beast is the greatest love story ever told. I'd disagree. The greatest love story ever told is in all actuality my longstanding man crush on Ewan McGregor - isn't he just dreamy, and my what an attractive candlestick…OK, so I may have just gotten distracted. So, where were we? Oh yes, Beauty and the Beast, why certainly, be my guest!

Following in the footsteps of Ken Branagh's Cinderella and Jon Favreau's The Jungle Book, Beauty and the Beast is the next in what seems like a long line of live action remakes of Disney classics. A bold and solid example of transcribing a well loved piece of animation into a perfectly fine, if unimaginative movie. I do at this point mean to damn it with the faintest of praise - by no means did I not enjoy Beauty and the Beast, I merely question its existence and its strict adherence to a film that stands tall to this very day. If you are in possession of the 1991 original, and are tied between this and seeing something else at the cinema, please be aware that you've already seen this movie and while it is worth your time it is at moments a line for line copy of the original.

For those of you not to have seen the 1991 original (who are you and where have you been?) Beauty and the Beast follows the story of Belle (Emma Watson) an apparently strange and 'different' girl who dreams of more than just the small provincial French town she calls home and the overly keen attempts of her would be suitor Gaston (Luke Evans) and his gleeful cohort LeFou (Josh Gad). After her father (Kevin Kline) steals a rose for her from an enchanted castle, she takes his place as the prisoner of the fierce and cursed Beast (Dan Stevens). Trapped within the castle she befriends the cursed staff (McKellen, McGregor, Thompson, Tucci, McDonald, Mbatha-Raw) and embarks upon the reported greatest love story ever told, albeit without any form of reprise for the mild Stockholm syndrome that may be taking place before us on the screen.

Taking the form of a musical, Beauty and the Beast fills itself out a little more than its animated predecessor, with musical maestro Alan Menken returning to pen a few additional songs that bolster the running time to a hefty 129 minutes. While tonally correct for the film, the newer tracks don't pack quite the punch as the ones written twenty six years prior and stand apart as a result, although they are performed more than adequately by the well stocked selection of cast, with the likes of Ewan McGregor, Emma Thompson and Luke Evans being standouts among them. Watson does well as Belle - not coming from a musical background she performs more than admirably bringing a more strong willed performance to the character who takes her fate a little less quietly than her animated counterpart. Watson's Belle is perhaps as well a far more defined character, possessed of ingenuity and guile that make her a fitting role model for girls and young women.

Dan Steven's Beast is acted well but suffers from the lack of physicality provided by the motion capture and CGI that comprises the characters beastly appearance - it provides a stark contrast to the heavy physicality provided by the village locales and scenes. Josh Gad and Luke Evans as LeFou and Gaston respectively fair far better in comparison. Evans particularly shines as Gaston, bringing to bear his sheer physicality and more bestial tendencies he used so well as Richard Wilder in last years High Rise. Of the cursed staff, Stanley Tucci feels wasted whereas the likes of Ewan McGregor, Ian McKellen and Emma Thompson really outdo their more two dimensional counterparts. From a design point of view, the cursed servants are imaginatively done if not a little creepy in their execution - you'll never feel the same after being winked at by the disembodied face of Emma Thompson superimposed upon an animated teapot or accosted by an opera singing set of drawers channeling shades of Cuthulu.

In short, Beauty and the Beast is a solid attempt to recreate the spark that the original held twenty six years ago - it by and large accomplishes this. If you're a fan of the original then it's a must see, and if you've never watched it before then you won't miss out; you'll laugh when you're meant to and cry at the appropriate moments. If you're a cynic then it's optional and if you're like me you'll go for the candlestick.