Friday, March 17, 2017

BEAUTY AND THE BEAST (2017): Hermione Granger and the Reluctant Werewolf

NOTE: Be our guest, be our guest, put our SPOILERS to the test.

“If it's not Baroque, don't fix it.

- Cosgworth (voice of David Ogden Stiers), Beauty and the Beast (1991)



There are not a lot of perfect movies out there, especially these days. But if there is a contender for such a title, Beauty and the Beast would be a welcome choice. I am, of course, referring to the 1991 Disney animated classic (you thought it would be Cocteau's?). The film came after Disney reinvented its animation studio following The Little Mermaid and caught the world by its collective heartstrings and refused to let go. To this day, it is the only traditionally-animated film to be nominated for Best Picture at the Academy Awards (it lost to the Hannibal Lector film The Silence of the Lambs). From there, Disney continued to utilize the film's beloved characters in everything from direct-to-video spinoffs to theme park restaurants.


In 2010, Disney released Tim Burton's Alice in Wonderland to massive box office success (chalked up to the then-reliable star power of Johnny Depp and the 3D ticket sales brought on after Avatar) and launched a new mission for the company: they would dive back into their own animated canon, remake them in live-action CG hybrids and profit off of parents reintroducing their children to timeless stories told by today's movie stars and directors. Remakes of Sleeping Beauty (soon after crafted into an Angelina Jolie vehicle titled Maleficent), Cinderella (directed by Thor's Kenneth Branagh) and Pete's Dragon (which surprisingly became a critical darling) would be greenlit. And if other Disney fans did not like them, they always had Pixar, Marvel and Lucasfilm to turn to. What could go wrong?


Belle (Emma Watson) is a beautiful young woman with an inventive mind and a spirit of adventure. Naturally, this makes her the topic of gossip in her little French village and the unwavering target of the affections of big game hunter Gaston (Luke Evans), who is vain and ill-tempered. Her doting and encouraging father Maurice (Kevin Kline) leaves on a quick trip to the market and winds up lost at the front of a massively imposing castle. When he does not return the next day, Belle sets off after him and finds him a prisoner of the castle's belligerent master, a large and hairy Beast (Dan Stevens in performance capture). Belle hesitantly agrees to take her father's place as his prisoner. Belle soon discovers the Beast is not the sole occupant of the castle; a large assortment of enchanted talking objects show her hospitality and kindness and gradually reveal they used to be human along with the Beast. What Belle does not know is that the Enchantress who cursed him and his servants did so because she saw he had no love in his heart; however, if he could love someone and have them love him in return, the spell would be broken. "For who could ever learn to love a Beast?"


The cast of the film had a lot to live up to despite their doppelgängers being hand drawn. Emma Watson delivers a fine performance as well as demonstrating keen musical chops. The movie simply would fall flat without her. Her compassion and grace is the most beautiful aspect about her character and livens up the proceedings. Dan Stevens is not an actor I am familiar with (I did recently see the pilot episode to his new FX series "Legion"), but his is probably the most difficult part in the film. Buried under a mass of CG fur, Stevens manages to work the performance capture technology to his advantage and maintains control of his facial expressions. Kevin Kline is not the spitting image of the original Maurice but his heart comes through with his scenes with Watson. He also is in the movie a lot more than I would have guessed and it is good to see Kline in such a mainstream movie again. Luke Evans and Josh Gad have surprisingly good camaraderie and work well off each other. I certainly would have preferred Gad to be dressed in the exact costume his animated counterpart wore but this is a minor nitpick. 


Where the movie really falls is in the voice cast comprising the castle's enchanted objects. It certainly is not for a lack of casting; Ewan McGregor (as Lumiere), Ian McKellen (as Cogsworth), Emma Thompson (as Mrs. Potts) and Stanley Tucci (as Cadenza, a character completely created for the film) are all vastly-talented actors who are pretty much miscast all across the board. McGregor has even said as much, saying his performance of "Be Our Guest" was fouled up by his attempted French accent which ended up sounding Spanish. In animated form, the original characters were all pleasant to look at and were clearly designed following in the footsteps of Disney's Nine Old Men. However, their realistic depiction here is just unnerving. How hard would have been to put Ewan McGregor's face in the wax of a candle? He is part of the candelabra in the final film and it just comes off as ugly. When the voice cast appears as themselves at the end of the film, it feels like their makeup was done by the team from that ghastly Nutcracker movie years ago; they look pretty horrid. 


The songs from the original (lyrics by Howard Ashman and music by master composer Alan Menken) had the world falling in love and credit goes to director Bill Condon for dissuading Disney from making a version of the movie without them. Anybody can make a movie based on the story of "Beauty and the Beast", but only Disney can make a movie with the song "Beauty and the Beast". The only song that Belle does not sing that I feel accurately stands tall next to the original is Luke Evans taking on "The Mob Song (Kill the Beast)". There are new songs in the film, but despite them coming from Menken, they are not nearly as memorable. They got it right the first time. The original Beauty and the Beast is my second favorite musical behind Mary Poppins (and the director of Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides is about to go mess that up too).


There is a certain phrase that goes, "Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery." This story is nothing if not sincere, but this movie is nothing but a flattering imitation. Is it bad? No, not in the least. The animated Beauty and the Beast was and remains a perfect movie; lightning in a bottle with no live-action version necessary. However, if a movie like this has to exist, its sole benefit would be to point back to the superior version.