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Post by Bioshock Infinite WD on Sept 5, 2015 20:15:06 GMT
Well here's a looong story for you. Okay, my girlfriend loves Beauty and the Beast, one of her favorite films period. But when she was younger, her parents got her the second direct-to-video sequel called Belle's Magical World. And it was bad! It actually made her stop liking the original movie for a year or two. She got over it eventually, but she HATES that movie to death! If that movie was a human being, she would have strangled it to death. So as a "gift" I got her favorite Youtube personality, Mat Brunet also known as Animat. I requested a review of the film and it just came out recently, and there was even a "watches" video of him watching the film. Trust me, this thing is painful to watch if you love the original. PS, she loved this review, thought it was the sweetest thing ever.
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Post by Bioshock Infinite WD on Apr 3, 2017 16:05:02 GMT
Okay let’s get this out of the way, I have a deep personal connection with the original 1991 masterpiece. Its music always calms my nerves, it always reminds me of the greatness of cinema. Belle is one of my favorite film characters period, and I have an unending amount of respect for Paige O’Hara, the woman who gave that character life. She is my hero and the kindest person I have ever met in my life. I just wanted to make that clear before we begin.
Now, as Cogsworth says in the original film, “I just wanted to say… I was against it from the start!” It’s no secret that I was dreading this movie from the moment it was announced in August of 2014. I have no favorite film, but Beauty and the Beast is without question one of my favorites. I could do an entire essay on why it’s good, and to some extent I have done that over the years. There was nothing to improve upon, not a line that could have been said better. So I approached this with expectations so low they were right next to dinosaur bones. And in the end, my fears were justified in just about every respect possible.
Let’s start with the killing blows shall we? This movie is destroyed by both massive flaws and tiny flaws both at the same time. One of the biggest flaws is the heroine, Emma Watson. Oh she’s not Belle, she’s Emma Watson. Like I said, the original was one of the greatest vocal performances, and the animators brought so much life and depth to the character. From the moment she appears, all bets are off. Her singing of the first three words of the Belle song is nails on a chalkboard. Her vocal singing is comparable to Russell Crowe from Les Miserable or Pierce Brosnon from Mamma Mia, it’s that bad. To compare her to Paige O’Hara is akin to Julie Andrews vs T-Pain. She clearly has not had any singing lessons or so little it didn’t matter. She sing talks her way through a musical that was written for Broadway singers. Even worse, every note is very noticeably autotuned, so much so that I would argue even people that are not very familiar with musicals can tell something is off. To cap it off, she doesn’t seem to be very interesting, she has no passion for any of these songs. Her acting isn’t much better, while I’m aware Bill Condon directed this movie, I didn’t think she would be on the level of Kristen Stewart from the Twilight films he directed. All she does is sneer or try to react to the special effects around her, but in the end it’s a blank expression. Which is a shame since the original is so expressive. For the past few months Emma herself has been touting how much stronger this character is. Setting aside that the original is a pretty strong character, her idea of additions are pretty superficial. She claimed for months that she was an inventor and that it adds layers. All that amounts to is one quick scene that lasts one minute and it’s never referred to again. In fact she seems less active and is a lot more unlikable. The original Belle was incredibly kind but had limits, here Emma seems to just sneer and be mean to people even when they are not doing anything bad. She also mistakes humanity for weakness, let me explain. In the original Belle loses her father, her dreams, her aspirations, and her freedom in the span of a few seconds. She manages to hold herself together, but the moment the Beast leaves, she breaks down and cries. Here, Emma Watson never does that and instead instantly tries to escape. Emma Watson thought emotion like that, something that makes Belle relatable and human, makes Emma a weaker character. The Emma changes make the character far more stone cold and less relatable. They also thought adding a backstory about her mother would add more layers, it doesn’t and all it does is mess with the pacing. To summarize everything that is wrong with Emma Watson is to basically state everything. There is not a positive angle to find, and I truly looked.
I’m sure you noticed that I’ve said “the original” quite a bit. This is another massive problem, this movie is neither an original tale nor is it as old as time, more like 25 years give or take. I’d wager at least 75% of the script has been reused, so much so that sometimes the line won’t even fit the scene. You’ll have Cogsworth state how he was against anybody entering the castle, but a few scenes later he wants to stand up to the Beast. In the original version Cogsworth was very much more loyal and against fighting the Beast. Here he tries to fight. That line is only there because it was in the original. Outside of two scenes, it’s the same movie scene by scene, and it’s very often shot by shot and line by line. Entire jokes are copied, even if they were hardly iconic bits from the original. I am shocked Linda Wooverton, the woman who wrote the original script, is not credited at all. It’s not quite the Gus Van Sant version of Psycho, but its far closer than any other remake I can think of in recent memory.
Now for that 25% added, it adds nothing and often takes away. Take for example, the scene where the Beast lets Belle go. In the original he looks at the rose, goes through five emotions and then softly tells her to go. She questions what she heard before smiling and patting him on the cheek before leaving. Here he lets her go, and the scene cuts. There are many scenes that take any nuisance and cuts to the point. All the subtle and human aspects are thrown to the side. They even miss the extremely subtle touches. In the original Belle is the only person in the village to wear blue, and later her dad and the Beast where blue. It was intentional, a way to make her stand out from a crowd and symbolize being an outcast. In the new movie half of the extras wear blue, thus missing the point. The only two major scenes I can think of is a long winded scene with Maurice and Gaston that serves the same purpose as a scene from the original. Only difference is, it drags on longer just for the result to be roughly the same. The only true new scene is a bizarre scene in Paris that felt more like a deleted segment from the video game Bioshock Infinite then Beauty and the Beast. It sadly adds nothing and just answers a question that was already obvious at the start, and always obvious no matter what telling of the tale we are getting. That being that Belle’s mom is dead, a real shocker I know, it’s not like Disney or fairytales in general kill the mother often. The film adds four new songs, two of which I’d make an argument are not songs. Not only are they poorly placed and paced, two of them have to be roughly only 30 seconds long. Kevin Kline sings an incredibly short number right after the opening number, it barely registered. I had to check online to see if it was even a song. It adds nothing as one could expect from such a short number. There is another song in the Paris scene that is roughly as long but its Emma Watson singing, so it’s more a mercy that it’s short. There’s a new song number for the objects that more or less takes the place of Human Again from the Broadway show but is far less impressive on scale and singing. The new song number is far less impressive on scale and singing. Speaking of which, why not just use the Broadway songs? Or make this an adaptation of the Broadway show? It would justify the films existence a bit more. Finally the Beast gets a song and it’s probably the best of the four, but it’s still highly forgettable next to Howard Ashmen and Alan Menken’s legendary toons. It also is awkwardly placed after the Beast lets Emma go, thus robbing some of the emotion. Overall I can’t think of a single new aspect that was an improvement and several made the film worse.
The Beast also gets the sharp end of the stick. Dan Stevens is a good actor as seen in shows like Downton Abbey, but here the CGI smothers any chance he had. The CGI across the board is bad, but the Beast is among the worst. You can’t help but stare at his mouth, it moves unnaturally. It’s comparable to the CGI Peter Cushing’s in Rogue One, but that character has five minutes or less of screen time. Here he’s stuck in a large portion of the film. His vocal performance when yelling isn’t bad, but he lacks the softness that Robbie Benson gave to the character. Needless to say the chemistry with Emma is nonexistent, they don’t work off each other. Hell, Emma has better chemistry with her own father, I can’t overstate how bad they work off each other. This kills the romance which is the entire point of the movie, it’s a romantic musical first and foremost. The original was a great love story, so much so it was 33 on the AFI list of romantic movies. The Beast is also made far more unlikable, here he taxes people to gain more money and was planning on just leaving Emma locked away forever. A few of his scenes even got switched with the side characters, giving him less screen time at the start. They also made the unwise addition to explain the Beast’s backstory. Because we all wanted to know he had daddy issues right? That is never explored again just like Emma’s backstory. His singing is also mediocre but that can be said of everyone in the file except one person.
I’ve mentioned that a lot of characters have a bigger mean streak compared to the animated counterparts, that’s true except for one. The legendary larger than life villain Gaston has been toned down to be more likable and I believe an attempt at being tragic. To say that making the villain more likable and the hero’s less likable is an issue is quite an understatement. He’s less egotistical, in fact the only scene where he acts like his animated version was in the trailer, thus giving a false impression. Luke Evans is an actual Broadway singer, but his voice is, as Gaston himself says, “only so so.” Thus the Gaston song number never reaches the high notes it needs to survive, couple that with a lot of energy and it drags on far longer than it should. Evans tries to make the material work, but the writing just overwhelms him, even if he’s trying a tad harder than some people. His character arc is cut in half and then just ends at around the half way mark. His side character Lefou is given a lot more than the original, and this isn’t a positive. First off, giving more screen time to the side characters has the risk of taking away from the main love story, and it does just that. It also shows that this type of character works in smaller doses, or it could be Josh Gad was far more annoying than Jessi Corti. Speaking of which, I guess I have to mention the gay controversy. The character is very obviously gay, much more so then I expected. There are countless looks, and double entendre’s that it starts to become tiresome. It doesn’t help that his new character arc is very sporadic and the ending doesn’t make any sense. Oh and there is no pay off to his new orientation if you were hoping for one, he dances with another guy at the end for two seconds. I hope that wasn’t your main reason for watching.
The supporting cast does not work very well, a shame since the actors behind them are people I genuinely like. Cogsworth like I said seems to switch from being an obedient dog and defiant, which is a problem since Lumiere is the defiant one. Ian McKellen is a great actor, he is magnificent as Gandolf the Grey in the Lord of the Rings films and as Magneto in the X-Men series. Here? All he does is quote David Ogden Stiers lines but with Gandolf’s voice, he doesn’t even try to make it sound different. He also seems to not be having any fun with the role, a shame since Stiers was having the time of his life. Ewen McGregor is also a fantastic actor, so good in fact he is able to make his young Obi Wan Kenobi work in the Star Wars Prequels. Here… they saddle him with one of the worst French accents in recent memory and tells him to try and recreate Jerry Orbach’s performance. Whatever goodwill he has is drowned under that accent, ironic since his wife is French and Orbach was from the Bronx, yet he did a far better accent. Then we have Emma Thompson, a great actress and the lead in another film near to my heart, Sense and Sensibility. For some reason she was told to do a thicker cockney accent then Angela Lansbury and it wipes away all the warmth and comfort the original character add. Instead of being the mother you never had, she is the annoyed bartender in Birmingham yelling to order your drink now! The only new character in the entire film is a piano played by Stanley Tucci, and he gets five minutes of screen time. His only characterization is having a tooth problem. Some people think the character is am homage to the Tim Curry organ in the direct to video film Enchanted Christmas. I don’t think so personally, he adds nothing and is barely worth bringing up. Finally there is the great Audra McDonald, a six time Tony winner, as the Wardrobe. Honestly she is the best singer far and away compared to everyone else, and she gets a total of a minute of singing in the movie. This is the equivalent of having Judy Garland only to throw her to the side in exchange for Britany Spears. Her only characterization addition is having narcolepsy, so in the middle of these amazing notes she will fall asleep. Not only is this incredibly wasteful, but she gets saddled with possibly the worst design of the objects. This is a massive problem for the film as a whole, but the CGI side characters are the worst example. They are all designed realistically, but they are still meant to show a range of emotions. Being realistically designed means they have a limited amount of expression, and can be overdesigned, with Cogsworth being the worst designed. He’s a mangled mess of cogs and wires with tiny holes for eyes. Some designs are even creepy, with Miss’s Potts ceramic face being unnerving. Her son Chip has these large orange eyes that have no expression, and they choose to for some reason have several close ups of him. It’s eerie to say the least. Sadly the Wardrobe gets it worse, as it’s just a giant armoire with no eyes, a big mouth and the way she dress’s people could so easily be changed to sucking the soul out of someone. The CGI ruins whatever good things the voice cast could have done, but the voice cast itself doesn’t even do a stellar job to begin with.
Not everything is bad, I have very few positives but only a few. Kevin Klein is the best actor in the movie, bar none. The writing still lets him down as he has been changed to greatly resemble Geppetto from Pinocchio, down to making clocks and not being an inventor. He is also now an overprotective dad, something Maurice was never in the original and is a common Disney cliché. That all being said, he is the only actor who express’s emotion in the movie. You do believe he loves his daughter. He’s still given nothing to do but he at least sells the emotion. That may sound minor but I’ll take anything I can get.
Finally let’s talk about the Enchantress, the witch that kickstarts the entire movie. It may sound weird to pick out what should be a character that has less than a minute of screen time, but bear with me here. She looks good as an old lady, but her transformed form looks like a glowing Christmas Tree decoration. It’s an odd design, makes you wonder why the intro wasn’t just the stain glass window prologue from the beginning. The reason why I’m talking about the character is, and I guess this is a spoiler but you know the story so it doesn’t matter. She comes back, yeah, the witch who caused everything comes back. First she is quickly introduced as a beggar woman in the village, okay. She then saves Maurice in the woods and seems to know him well, that’s very odd. In the end she walks in when the Beast is dead and brings him back to life because he feels bad for Belle. This ending causes a never ending supply of plot holes. Okay, so Emma doesn’t save the day, the witch does, way to take away from the accomplishments of the characters. Why didn’t she curse Gaston at any point in the years this movie took place? Gaston is not very kind to her, and it didn’t take much for the Beast to be turned into a monster. When Gaston calls the beggar a hag and yells for her to get lost, nothing? The witch is also a lot crueler then the original, again a common thread throughout the movie. Not only does she give the Beast a magic mirror to see anything he wants, she also gives him a teleporting book to go anywhere, except people would probably try and kill him thus making it a cruel joke. That book by the way is used for the out of place Paris scene and is never used again, even when it would have helped Belle, another plot hole. The curse now outright kills the servants, including the children and a pet dog. How is this character meant to be likable? We are supposed to like this character clearly by the end but she is so cruel. I know the original cursed the servants but that film never asks for you to like the witch. She also cursed the village to forget everybody, and apparently warped their personality in order to be horribly sexist to Emma Watson. Something that just magically changes at the end. This small addition adds so many problems to the rest of the film that I can’t for the life of me understand why anyone thought it was a good change.
Now let’s talk about the pacing, in all my years of film watching, I have never seen such a strangely paced movie. Certain scenes are switched around, so information is given out at the wrong time. The Belle Reprisal song is placed before Maurice leaves town, but its right after the short Kevin Klein song. So you have three songs directly one after the other. The reprisal itself seems rushed, there is no set up for that song. But then the songs themselves are heavily slowed down. This may have been to make it easier for the lesser voices to grasp them, but it kills the energy of every song in the movie. Be Our Guest is an absolute mess, they pad it out by adding more dancing but the awful CGI and lack of energy drags in into the ground. It also suffers from what I would call George Lucas syndrome, which is throwing tons of CGI on the screen to the point where it overwhelms you. Gaston like I said, lacks energy because of the slowed pace. They added new lyrics that the late Howard Ashmen wrote, but they were probably thrown out for a reason, as they don’t flow as well. It also suffers from sound mixing issues, as this chorus sometimes drowns out Luke Evans to a point where I cannot hear him. The Belle song also suffers from this too, plus a lot of extra’s not sounding very good. Something There has this speed issue of moving too fast, the scene ends and starts to montage and yet the singing continues. It fails to show the audience this is the moment Belle falls in love with the Beast. The Mob Song has an entire verse cut out for some reason and seems to end abruptly. Finally, the Oscar winning Title song, Beauty and the Beast. The scene that was coupled with one of the first major uses of CGI in a massive ballroom. A scene so beautiful people have been known to cry. A scene that was ranked in the New York Times top 100 greatest movie moments at 84. It fails to impress. Thompson’s accent butchers the hauntingly beautiful lyrics, and they cut out the cello from the background orchestration. Worst still, the size is really tone down, the room seems small and the dancing is very unimpressive. They just hold hands and the Beast holds her up at the end, by her back. There is no twirling, nor being carried around the room. It underwhelms when it should be sweeping and romantic. The credit songs are also a loss. Celine Dion’s song at the end is so quick you barely can tell it’s her. The John Legend/Ariana Grande version of the title song suffers from the two having misplaced voices, they don’t pair well with the style of song. And Josh Gorban is clearly getting old judging by his song at the very end. Not a single song works, which is a shame since every song in the original works.
Now let’s talk about the sets, costumes and the CGI. The set design is one of the better aspects, as the castle at times look pretty good. I say on occasion because you can tell what’s a set and what’s CGI and it hurts the film badly. The first shot of the castle looks good, but later exterior shots look really cheap, shocking since it reportedly cost 180 million dollars. The village looks like a set from the Broadway show, which would be impressive for a stage show but for a blockbuster movie that’s a problem. Now the costumes are, interesting to say the least. The costumes have been the best parts of several of the past remakes, with the 2015 Cinderella remake really hitting it out of the park. Here… they are okay, when they stand out it’s for the wrong reasons. Emma Watson’s classic village outfit looks less like a peasant girl and more like something a woman would wear in 1990s New York. It looks completely out of place compared to 18th century French attire and military uniforms that look period accurate. Even stranger, she had the skirt bottom stuffed into her waist to reveal her bloomers. Emma herself said this is to make the character more free spirited, but the dress is clearly mobile enough and this is the equivalency of walking in public with your underwear showing. I’d honestly side with the village, she’s a complete weirdo and out of place. Worse still is the iconic yellow ballroom gown. Emma has gone on about how great it was she turned down wearing a corset, a statement I fail to see the point. But it really lessens the wow factor of such a beautiful piece of clothing, she even downsized it in order to be able to move in it. She turned a dress as iconic as Audrey Hepburn’s black dress from Breakfast at Tiffany’s to something you would see at school prom. Finally the CGI is dodgy as can be the whole movie. It really hampers the Belle Reprisal, as you can tell the hills in the distance are fake. The Sound of Music replica this is not. The white wolves look very odd during the chase scene, and there is always a distinctive disconnect between the actors and the CGI characters. There is never an instant where the CGI improves the film, it just makes everything feel more artificial and soulless.
Now let’s get to the small problems, the tiny bits that slowly add up over time. I won’t mention all of them since we would be here all day, but here’s some of the notably odd changes. There’s a bit in the Belle song where she sits on a fountain and sings about her favorite part of her favorite book. The way Paige says just the words, “Oh isn’t this amazing,” is one of my favorite musical moments in film history. Here, they recreated the fountain perfectly, and it’s still in the town square, but during the song number Emma just walks by with her book under her arm. But the line is still said, it makes no sense why that line is there beyond it was in the original. During the Belle Reprisal, she’s supposed to run into the hills and lay on a bed of dandelions and the wind softly blows the seeds into the wind. It’s so beautiful that I have a painting of that moment in my room. Here, Emma just stands there as she says the lyrics and the scene cuts. This may sound minor, but there are literally dozens and dozens of little moments like that. It eventually starts to get to you.
Look, I went in expecting the worst, I gave it a chance. It didn’t earn it, it was everything I thought it would be and more. Its artificial, its soul-less, and it has no emotional center. As a musical it fails miserably, the singing is some of the worst I have ever heard and the pacing kills the rest. As a romance the leads have no chemistry and when things progress they feel forced. It doesn’t work as eye candy as the CGI is ghastly, and all this film does is instantly wish you were watching the original. It’s also so close to the original that even if all the bad aspects were not in the movie, I would still probably not recommend it for its more of a reenactment then a remake. In fact, I can sum up this entire review by citing three other people’s opinions. The voice of Belle, Paige O’Hara, was very excited for this movie. After Paige saw it, all she could muster was, it looked nice and had a good cast. Later adding that she wishes these movies would have more of a Broadway cast. The late Rodger Ebert said about the Psycho remake a statement that very much applies here. “the film demonstrates that a shot-by-shot remake is pointless, genius apparently resides between or beneath the shots, or in chemistry that cannot be timed or counted.” Finally, Don Hahn the producer of the original Beauty and the Beast said on the commentary track in back 2002. “This movie could only have been made in 1991. It could have been good in the 80s, it could have been good in the 2000s, but would it have been nominated for Best Picture? No.” All of these statements are so very true, I give this movie a two out of ten rating. It only escapes being a one, by virtue that one of the direct to video sequels to the original is unwatchable. This movie, to quote “Something There”, most certainly not new, but is absolutely new and a bit alarming.
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Post by Teacakes on Apr 3, 2017 20:29:25 GMT
First of all, I just want to say that I haven't had a deep, emotional connection with the 1991 original Beauty and the Beast compared to that of you, Bio. I think it's s really good movie, beautifully animated, and it all still holds up to this day. I thoroughly enjoyed watching it in the days of my youth, but I only just recently watched it before going to see the 2017 remake. That being said, I still know the movie very well, as well as all of the songs.
I was mildly interested in the remake. I told myself I'd go see it in the cinema and just see what would happen. I honestly thought it would not hold a candle light to the original, but I found myself enjoying it. I've even been on a second viewing.
Right off the bat, we have the introduction, where instead of stain glass windows, we actually see the Prince and what he was like prior to being the Beast. I like this addition a great deal, as it gives us a better impression of why the enchantress cursed him in the first place. I think Dan Stevens did a fantastic job at portraying this corrupt, vain, spoilt, rotten prince, which in turn, makes his change in character throughout the film even greater.
I can agree with you that Emma Watson is no where near as good as Belle compared to that Paige O'Hara. However, despite this, I think she was good as Belle, and although her singer voice is once again, not as good, it was... Passable to say the least. I won't go out of my way to say 'Wow, she's amazing, best Belle evar!' The auto tune, to me, was not as distracting as you might think. It may have been at the start, but I quickly got used to it. I wouldn't say that Emma Watson's portrayal was incredible, her vacant impression during 'Be Our Guest' and mediocre reaction to the CGI characters dancing about was distracting, but overall, she was good, and that's all I can really say.
Now Beast, hoo boy, I can say a whole lot about him. To start with, as I said before, I think Dan Stevens did an incredible job with his portrayal of both the Beast and the Prince. If you asked me if I preferred Dan Stevens or Robbie Benson, I honestly would not be able to tell you right now as I haven't quite figured it out for myself, so let's just say I like then both equally. Beast's anger, his pain, his torment, it's all captured so well. As for the CGI, while you may think it looks awful, I for one thought that it was what made this performance. Is the CGI better than the original animation? No, the animated version of Beast is absolutely perfect, every frame is pretty much a work of art. Back to this version of Beast though, look at his eyes, that is key. His performance wasn't lost in the CGI, it was stil there, it still came through, to me at least. During the scene where he lets Belle go, he may not have taken the time to truly think about it, gone through about 5 emotions like the original Beast had, but you could see the pain in his eyes, the sorrow, he was on the brink tears, and that stuck with me. His song 'Evermore' was sung amazingly, the lyrics were great, I felt the emotion through every word,I love how he climbed the tower higher and higher just to keep Belle in view as long as possible. I regard that song as the best new song they introduced and I seriously hope it wins an Oscar for best original score, or at the very least gets nominated. Personally, I think Dan Stevens stole this movie, which is why I had so little to say about Belle as I was focused on him throughout it.
I wanted to express my view on our two main leads, I'll write some more for your other points soon. Before I do that, do you have anything to say to my thoughts on the main characters?
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Post by Teacakes on Apr 4, 2017 16:08:33 GMT
Fair enough, I can understand why you don't like the CGI, it can be hit and miss with people, some people like it, some people might not, it's all a matter of opinion. I personally think that Dan Stevens did a good job at showing both the angry and softer side of Beast. That is why I think he stole the show for me. I can't believe I didn't know about this guy beforehand, I look forward to seeing him in more stuff.
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Post by Bioshock Infinite WD on Apr 4, 2017 16:14:22 GMT
Fair enough, I can understand why you don't like the CGI, it can be hit and miss with people, some people like it, some people might not, it's all a matter of opinion. I personally think that Dan Stevens did a good job at showing both the angry and softer side of Beast. That is why I think he stole the show for me. I can't believe I didn't know about this guy beforehand, I look forward to seeing him in more stuff. He's a good actor in Downton Abbey, the Guest and recently Legion, hell I like a lot of people in the cast, I just don't think this was anyone's best.
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