Despite Some Pacing Issues And A Few Technical Flaws, "Beauty And The Beast" Is Still A Magnificent, Magical Journey Boosted By Strong Performances From Its Lead Actors

Rating: 9/10 (19 March 2017)

"Beauty And The Beast" is Disney's fourth live-action remake of a classic animated film, is directed by Bill Condon, and star Emma Watson as Belle, a bookworm who goes a castle holding a beast who has been coursed and they start to fall in love with each while Gaston (Luke Evans) has other plans.
I was really looking forward to this film after seeing "The Jungle Book," and seeing how well Disney pulled off that magic, and thankfully it worked in this film. Not as good as the animated classic, but a very strong-live action remake.
Emma Watson does a very good job as Belle. I can see this as a career revival for Emma. Looking at her films between Harry Potter and this, I think a lot of people didn't really know where her acting career was going. And goddamn can she sing. Her voice is magnificent. Who knew she could belt those high notes. A movie like this has to have good chemistry from its two leads. if it doesn't, this movie would have failed, but luckily, she and Dan Stevens make a great team and their chemistry together is really realized in a lot of the bonding scenes in this film.
Let's talk about Luke Evans as Gaston for a moment. Luke Evans proves why he is one of the best actors working today. Gaston was villainous, he was evil, downright unlikeable, like a classic Disney villain or any movie villain for that matter should be, and it really helped that he was portrayed by someone like Luke Evans. Evans gives it his all and the supporting cast does as well, as not one single one of them has a bad singing voice.
Some of the songs were extended, which I liked. The "Gaston" song was extended for this movie to show just how evil the dude really is, and I appreciated that. All of the classics from the original animated film are in here like "Belle," "Be Our Guest," "Beauty And The Beast," "Gaston," and "Kill the Beast." My only problem with so many songs and an added 40 minutes on the runtime compared to the original is that at times it feels like this film can be a bit slow. You feel like you're a lot further into this film than you really are and you realize that sometimes a couple of the songs drag.
There also some times that the CGI with the Beast bothered me. It didn't look very smooth in these scenes when it was mostly flawless for the rest of the film. I've talked to other people about this and they say they didn't notice it, but for some reason I did, and it stuck out so I had to talk about a technical flaw I saw.
This vision is well realized. The world this film portrays portrays it in a way that is believable. You believe this place actually exists and is fantasy world that people like Belle could live in. I really liked this movie, and am looking forward to many more Disney live-action remakes.
I am going to give "Beauty And The Beast" an 8.5/10.
You can find my video review of "Beauty And The Beast" on YouTube here:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zMtb_uXG9c4