Disney simply cannot resist mucking about

Rating: 7/10 (19 March 2017)

The first thing you need to understand is that, according to some scholars, every story is at its essence a love story. Even, for example, some the male-oriented actioners can be perceived as a tale where the hero is in love ... with himself.
Second, the original Belle Et La Bete is an 18th century French tale with antecedents, they say, in older literature going back 4000 years. (Wikipedia) Since it is a French tale, it is only fitting that the French were the first to film it, in the 1940s, with Cocteau at the helm. One of my all time favorite films.
Now to the Disney machine. Disney has done this story before. Disney, being Disney, simply cannot resist the temptation to set the story to music. Seriously. If there is a third world war, and 100 years from now, Disney does a film about that, it will no doubt be a musical too.
The story was changed significantly. Add the musical interludes and you are really dealing with a variant or "fork" of the tale but not the real one. It is significant that even the critics who love the film cannot help but notice that chunks of it are "awkward." Watson is a delight. Can never tire of seeing her light up the screen. The movie however is deeply flawed, and odd.
See the French original. Or see the Kristin Kruek TV knockoff. Both are, overall, better and more focused productions.