Middle Age Fat Guy Likes It.

Rating: 9/10 (12 April 2017)

OK, so I'm a middle aged fat guy, former soldier and retired cop. Hard ass never liked musicals in my life. I couldn't stand "Oklahoma", "West Side Story", "Guys and Dolls", etc and I'm a HUGE classic movie buff. Loved the ones NOT musicals and absolutely refused to give any Disney musical even a chance at entertaining me. If it was guns, explosions, hot chicks in Daisy Dukes, I was all for it. I loved the ones like "Marty", "On The Water Front", "Casablanca", etc. Still wasn't going to watch a musical.
Then this movie came out and I saw the previews. I found myself watching the previews every time I came to IMDb to write about some subject. It slowly started creeping into my conscience. All I knew is it had that little girl from the Harry Potter movies that my boys so loved growing up.
Then I heard her sing and it grabbed me by the heart. This last Christmas I spent with the Moscow ballet and so I was already into ballet and music. Just not musicals but her singing had me telling my wife, "We're going to see that when it comes out." I've literally seen thousands of movies in my life. I used to work at a cinema. I can tell you the movies that I have actually paid to see at the theater more than once: "Star Wars (original)".... "Terminator"...."Spaceballs"... "Unforgiven".... "Schindler's List"... "Saving Private Ryan"..... "Beauty and the Beast". I don't care about Oscar winning movies. I watch them because if someone asks about them, I'll actually know what I'm talking about.
I'm not gay but I watched "Brokeback Mountain" just so I could tell people that they were full of bulls**** when they trashed it. People never saw it and just drove it into the ground. When it came to BATB, I heard people passively talking about it as, "Just another Disney musical that we might take the kids to see." 50 years old.. 250 lbs retired soldier and police officer... Has testicles firmly in place.. Married... Kids are grown and living in the world... I look like a cross between Tom Arnold and Alfred E. Newman..... and I not only paid twice to see it, I'm going to take my wife and watch it a third time tomorrow.
I can tell you the CGI/Human interaction is incredibly detailed and perfect. All of the characters bring energy to the story in their own way. The casting was damn near as perfect as you can get in a movie of this scale, requiring so much talent. The acting was believable, the singing was encompassing and vibrated your heart. I kept waiting for a "slow" part so I could run to the restroom. The movie never slowed down a bit. It kept going right along, smooth transition from scene to scene, the music keeping you involved. I was enthralled.
Go see it. If you need a middle aged fat guy to go with you so people don't think that you're a creeper, call me. I've seen it alone and you do get strange looks. But it's worth the strange looks.
I hope you do go see the movie and I hope that you enjoy it.
Bill