Traditional Hollywood musical with modern techniques

Rating: 7/10 (16 April 2017)

If you haven't seen this Beauty & The Beast adaption yet, please go and watch this movie without prejudice. Don't expect a 'real life action' version of the Disney animation movie from 1991. Better compare this to a musical movie in the best Hollywood tradition, bedazzled with state of the art computer graphics, it's a treat.
The Good: If you like musicals with luxurious sets, vivid colors, you'll love this movie. Also it's a parade of well known actors, and their voices. Some scenes are reminiscent of other musical movies like The Sound of Music (Belle on top of the mountain) or Oliver Twist (Gaston's beer-drinking song) The woods and cloudy skies seem to derive straight from Lord of The Rings. I felt myself getting into this 3 D story book, enjoying every minute of it, although I'm quiet familiar with the fairy tale.
The Bad: IMO this Disney production is too much a remake of its own animated movie, using the same colors and styles for the actors' wigs and costumes. Then, naturally, people start complaining about actors who are not 'the real Belle' or 'Gaston' or whomever they play. If the makers would consider this a classic Broadway musical, they would allow their actors to use the stage like in Phantom of the Opera or Moulin Rouge. Now some scenes were copy paged from the nineties version, like the living mops cleaning the castle or the flying dinnerware creating all kind of abstract motions and patterns. They could have known those creations are always better made in animation.
Overall, I enjoyed this adaption very much: the story lines were solid like the all star cast, some were better singers than others, with notable roles from Luke Evans, Josh Gad and Kevin Kline. The scenery and music score were perfectly arranged, the emotions right on spot. Highly recommended for musical lovers!