Beauty and the Beast (2017 film)

Beauty and the Beast is an American live-action fantasy, musical film directed by Bill Condon, and distributed by Walt Disney Pictures. It is a remake of the 1991 animated film of the same name and was written by Evan Spiliotopoulos and produced by Mandeville Films.

The script was rewritten by Stephen Chbosky. The film stars Emma Watson as Belle and Dan Stevens as the Prince/Beast. It was released on March 17, 2017.

Summary
“Beauty and the Beast” is the fantastic journey of Belle, a bright, beautiful and independent young woman who is taken prisoner by a beast in his castle. Despite her fears, she befriends the castle’s enchanted staff and learns to look beyond the Beast’s hideous exterior and realize the kind heart and soul of the true Prince within.

Plot
In a vast castle of grandeur, a young prince is having a party of lovely woman as Madame de Garderobe sings. By this is interrupted when an old hag arrives at the palace and offers the prince a rose. But the prince declines the rose and the hag transformed herself into an Enchantress. The Prince begged for forgiveness, but the Enchantress would not forgive him and she transformed the Prince into a Beast and all his workers into Enchanted objects, and she removed the villagers' memories of the Prince and the castle. She turned the rose into an Enchanted rose, and said that if the Prince hadn't learned to love by the time the last petal fell off the rose, he would be a Beast forever, and  the Enchanted objects would become antiques.

Cast

 * Emma Watson as Belle
 * Dan Stevens as Beast/the Prince
 * Luke Evans as Gaston
 * Kevin Kline as Maurice
 * Josh Gad as LeFou
 * Ewan McGregor as Lumière
 * Ian McKellen as Cogsworth
 * Emma Thompson as Mrs. Potts
 * Stanley Tucci as Maestro Cadenza
 * Audra McDonald as Madame de Garderobe
 * Gugu Mbatha-Raw as Plumette
 * Nathan Mack as Chip
 * Thomas Padden as Chapeau
 * Adrian Schiller as Monsieur D'Arque
 * Hattie Morahan as Agathe/The Enchantress
 * Zoe Rainey as Belle's Mother
 * Gerard Horan as Monsieur Jean Potts
 * Henry Garrett as the King
 * Harriet Jones as the Queen

Casting
Emma Watson was announced as the lead role as Belle in January 2015, Two months later, in March of 2015, actors Luke Evans and Dan Stevens were revealed to be in talks to play Gaston and the Beast respectively in the film. Josh Gad was confirmed to play LeFou in the film. Emma Thompson, Kevin Kline, Audra McDonald, Ian McKellen, Gugu Mbatha-Raw, Ewan McGregor and Stanley Tucci also joined the cast in March of 2015.

Filming
Filming began on May 18, 2015 and ended on August 21, 2015, six day's later it was announced that the film had officially wrapped up production.

Music
The soundtrack was released by Walt Disney Records on March 10, 2017.

Reception
The film has recieved a mixed-to-positive reception when it came out. Most critics praised the sets and the songs, but many critics panned some of the actors, especially Best Actress Winner Emma Watson as Belle. The film has a current rating of 71% on Rotten Tomatoes, based on 196 reviews. However, many Christians are boycotting the film due to the character of LeFou being a confused homosexual/bisexual. A drive-in movie theater owner in Henagar is refusing to screen the film, and the film is banned in Malaysia.

Differences between the 1991 film and the 2017 film

 * The Enchantress plays a larger role in the 2017 film.
 * Unlike the animated film, Maurice was an artist rather than an inventor. Instead, Belle is now an inventor.
 * Belle's backstory was explained on the film. This reveals why she and her father moved to a small town.
 * Aside from Belle, the Beast's backstory was also explained on how he became heartless towards the people.
 * Cadenza was a new character added for the 2017 film. He is the husband of the wardrobe.
 * Sultan is renamed as Fru Fru in the 2017 film.
 * Chip was an only child of Mrs Potts. In the animated film, Chip had brothers and sisters who were minor characters.
 * Unlike the animated film, the Enchantress gave the Beast not only the enchanted rose and the mirror but also a book that enables him to transport on a particular place.
 * Whenever a petal falls, parts of the castle will collapse. This is not present in the animated film.
 * Maurice was imprisoned in the castle only because of the rose he picked for Belle. This is a similar scene from the original fairy tale.
 * Belle did not take off the glass cover of the rose when the Beast caught her.
 * Belle was less dreamy of the books she read than what she was in the animated film.
 * LeFou was taller in this film. He was not bisexual in the original (however, he dances with a woman at the end, only to get accidentally paired up with a man when it comes time to change dance partners; the two look at each other in shock and are not seen again after this).
 * Unlike the original film, LeFou reformed at the end when he felt betrayed after Gaston left him to be beaten by the enchanted objects while Gaston left to find and kill the Beast during the battle.
 * Gaston was not muscular and had a mustache in this film. He was also known for being a soldier who fought during the war rather than just a hunter.
 * The Beast did not take Belle to a bedroom but it was Lumiere instead.
 * Fifi is renamed as Plumette in the 2017 film.
 * In the 2017 film, Gaston shot the Beast using a pistol instead of an arrow. And before his death, Gaston shot the Beast in the back with his pistol instead of stabbing him with a dagger.
 * The Enchantress appears at the end of the film to revive the Beast and reversed the curse she planted on him.
 * Majority of the characters' physical appearance as the enchanted objects inside the castle were changed: Mrs Potts' face was now on the right side of the teapot instead of at the spout, Lumiere somewhat appears to be a golden sculptured human figure candlestick, Madame Garderobe's face was inside the wardrobe instead on the top and Plumette resembles a miniature swan rather than an ordinary feather duster.
 * During "Something There," Belle and the Beast did sing unlike in the animated film where their singing voices are only non-diegetic during the scene.
 * In the 2017 film, Gaston falls to his death when a footbridge in which he was standing breaks apart.

International Premieres

 * February 23, 2017 (London)
 * March 16, 2017 (Albania, Brazil, Colombia, Czech Republic, Germany, Denmark, Greece, Republic of Korea, Croatia, Italy, Cambodia, Mexico, Nicaragua, Philippines, Portugal, Russia, Singapore, Serbia, Taiwan)
 * March 17, 2017 (Bulgaria, Canada, China, Estonia, Spain, Finland, United Kingdom, Hong Kong, Lithuania, Norway, Poland, Sweden, Turkey, USA)
 * March 22, 2017 (France)
 * March 23, 2017 (Australia, Argentina, Hungary, Israel)
 * March 29, 2017 (Belgium, Netherlands)
 * March 30, 2017 (Chile)
 * April 14, 2017 (South Africa)
 * April 21, 2017 (Japan)

Trivia

 * This is the first live-action adaptation of a Walt Disney Animation Studios movie that is from the Disney Renaissance.
 * Cadenza is a new character created for this remake. He is the husband of the Wardrobe who was transformed into a harpsichord and got separated from his wife while the castle was under it's spell.
 * This is Kevin Kline's first role for a Disney film since he played Phoebus in The Hunchback of Notre Dame and The Hunchback of Notre Dame II.
 * Filming began in Surrey, England on May 18, 2015 and was completed on August 27.
 * Bill Condon had actors sing The Lion King 's "Hakuna Matata" at the auditions to measure their singing voices. This was how he chose the final cast for this film.
 * This is the eighth of many live-action re-imaginings of Disney animated films released in the 20th and 21st centuries, following Rudyard Kipling's The Jungle Book, 101 Dalmatians, The Jungle Book: Mowgli's Story, Maleficent, Cinderella, The Jungle Book and Pete's Dragon. Many others are in development.
 * The teaser includes the opening music from the animated film and a piano sample of the title song.
 * Three new songs were written and composed for the film, in addition to the original songs featured in the animated version.
 * This is the fourth time that Emma Thompson does a role for a Disney film after playing Captain Amelia in Treasure Planet, Queen Elinor in Brave and P. L. Travers in Saving Mr. Banks.
 * This is the fourth movie collaboration between Ewan McGregor and Stanley Tucci following Jack the Giant Slayer, Robots and A Life Less Ordinary.
 * Actors Luke Evans who played Gaston and Ian McKellen who played Cogsworth, previously collaborated in The Hobbit trilogy, in which Evans played as the bowman called Bard while McKellen played as the wizard called Gandalf but their characters did not interact until the finale of the trilogy.
 * Actors Stanley Tucci who played Cadenza and Dan Stevens who played the Beast previously worked together in Bill Condon's thriller film The Fifth Estate.
 * Actresses Emma Watson who played Belle and Emma Thompson who played Mrs. Potts, previously worked in the Harry Potter franchise. In that franchise Watson played a witch and a student called Hermione Granger while Thompson played a witch, seer and a professor called Sybill Trelawney.
 * The production cultivated a total of 1500 "enchanted" roses for the movie.
 * All the wardrobe was made of sustainable materials friendly with the average environment.
 * Interestingly, the actors Emma Watson (Belle), Luke Evans (Gaston), Emma Thompson (Mrs Potts) and Nathan Mack (Chip) share the same birth date, April 15th.
 * Emma Watson reveals she wanted to play Belle instead of Cinderella, explaining that her personality associated much more with the former than the latter.