BEAUTY AND THE BEAST

BEAUTY AND THE BEAST

Late eighteenth century, in a small French village. Beautiful, dreamy and passionate girl of literature, lives with her father, a wacky old inventor. Having lost a night in the forest, he takes refuge in the castle of the Beast, which is thrown into the dungeon. Never to bear to see his father imprisoned, Belle then agrees to take his place, unaware that under the mask of a monster hide a Prince Charming trembling with love for her, but victim of a horrible curse.

After having rocked our younger years with cartoons that have since become classics that are passed down from generation to generation, the Walt Disney Company has been making the dream of every fan for many years: transforming animated films into feature films with live shots. Thus, after Alice in Wonderland, Maleficent, Cinderella or The Book of the Jungle, Disney has chosen to propose a new adaptation of the tale Beauty and the Beast.
If the different versions succeeded one another, between the adaptation of Jean Cocteau (1946), the musical of Broadway but also a French version presented by Christophe Gans (2014), with Léa Seydoux and Vincent Cassel in the main roles, it is to Bill Condon that Disney has entrusted the adaptation of one of his greatest hits, appeared on the French screens in 1992 and which has received multiple awards. Directed by Kirk Wise and Gary Trousdale, this animated film is the first animated film to receive an Oscar nomination for Best Picture.

The interest of the project of 2017 is to propose more realism, to dig deeper the history and especially to deepen the personality of the characters. And the least we can say is that for the occasion, Disney has put the dishes in the big! All the ingredients are there to make this film a true masterpiece of fairy tales. Casting, sets, costumes, music ... all elements come together to achieve the perfect flick fantasy. The result is a striking visual beauty, which contributes to the complete success of the transposition. The real shots bring a real added value to a story that the general public knows by heart.
A clever combination of motion capture, photo-realistic shots of characters such as a talking teapot and shots of outdoor sets, as well as computer-generated images, the film is easy to distinguish from its animated predecessor at first sight. eye. The evolution is particularly noticeable for the character of the Beast, who suddenly becomes much more believable thanks to the capture performance and the capture of facial expressions that make the work of actor Dan Stevens realistic. Helped by technology, the writers have sought to make the Beast more complex but also more humane; it is not the only one to benefit from this evolution, which legitimizes the relevance of this live company which relies on a real artistic project for the rest.

If the leitmotiv of the story of Beauty and the Beast has always been to privilege the theme of inner beauty, the film brings an unprecedented realism that helps us to believe more in the emerging love between the two protagonists. The psychology of the characters becomes clearer and learning more about their past helps to better understand their personality. With a good dose of self-mockery and humor, which set the tone for a sparkling film that puts us in full view from beginning to end, the characters and their stories are set up in sets at the neat aesthetics, in the purest tradition of great romantic Hollywood comedies. The modernity of tone and spirit will not escape the public, and will explain why the film is more suitable for teenagers and adults than for toddlers. The sudden depth of characters such as Gaston inevitably arouses the interest of a more mature audience, who will appreciate the likelihood of an adaptation that moves away from the fairy tale to fully embed this story in real life.

The communicative energy conveyed by a four-petalled cast that obviously plays wildly, offers all the lightness necessary for a story that has its share of shadows. If Emma Watson seems to transfigure her own character (feminist, modern, bibliophile ...) to her character, and the performers who hide behind Miss Samovar, Light or Big Ben, have a voice so enthusiastic that they hide their excitement, c rather, the duo Luke Evans-Josh Gad will be remembered by the audience. They form an irresistible duet, between the arrogant Gaston and his faithful sidekick LeFou. The two actors are a comic couple that the viewer will not forget anytime soon. Not to mention the fact that they sing divinely well. Because who says Disney always says ... music!