‘Be Our Guest’: Live action remake of classic Disney film in theaters
Audiences will step into an enchanted castle while they are asked to “Be Our Guest” in the live action adaptation of Walt Disney Studios’ “Beauty and the Beast” in theaters this weekend.
Belle (Emma Watson, The Harry Potter series and “The Perks of Being a Wallflower”) is imprisoned in a castle by The Beast (Dan Stevens “Downton Abbey” and “Legion”) where she becomes friends with enchanted objects such as the candlestick Lumiere (Ewan McGregor, “Transpotting” and “Star Wars: The Force Awakens”), a clock, Cogsworth (Ian McKellen, “The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies” and “X-Men: Days of Future Past”) and a teapot, Mrs. Potts (Emma Thompson, “Sense and Sensibility” and “Love Actually”).
Outside the castle the bully Gaston (Luke Evans, “The Raven” and “Dracula Untold”) and his bumbling sidekick, LeFou (Josh Gad, “Frozen” and “The Wedding Ringer”) try to hatch a plan to not only have Gaston marry Belle, but also rescue her from the castle while killing the Beast.
Watson, who grew up on camera when she portrayed Hermione Granger in the Harry Potter films feels like this role makes her feel like she finally matured.
“I am probably never in my life gonna have a more romantic moment than this! I’m peaking at 26! My most romantic moment! It’s never gonna get better than this,” said Watson in an interview with E! Online.
In the same interview, Watson had thoughts when it came to the famous yellow ballgown that has been a dream for little girls for years.
Watson said, “It was kind of nerve-wracking. That yellow dress is beloved in the imagination of girls all over the world, you want it to be perfect.”
Before the film’s premier, Disney received backlash from some groups for Gad’s portrayal of Disney’s first openly gay character.
According to the Associated Press, Gad said, “(Director) Bill Condon did an amazing job of giving us an opportunity to create a version of LeFou that isn’t like the original, that expands on what the original did, but that makes him more human and makes him a wonderfully complex character to some extent.”
Because of it a Henagar, Alabama drive-in will not show the film and the Russian government is thinking of banning the film all together.
However, “Beauty and the Beast” has received positive reviews from critics during the premiere including Watson’s portrayal of Belle.
“Watson is a sturdy, no-nonsense Belle. In one quietly extraordinary moment, she hatches a plan to save the endangered Beast, with whom she has slowly fallen in love. When she outlines the scheme to her father, he says, solemnly, ‘It’s dangerous.’ She looks at him directly and says, ‘Yes. Yes it is.’ There’s no malarkey about bravery here – Belle knows there can be no courage without fear,” wrote Stephanie Zacharek in a review for Time.com.
“There is no need to worry that this version might crush the gentle charms of the 1991 picture: Even though Condon more or less faithfully follows that movies plot, this ‘Beauty’ is its own resplendent creature,” she also wrote in her review.
“Beauty and the Beast” is rated PG for some action violence, peril and frightening images.
Other films coming to theaters this weekend include:
n “T2: Trainspotting” starring Ewan McGregor, Ewen Bremner and Jonny Lee Miller and directed by Danny Boyle in this sequel that takes place 20 years later when Mark Renton returns to Scotland to meet up with his old friends Sick Boy, Spud and Begbie.
The film is rated R for drug use, language throughout, strong sexual content, graphic nudity and some violence.
n “The Belko Experiment” starring Adria Arjona, Michael Rooker and Abraham Benrubi and directed by Greg McLean in this thriller about a social experiment involving 80 people, who are locked in their corporate office in Colombia, who are ordered by an unknown person to participate in a dangerous game of kill or be killed.
The film is rated R for strong bloody violence throughout, language including sexual references and some drug use.
n “All Nighter” starring Analeigh Tipton J.K. Simmons and Emile Hirsch and directed by Gavin Wiesen in this comedy about a workaholic father who tries to visit his daughter when he finds out she has disappeared. He must partner with her ex-boyfriend to try and find her.
The film is rated R for language throughout, sexual material, drug content and brief nudity.