Movie Review: Beauty and the Beast (2017) Part 1 3-20-17
This
whole craze of live-action Disney remakes began in 2010, with Tim
Burton's Alice in Wonderland.
Despite receiving very mixed reviews, the
film earned over a billion dollars worldwide! It kind of bothers me that
it earned more money than DreamWorks' How To Train Your Dragon, which
premiered around the same time. I have yet to see the sequel, and I don't plan to in the near future.
The
next live-action Disney remake was Maleficent, released in 2014,
starring Angelina Jolie as the famous wicked sorceress. It was meant to
tell the story of Walt Disney's Sleeping Beauty through the eyes of
Maleficent, as well as how she became evil. Instead, we got a mess of a
film in which Maleficent is the hero and King Stephan (Aurora's father)
is the villain. To make matters worse, Flora, Fauna, and Merryweather,
the Three Good Fairies in the original film, were demoted to female
equivalents of The Three Stooges.
I also feel like the climax kind of copies Frozen.
The
third live-action Disney remake was Cinderella, released in 2015. It
stuck faithfully to both the Disney version and the Charles Perrault version
of the fairytale, and added a deeper backstory to Cinderella (whose real name is Ella this time around). When I first saw this film in theaters, it was right after
one of the most insane ideas ever for a crossover episode: Steven
Universe's 'Say Uncle', a crossover episode of Steven Universe and Uncle
Grandpa. What next? A crossover episode of Star vs. the Forces of Evil
and Pickle & Peanut? Or a crossover episode of Teenage Mutant Ninja
Turtles (the CGI turtles) and Fanboy & Chum-Chum?
The
fourth live-action Disney remake was The Jungle Book, released in 2016.
It had a young boy, Neel Sethi, who plays Mowgli in this version, in a
CGI jungle with hyper-realistic CG animals voiced by celebrities like Bill
Murray, Ben Kingsley, Christopher Walken, Idris Elba, and Scarlett
Johansen. Only two of the songs from the original film returned: 'The
Bare Necessities' and 'I Wanna Be Like You'. It's a very enjoyable film,
but I feel sad that the vultures, nor Shanti, the human girl Mowgli
falls in love with at the end of the original film, don't return. I also
don't like how this line in 'The Bare Necessities' was cut out.
Baloo: Now, when you pick a paw-paw
Or a prickly pear
And you prick the raw paw
Next time, beware!
Don't pick the prickly pear by the paw
When you pick a pear, try to use the claw!
But you don't need to use the claw
When you pick a pair of the big paw-paw
Have I given you a clue?
Mowgli: Golly, thanks Baloo!
Baloo: The bare necessities of life will come to you!
They'll come to you!
Also
released in 2016 was Pete's Dragon, based on the 1977 film of the same
name. I actually talked about this film back in August, and I think it's
a near-perfect live-action family film.
I will talk about the recent remake of Beauty and the Beast in Part 2, which I'll post later today.
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