Beauty and the Beast (Live-Action)

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estefan
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Re: Beauty and the Beast (Live-Action)

Post by estefan »

I think with Alice in Wonderland, she was just interested in writing a continuation of Lewis Carroll's books with Alice returning there as a young adult. I personally don't count Alice as one of the "live-action remakes" as it's not retelling the story and it even avoids making specific references to the animated film.

I consider Tim Burton's Alice in Wonderland to be more in line with "Return to Oz", a continuation of the original book that doesn't take inspiration from earlier film adaptations. Although "Return to Oz" was based on two of Baum's Oz books, while Woolverton came up with her own story for Alice.
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Re: Beauty and the Beast (Live-Action)

Post by DisneyFan09 »

Sotiris wrote:Linda Woolverton didn't like the live-action Beauty and the Beast. Do you think it's just sour grapes because she wasn't asked to be involved or does she have a point?

Original 'Lion King' Screenwriter Apprehensive of Remake: "I Wasn't Thrilled With 'Beauty and the Beast'"
https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/ ... st-1165869
At least she's just like the majority! :P
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Re: Beauty and the Beast (Live-Action)

Post by blackcauldron85 »

estefan wrote:I think with Alice in Wonderland, she was just interested in writing a continuation of Lewis Carroll's books with Alice returning there as a young adult. I personally don't count Alice as one of the "live-action remakes" as it's not retelling the story and it even avoids making specific references to the animated film.

I consider Tim Burton's Alice in Wonderland to be more in line with "Return to Oz", a continuation of the original book that doesn't take inspiration from earlier film adaptations. Although "Return to Oz" was based on two of Baum's Oz books, while Woolverton came up with her own story for Alice.
That's a really, really good point. I only saw 2010 AiW once, so I wasn't thinking of that!
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Re: Beauty and the Beast (Live-Action)

Post by thedisneyspirit »

It still lay the seeds for the live actions to come...
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Re: Beauty and the Beast (Live-Action)

Post by nomad2010 »

DisneyFan09 wrote:
Sotiris wrote:Linda Woolverton didn't like the live-action Beauty and the Beast. Do you think it's just sour grapes because she wasn't asked to be involved or does she have a point?

Original 'Lion King' Screenwriter Apprehensive of Remake: "I Wasn't Thrilled With 'Beauty and the Beast'"
https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/ ... st-1165869
At least she's just like the majority! :P
I’d be curious to see what would’ve happened had they brought her on. She’s really not given us anything good since her big animated movies. Alice was fine as a sort of sequel but it suffered from a lot of issues and felt rather lazy. And Maleficent is a mess that destroys a beloved villain. I know technically the characters in Beauty and the Beast are her characters, and therefore she might have some insight into them others wouldn’t. Maybe she’d have made it the modern live action classic it should’ve been instead of the confounding, incomprehensible misunderstanding of the source material, and lazily shot bore it eventually became. I can only imagine how frustrated she is with the live action movie. It has to hurt a bit to have seen it so poorly executed.
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Re: Beauty and the Beast (Live-Action)

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JeanGreyForever wrote:I feel they'll be better when it comes to their treatment of Snow White. Besides the fact that Snow White has sort of an untouchable status, we also know that Disney is planning on making it a musical like the animated movie so it can't stray that far from the original.
True.
JeanGreyForever wrote:I'm not a fan of the ending either but I'm assuming it was chosen to segway into a sequel. Nevermind that the ending of the original book has him go back to the man village yet there's still a sequel to the book but I trust Jon Favreau.

The only thing I liked about the Paris scene was seeing Notre Dame since it felt like an easter egg to Hunchback but even I know that 99% didn't mean anything about a live-action Hunchback film.

I never realized that Josh Gad didn't play LeFou as gay. I assumed he knew the character was meant to be portrayed that way.
Oh I didn't know that, but if he intented to blend the books and the Walt film into the remake, he should have had him go to the man village and stay there before he does the sequel as that happens in both the books and the Walt film.

Josh Gad said when he read the script he didn't feel LeFou was gay, but maybe he played him gay. I don't know, it's a mystery to me.
estefan wrote:I consider Tim Burton's Alice in Wonderland to be more in line with "Return to Oz", a continuation of the original book that doesn't take inspiration from earlier film adaptations. Although "Return to Oz" was based on two of Baum's Oz books, while Woolverton came up with her own story for Alice.
True, Alice was really a sequel. But Return to Oz uses the ruby slippers that only come from the MGM movie. I forget if it uses anything else.
nomad2010 wrote:I’d be curious to see what would’ve happened had they brought her on. She’s really not given us anything good since her big animated movies. Alice was fine as a sort of sequel but it suffered from a lot of issues and felt rather lazy. And Maleficent is a mess that destroys a beloved villain. I know technically the characters in Beauty and the Beast are her characters, and therefore she might have some insight into them others wouldn’t. Maybe she’d have made it the modern live action classic it should’ve been instead of the confounding, incomprehensible misunderstanding of the source material, and lazily shot bore it eventually became. I can only imagine how frustrated she is with the live action movie. It has to hurt a bit to have seen it so poorly executed.
Word.
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Re: Beauty and the Beast (Live-Action)

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Q: Linda Woolverton, who wrote the original Lion King and Beauty and the Beast, told THR she wasn't thrilled with the live-action Beauty and the Beast. Did that sting?

Sean Bailey: All these stories have something timeless about them. There have been many variations of Beauty and the Beast. We had our interpretation for this time. Linda worked on one that was an interpretation for a different time. Someone I'm sure will interpret it differently 20 years from now.
Source: https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/ ... ng-1169170
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Re: Beauty and the Beast (Live-Action)

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Sotiris wrote:
Q: Linda Woolverton, who wrote the original Lion King and Beauty and the Beast, told THR she wasn't thrilled with the live-action Beauty and the Beast. Did that sting?

Sean Bailey: All these stories have something timeless about them. There have been many variations of Beauty and the Beast. We had our interpretation for this time. Linda worked on one that was an interpretation for a different time. Someone I'm sure will interpret it differently 20 years from now.
Source: https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/ ... ng-1169170
What a jerk! They deliberately used HER script for this "interpretation".
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Re: Beauty and the Beast (Live-Action)

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farerb wrote:What a jerk! They deliberately used HER script for this "interpretation".
That was indeed disrespectful. Why are they so against hiring screenwriters and other creative talent from the original, animated films to work on the respective live-action remakes? You'd think they'd want the people who know these films and characters the best to work on the remakes and ensure they remain true to the spirit of the originals, thus ensuring their success. I find it bewildering they don't do that. They should have asked him about that instead.
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Re: Beauty and the Beast (Live-Action)

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When you compare Woolverton's original script to the final film, a lot was changed in the process by Roger Allers, Brenda Chapman, and Chris Sanders, along with other members of the story team. Then, when comparing that final 1991 film to the 2017 version, and I did the math, only 12% of dialogue was re-used from the original film. That number goes down even more when you compare what dialogue from the 1990 script made its way to the 1991 film. These lines of dialogue are all that's transitioned from Linda's original, June 1990 script to the 2017 film:
  • The most beautiful girl in town.

    Incredible!

    little wife

    Philippe!

    Hello? Is anyone here?

    Mama, there's a girl in the castle!

    Belle?
    Oh, Papa!
    How did you find me?
    Oh, your hands are ice. We have to get you out of here.

    You...will join me for dinner. That's not a request!

    Help! Someone help me!
    Maurice?
    Please! Please, I need your help! He's got her. He's got her locked in the dungeon.
    Who?
    Belle. We must go. Not a minute to lose!
    Whoa! Slow down, Maurice. Who's got Belle locked in a dungeon?
    A beast! A horrible, monstrous beast!

    Crazy old Maurice.

    Will no one help me?

    I've been burnt by you before!

    Well if you hadn't run away, this wouldn't have happened!
    Well if you hadn't frightened me, I wouldn't have run away!
    Well you shouldn't have been in the West Wing!
    Well you should learn to control your temper!
    thank you, for saving my life.

    Papa.
    Take it with you, so you'll always have a way to look back, and remember me.
    Thank you

    After all this time, he's finally learned to love.
    But it's not enough. She has to love him in return.
    And now it's too late.

    Belle?

    My father's not crazy.

    Show me the beast!

    He's no monster, Gaston. You are!
    The beast will make off with your children! He'll come after them in the night.

    We can't have them running off to warn the creature!

    We'll rid the village of this beast. Who's with me?

    Invaders!

    Let them come.

    No!
    Belle.

    Please, don't hurt me! I'll do anything! Anything!

    At least I got to see you one... last...time.
    No, no! Please! I love you!
The making of an animated film is a very collaborative effort, so we can't just blindly say that everything in the animated film came from Linda. Plenty of interviews with the story team would say otherwise, especially as Allers has gone on record as saying that the story team and Linda would clash a lot because they came from an animation background where she came from a screenwriting background. Bailey's remarks, I feel, are not rude at all, but a diplomatic way of saying "different filmmakers made different approaches to the material." He had to sidestep the obvious (that she clearly wasn't asked to work on it), and did so without having to actually answer the question, while also addressing that neither version will be the be-all, end-all rendition of the fairy tale. Another variation will be made for a new generation, whether or not it'll be Disney's remains to be seen.

What little of Woolverton's 1990 work that survives in the 2017 film are still the important pieces. Belle finding Maurice in the dungeon, Maurice trying to get help, Belle & Beast's post-wolf attack argument, and the realization of love for both characters. They're the backbone of the film, and clearly Stephen Chbosky knew that those pieces worked.

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Re: Beauty and the Beast (Live-Action)

Post by Disney's Divinity »

I don't think it was disrespectful at all. And considering her recent work is regularly attacked on this forum, why some would suddenly put trust in her judgment of a film when convenient is beyond me.
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Re: Beauty and the Beast (Live-Action)

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Kind of like Escapay, I agree it isn't disrespectful, ncessarily, because this could be seen as a new version people need to make their own, even the writers as well as the actors. But to not consult the people living that made the film, at all, I can see how to them they would view it as disrespectful. If I made something, and then someone made a live-action version of it without consulting or including me at all, I would feel hurt, and like they might mess it up.
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Re: Beauty and the Beast (Live-Action)

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New interview with Menken where he talks about the live-action remake.
Q: Let’s talk about the deluge of Disney live-action remakes coming down the pipeline. Beauty and the Beast was a big hit that really delivered for audiences and creatively seemed to fall somewhere between the animated original and Broadway stage version. What’s the creative mindset for these? Is it to remain as true as possible to the original? Do you feel pressure because audiences love those originals so much?

Alan Menken: Well, I feel a protectiveness. Animation and theater are both mediums where the writers, especially songwriters, really move into the center of the co-creative process. For a live-action movie, it is truly a director’s medium, so it’s very dependent on what the director wants. Bill Condon is a huge Broadway fan, so even when we didn’t fit songs from the Broadway show into the movie, he still wanted some of those themes to be reflected in the underscore. He wanted to be very close to the theater style, but he also wanted to dig deeper into the authenticity of the 18th century and of France.
Source: https://makeitbetter.net/entertainment/ ... l-miranda/
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Re: Beauty and the Beast (Live-Action)

Post by Atlantica »

I was listening to my Disney playlist today on the way to work, and Belle from the film came on. I flat out absolutely cringed at Emma Watson's delivery .... it's just .... awful. I can't believe that it was the best they could come up with ? I'm not talking about her actual singing, but her dialogue delivery. It's just so ... flat ? Just declaring words rather then being buoyant and excited about them; I'm not saying she should do an impression of Paige O'Hara or Susan Egan, but wow the difference in acting ability sure shows.

But that also can't be aimed solely at her, the musical director should have stepped up and got something more from her.

The rest of the song is still just as good as the stage and film versions, but it's the pausing of the song for her to speak that made me physically cringe in the car this morning, these specifically :

....To return this book to Pere Robert, it's about to lovers in fair Verona
....Two cities in Northern Italy, I didn't want to come back. Have you got any new places to go?
....Your library makes our small corner of the world feel big
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Re: Beauty and the Beast (Live-Action)

Post by JeanGreyForever »

I agree with you not just on Emma Watson's singing, but her dialogue delivery as well. Frankly, she has a very smug and supercilious expression on her face during Belle when she's walking through the village. I sort of excused it when we got the first look at the Belle sequence, thinking that maybe it was her interpretation of a Belle who looks down at the villagers and can't fit in with them, but I think now it's clear that this was probably her attitude just from filming this movie.

I haven't really seen her outside of HP and BATB so I don't know if her acting is always like this or if she felt that playing Hermione/herself would work for playing Belle. I guess I'll find out in Little Women this upcoming December and I hope I'm not proven right in my belief that Emma Stone (the original choice for the movie) would have been a better fit over Emma Watson.
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Re: Beauty and the Beast (Live-Action)

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I feel exactly the same way as you, Atlantica and JeanGreyForever. I didn't mind her singing, and it's ok if you did, but her acting... It was like she didn't care about what she was saying! And thinking on it later I thought she must be like that because she is bored with the people around her, but A) I don't think it worked and B) it's not a quality that would endear us to her character. Belle, why don't you try to love your village instead of giving up? And don't you like the librarian/priest?

Her acting in the rest of the movie was better but she really didn't shine and in comparison to the original Belle she was...well, lame.
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Re: Beauty and the Beast (Live-Action)

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JeanGreyForever wrote:I guess I'll find out in Little Women this upcoming December and I hope I'm not proven right in my belief that Emma Stone (the original choice for the movie) would have been a better fit over Emma Watson.
:lol: Why would you want to watch Emma Watson in another film?

I expect I'll love her in Little Women, too, like I did with B&tB, HP, and The Perks of Being a Wallflower. I'm really looking forward to it, although it seems pretty fast after just getting another LW miniseries with Angela Lansbury not long ago.
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Re: Beauty and the Beast (Live-Action)

Post by Atlantica »

I'm glad it's not just me who thinks the same about the singing / talking capabilities. I remember a while back on this board ( or maybe via youtube comments, I can't remember ), they did a behind the scenes of the recording of the soundtrack, and the only person they didn't show was Emma. Whether that's just a funny coincidence or not I don't know, but did come over a bit :?

I'm glad some people like her interpretation, but just wasn't for me.
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Re: Beauty and the Beast (Live-Action)

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Yeah, her singing was autotuned to be better.

Did they show Dan Stevens singing?
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Re: Beauty and the Beast (Live-Action)

Post by Atlantica »

Yup, he was singing without the effect on his voice and he sounded pretty awesome I must say. It does stick out like a sore thumb that she's the only one not shown pretty much :lol:
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