There were many changes made from the animated Beauty and the Beast to the 2017 version. Some of the changes were well executed and I enjoyed, but some of the changes could have been better. “The most difficult part was both honoring the original animated film and also giving it its own idententy,” said producer David Hoberman. Thus, not everyone will like all the changes because, although we may want to see it stay true to the animation, it is also a movie of its own.

1. There is a connection to the original fairy tale.

When Maurice finds the castle, he enters without any problems. A warm fire and some food await for him. It is not until after he is leaving the castle where a problem arises. Maurice tries to take a rose from the garden to bring back to Belle, and the Beast then locks him up for being a thief. This is directly what happens in the fairytale. The daughter asks her father to bring her back home a single rose, and then he gets punished by a beast for taking one. I thought this change to the movie was done really well. It was a nice addition by better giving the Beast a reason for locking up Maurice.

2. LeFou is presented as a gay character.

First of all, I have to say that Gaston and LeFou were my favorite part of the movie. Both actors did a good job, and I enjoyed how their friendship was not perfect throughout the film.

There had been a lot of controversy for having a gay character, but I thought it was a fine change. For those who are hesitant with this change, LeFou’s being gay was pretty subtle. Instead of focusing on just that, I thought LeFou was a complicated character who was still confused about what he was feeling. In some scenes he appeared to have a crush on Gaston, but at other times he seemed to want to be Gaston.

I think it is also important to note that there was more to LeFou than simply being gay. After struggling with some of the decisions Gaston had made, LeFou ends up deciding he did not agree with Gaston anymore, and ended up fighting against him. Thus, I think this version of the movie greatly developed his character in more ways than one.

3. Background stories of Belle’s and the Beast’s parents are included.

The background stories of both characters give a nice insight to the ways they think and act. With Belle we learned that her mother died of the plague, and she had spent a portion of her life trying to figure out what happened to her mother. With the Beast we learned that he became cruel because his father raised him to be that way after the death of his mother. More importantly, we learned that the staff at the castle did nothing to stop his father from making him cruel, explaining why the staff do not put all the blame on the Beast for their misfortunes.

I liked the idea of indluding the backstories, but I thought it could have been done better. The backstories, particularly the Beast’s, felt a little rushed to be included in the movie.

4. New songs are added.

The songs were not my favorite part of the film. The film did a good job of incorporating new songs while keeping the ones from the animation, but there was some obvious auto-tuning. For a musical, I think it should be expected that the cast includes great singers, and there should not be too much use of auto-tuning. However, the new song “Evermore” was really great. The song fit well into the movie, and gave more insight into what the Beast was thinking when Belle left the castle. “Evermore” is now one of my favorite songs from the film.

5. The village is also enchanted.

In this new version, the village was enchanted along with the castle. Everyone in the village forgot the castle existed, and they forgot the existence of their loved ones. This was the most obvious with the character Mr. Potts. At the end of the movie Mr. Potts is reunited with Mrs. Potts and Chip, but he had forgotten about them for all those years because of the curse.

This was a nice change because it helped explain why the villagers never found the castle before. Also, I liked that the curse affected every single character present in the film, rather than just the members of the castle.