Google Home confuses users with apparent ad for ‘Beauty and the Beast’

And then they heard something else: “By the way, Disney’s live action “Beauty and the Beast” opens today”. The Oscar victor looked to the 1991 original as her starting point, and then to 18th century French fashion for further inspiration.

“When we filmed this my eldest daughter was not aware of Harry Potter at all”, he says. The film also stars Emma Watson, who plays the role of Belle, and Dan Stevens, who is The Beast. It’s ultimately the same beginning as last time: We’re here to see the prince get cursed to beastdom by an old woman who, scorned by the prince’s lack of hospitality, reveals herself to be a marvelous enchantress. In 2015, Lily James stepped into the glass slippers in “Cinderella”, and a year ago, Neel Sethi gave us a real-life Mowgli in “The Jungle Book”.

Watson made sure Belle has an edge to her, as well. This was a problem with the original, too, and you’d think it might get addressed with an extra 40 minutes of screen time in the remake.

So, Belle winds up prisoner to Beast and they eventually begin a friendship that will probably turn into a romance. In this version, Belle is the inventor instead of Maurice. What would she say to a college freshman?

“When I showed them to [director] Bill Condon, he said ‘yes, let’s use those!’ We put a lot of those lyrics into Gaston”. “We took it from the styling of the castle”.

Part of the issue also stems from how tiresome both Belle and Beast are. It narrows in on the loss of her mother as a source of pain, and draws parallels to the Beast, who also lost his mother. What happened to her?

But if you’re a romantic and love the fantasy of the story, I think you’ll be pleased with the film and the way it was adapted including the deeper back story. As they are set to attack, she is saved by the Beast as he fights with the wolves. “That [red] costume was made entirely from sustainable fabrics”. I am a mum … so it changes my whole way of seeing things.

Menken loves different interpretations of his work. “What kind of chauvinism and sexism and prejudice can the Beast exhibit that Belle has to batter through, but also what are his lovely, sweet, lovable qualities that she sees inside with her super-perception”.

“Honestly I hadn’t realized how much Belle and this movie meant to people before I started”, she admits.