Look, I understand that this is one of the favorite animated movies in the public eye and I can mostly see why. However, I just don't feel the same way. Belle is a very bland character, her personality is just she like-a da books. She doesn't really have anything going on. The romance between her and Beast is extremely rushed and out of place, just like "haha stockholm syndrome now they kiss". Gaston is great, of course, as is his song, but the rest of the songs in this movie that DON'T include Gaston for some part of it are mid at best and annoying at worst. Be Our Guest gives me a headache with how little there is going on, and the animation has some spotty moments. The whole movie does in a way, some spots where you can tell the movie still has some of the old era of disney in it. Detailed backgrouns which clash hard with the simpler character designs, it just doesn't look good to me. It's obviously still lavishly animated, a good looking movie. I just wish this movie came a little later into the disney renaissance, the age in its animation shows more than I wish it did. Even outside of its age, a lot of the designs are slacking. LeFou is a whole topic on its own, but even outside of him some of the other background characters (AND EVEN HUMAN BEAST) look really bad. Don't wanna knock it for its visuals too much because it is quite fine in that department and it's not the movie's fault. There's one part of the movie that does genuinely exceed the rest, and that's the aforementioned Gaston. He's a perfect antagonist, contrasting with the story and characters in a way that makes him a threat and a perfect thematic match. I'm gonna rewatch the movie to see if the rest of the movie can match my thoughts on him, but I'm not getting my hopes up.
Review of Beauty and the Beast
