'Beauty and the Beast' review: A grand CGI-enhanced spectacle, this fairy tale has not been made for kids

Director: Christophe Gans

Star cast: Vincent Cassel, Léa Seydoux, André Dussollier

Rating: 2.5/5

The story of 'Beauty and the Beast' or 'La Belle et la Bête' begins with a faceless woman reading out a story from the digitally yellowed pages of a book. The little audience of two listen enchanted to the story of Belle, a beautiful, kind-hearted girl. So far, Christophe Gans' adaptation of the timeless fairy tale follows the classical approach in retelling the fairy tale 'Beauty and the Beast'.

But that's all the "traditional" we could get in the film.

One of the most well-loved fairy tales of all time, this Franco-German romantic fantasy is based on French author Gabrielle-Suzanne Barbot de Villeneuve's 1740 version.

Starring Vincent Cassel ('Black Swan', 'Ocean's Twelve') and Léa Seydoux ('Blue Is the Warmest Colour', 'Midnight in Paris') as the lead couple, Gans' version of the fairy tale is a stylishly mounted and beautifully designed.

Gans has imagined the tale in an extravagant, Gothic fashion. The cursed castle sports huge, hollowed halls with picturesque creepers and flowers blooming indoors, the weather changes with chilling frequency, view from the bell tower is as breathtaking as can be imagined with the help of some world-class special effects.

Belle's family has grown too -- she has two vindictive older sisters, three young, good-looking brothers and a loving father. The beast too, despite his appearance, is impeccably dressed, mysterious and can dance fabulously well.

But for someone who's grown up watching Disney's adaptation, the story lacks the chemistry between the protagonists, as well as a light, comic relief. There's some distraction with the number and manner of Belle's family members; but the strangely deformed dogs that are supposed to become "best friends" with her don't even appear in front of her. We never thought we would miss the talking furniture from the Disney film, but we really did.

We observed an interesting resemblance to Indian mythological stories in 'Beauty and the Beast', with respect to the fabled golden deer. In the Indian epic Ramayana, Sita is enchanted by the beautiful golden and she asks Rama and Lakshmana to get it for her. The deer is actually a rakshasa (demon) called Maricha in disguise. Maricha takes this form to lure Rama and Lakshmana away from Sita so his nephew Ravana can kidnap her. In the film, however, the prince is obsessed with this golden deer and forms numerous hunting parties and goes on several expeditions to hunt down this deer.

Apart from unnecessary side-stories and sub-plots, 'Beauty and the Beast' features traditional villains as well. The background score for the film is adequate, the performances by the lead pair decent, but not remarkable. Cassel, who's definitely older than the usual prince charming, looks glamorous and enchanting (even as a beast).

While the earlier adaptations of the fairy tale have positioned themselves as having being made for children, Gans' version is too dark to pass off as something childish.

Call us silly, but after books and films such as the 'Twilight' and '50 Shades of Grey' series have passed themselves off as having based on 'Beauty and the Beast', we were hoping for a good ol' CGI-enhanced, PG-13 romp. But this film is a fairy tale not made for kids.