I was both interested and dubious in seeing this version of Beauty and the Beast. Interested because of the story and what the interpretation would be like, and dubious because it was SyFy, which often means bad effects and next to non-existent writing and acting. As much as I wanted to like it, it suffers from everything that makes the worst of SyFy's output intolerable. Estella Warren is beautiful granted, but the script and her character doesn't give her anything to work with other than look beautiful-which is little more than showing her longs legs and cleavage- and say the odd "witty/spunky" line, something that anybody can do. The script seemingly aimed to be witty, but ended up being cheesy and leaving all the actors(Warren was not the only person affected by the writing) little to work from, consequently the acting ranged from bland to overdone, Rhett Giles often veers towards the latter. The characters are little more than fantasy clichés(wicked witches and evil counts are types of characters that have been done before and so much better) and written in an underdeveloped and very vague manner, and the film manages to commit one of my pet peeves in regard to film and make them do stupid things. The story is overall dully paced and predictably told, and I never felt moved by the chemistry between the leads. The effects, make-up and gore are very fake in look, the troll actually looks more an uncooked turkey than a troll, and the scenery, while quite lush just didn't have any sense of wonder because it was all very choppily shot. The music at best was generic. All in all, a turd that not even Warren or the scenery can save. 1/10 Bethany Cox
Review of Beauty and the Beast
