Review: Beastly
It's dangerous to tempt fate, whether it's baiting a curse-hurling witch or titling a substance-versus-style plotted film "Beastly." In the case of the latter, it's all too tempting to hurl that invective right back at the movie. Unfortunately, it's too self-conscious to earn that moniker.
Alex Pettyfer (I Am Number Four) stars as Kyle, the vicious, entitled scion ruling over the in-crowd at his prestigious prep school. It's good to be Kyle, or like him, and in his world if you're not like him, you're dumb and/or ugly. All too quickly he offends one of the outcasts who just happens to be a witch (Mary-Kate Olsen).
Beastly doesn't waste a lot of time before jumping into the story, or character development. After Kyle flaunts his position and power one too many times, Kendra (Olsen) curses Kyle to look as ugly on the outside as he is on the inside. Apparently Kyle isn't so ugly on the inside as he appears, as Beastly can't quite go beyond the realm of "pretty-ugly." Instead of making him hideous, he's actually more attractive (and interesting) with his stylish disfiguration. Even Kendra, who is called ugly, has a Lady Gaga freak-chic sensibility that is more likely to cause a fashion craze than it is to repel.
Smokey eyeliner and shadowy sulk-stuffed montages aside, Beastly does attempt to prove substance matters over style, but keeps shying away from it, rather illogically. Our petulant hero is exiled to an outer borough with his saintly housekeeper Zola (Lisa Gay Hamilton) and quip-addicted tutor (Neil Patrick Harris). Despite all the encouragement Zola heaps on Kyle, she never utters the three magic words that could free him ... that someone who clearly is there to show there is an adult who loves him would actually do. That is reserved for Lindy (Vanessa Hudgens), the beauty whose fate becomes intertwined with the beast's in such an illogical manner that the audience was laughing.
After doing a little research, it seems the story onscreen doesn't jibe with Alex Flinn's well-received young adult novel, so either director Daniel Barnz's script doesn't trust audiences, or someone with purse strings didn't. My money is on the money folks, as Barnz's Phoebe in Wonderland is another classic story re-imagined with a contemporary story, with a lot more substance (as well as style). Also unlike Phoebe in Wonderland, despite talents like Hamilton and Harris and Peter Krause in front of the camera, none can overcome the changes to the story, especially the laughably ridiculous device used to put the beauty and the beast on the path to breaking the curse.
Beastly is montage and exposition heavy and light on character, and ultimately unsatisfying for an older or more discerning audience. It seems in fact that some of the changes were inspired by another Harris film, Clara's Heart, where Harris plays a bratty son who transforms under the patient guidance of a Caribbean housekeeper (Whoopi Goldberg). In the book, the housekeeper seems to be a much different character (and not just in name and ethnicity). One wonders how that came to pass. If this reviewer didn't know better, she would guess this was written as it was filmed and not based on a book.
At a running time less than 90 minutes (the official running time is not available), the best thing about Beastly is its brevity, which is otherwise a waste of talent and what seems to be worthy source material.