“Beastly” is a dreadful mess. Poorly written and poorly acted, especially by its hot young star, it is a movie that should be used as an example of lazy filmmaking.
Using the classic romance, “Beauty and the Beast,” as a jumping off point, “Beastly” attempts to modernize the story by setting it in a contemporary high school. Kyle (Alex Pettyfer) is a good looking, rich kid who rides his pleasing appearance and Daddy’s money to great popularity. But when he runs afoul of a teen witch, literally a witch played by Mary-Kate Olsen, he is cursed and his normal good looks give way to scars, piercings, and tattoos. Oh, and his blonde hair is replaced by a cracked chrome dome. The witch explains that if Kyle can find someone to love him as he is, the dreadful curse will be lifted. This leads his father, an egocentric television news anchor played by Peter Krause, to move his embarrassing son out of the city to a private location. From there Kyle takes on a new persona and lives like a hermit when he’s not stalking Lindy (“High School Musical’s” Vanessa Hudgens). Through a ridiculous set of circumstances Lindy becomes Kyle’s unofficial prisoner of sorts and romance flourishes.
The curse in “Beastly” that manifests itself with unique scaring and tattoos hardly seems that hideous. After all, tattoos are pretty popular these days and even Kyle’s scars and odd piercings seem to coordinate with his new look. One would think that the boy would be right at home rocking out on a stage and in one scene a keyboard can be seen in his room. Instead of afflicting Kyle with some legitimate illness (or even with bad body odor) that affects one’s personal appearance, the script goes for an almost hip conglomeration of changes that are pretty interesting. One of the boy’s tattoos changes colors with blue flowers blossoming. Missed is an opportunity to bring attention to a real ailment that would have built-in authenticity.
“Beastly” feels wholly incomplete, as though huge sections of the story have been removed in post-production in order to force the film its brisk 95 minute running time. An entire year passes over the course of the film, but other than time lapse techniques, you get very little impression that the characters have experienced such a period of time. And that is not a good thing for a movie about a dramatic change in a person’s life that results in great personal growth. To say that “Beastly” is illogical and unbelievable would be a gross understatement. And sadder still the moral that so marked the source material is muted in this modern incarnation to the point where it will have little impact on the core teen demographic and older viewers alike.
And what of the young hot cast? Just a couple weeks ago, we saw Alex Pettyfer in “I Am Number Four” a science fiction film that my co-host on The Film Fix said worked because the cast was so good looking. Ironically, like the character he plays in “Beastly,” Pettyfer seems to have made a career out of being incredibly good looking. And that might work in the modeling game, but his looks will only take him so far as an actor. Coming off much better in “Beastly” is Vanessa Hudgens as the love interest. But her character like most of the characters in the film is so badly written that her natural charisma can’t make us believe that she is a poor kid with a drug-addict father. And Mary-Kate Olsen, one of the “two twins,” vamps capably through her scenes with odd piercings and a facial tattoo. Given that Olsen is the oldest of the alleged “high-schoolers” in the film, it might be acceptable that her character has a prominent facial tattoo. Let’s just hope that high-school aged kids don’t follow her lead and opt for permanent facial art. Mike Tyson ought to be the poster child for that sort of thing.
“Beastly” is a miserable attempt to bring “Beauty and the Beast” to a new generation.