Noel Teo
The premise of being cursed to look as you truly are within, is as old as Beauty and the Beast, and updated 10 years ago in Shallow Hal.
The latest victim of his own inner beauty, or rather ugliness is 17-year-old Kyle (Alex Pettyfer) in Daniel Barnz’s latest modern fairytale, Beastly.
Being attractive, charismatic, wealthy and hence God’s gift to pubescent girls, Kyle is the prince of his high school kingdom. But as his narcissism draws him to new levels of self-obsession, he abuses his popularity by victimising the weaker students. This incurs the wrath of Kendra (Mary-Kate Olsen), a witch disguised as a student, who becomes the target of his public ridicule. She punishes him by stripping him of his good looks and turns him into the truly ugly person that he is.
As with all fairy tales, the only hope for the curse to be broken is to find true love in a year, lest his fate be made permanent. Lindy (Vanessa Anne Hudgens), a girl he never paid attention to in class, seemed destined to be his candidate for love.
Fans of the book written by Alex Flinn, that Beastly is based on, will notice a few differences. In the book, the witch Kendra also doubles up as the unsuspecting housekeeper, Magda (known as Zola, (Lisa Gay Hamilton) in the film). She serves Kyle while he stays at the apartment his dad bought him. What Kyle doesn’t know is that Magda is spying on his every move. At the end of the book, she reveals the truth by transforming from sweet, innocent Magda to the cynical witch, Kendra. However, in the movie, Zola and Kendra are separate characters.
Another deviation from the book would be the extent of Kyle’s transformation. In the book, the beast had hair, claws, and sharp teeth, as depicted in Disney’s Beauty & the Beast. But in the film, Kyle is a far more palatable human baldie, with disfiguring scars and tattoos. One of the tattoos is a tree that signifies how long he has left to break the spell.
What we appreciate is that, Will (Kyle’s blind tutor who home schools him and is his love guru) portrayed by the comical actor and awards show host Neil Patrick Harris, gives a surge of wacky humour to the movie. He makes not-so-subtle references to Barney Stinson, a character he plays on the hit TV series, “How I Met Your Mother” in the film.
In one of the scenes, he goes “Whatzzup” in his Barney tone and this cracks the audience up. Also, he never fails to return Kyle’s skepticism with wit and a touch of class that is, iconically, Neil Patrick Harris. When questioned about his ability to play darts, Will replies, “I went to this dance and this emo chick gave me a dart hex.” On top of that, in the scene where he introduced himself to Lindy and made a lame joke, he apologised and “restarted” their introduction by rewinding his words until it was “Hi, I’m Will” again.
One of the most important things in a movie is the soundtrack. In this case, the songs selected for Beastly were apt and they enhanced the overall enjoyment of the film. Indie songs like “Garden Of Exile” by Toby Martin and Mat Kearney’s “Breathe In, Breathe Out” helped set the gloomy mood for certain scenes. Another song that highlighted Lindy and Kyle’s sadness was Pixie Lott’s “Broken Arrow”.
However, there were other downfalls to the movie.
The beginning of the movie played out really quickly, giving the actors little time to develop their characters. Furthermore, scenes changed too quickly, again offering less opportunity for the story to expand to its full potential.
Pettyfer’s portrayal of Kyle seemed immature. When he was trying to get Lindy to like him by giving her gifts, he threw a random fit of punches in the air out of sheer frustration when she rejected them, making his character seem like an angsty schoolboy, which definitely made me cringe in my seat. Pettyfer also didn’t seem desperate enough even when he was trying to plead with the witch to undo the spell. Vanessa, on the other hand, fit right into her role and was perfect at playing the ‘girl-who-slogs-for-studies-and-family’ role, which was reminiscent of her High School Musical role, the “geeky beauty”, Gabriella.
In a nutshell, the movie paled next to the book, which was a #1 New York Times bestseller. It could have been developed further so that the actors would have more time to build on their characters. Without Neil Patrick Harris’s sense of humor, the movie would have barely survived with its cheesy lines like “Love is never ugly” and “I’m worthy for you”, along with its shallow characters.
Movie: Beastly
Rating: ★★✩✩✩
Opens: 12 May
Duration: 85 minutes
Language: English
Age Rating: PG
Genre: Drama, Romance
Director: Daniel Barnz
Cast: Alex Pettyfer, Vanessa Hudgens, Mary-Kate Olsen