Posts tagged Controversy
MOVIE REVIEW: Beauty and the Beast

Bill Condon’s “Beauty and the Beast” stands firmly on its own merit.  True to Disney’s recent trajectory, its goal is to “reimagine” a previous animated classic into the live-action medium for a new era and audience.  Unlike the recent treatments of "Cinderella" and "Malificent," this "Beauty and the Beast" stays a full-blown musical.  Imitation, emulation, and homage are all part of that process, but so is reappraisal and reinterpretation.  Those later two actions are what drive this new fantasy film to soaring and successful heights.

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MOVIE REVIEW: The Birth of a Nation

Circling back to the “timely” label, the film bears the designation in equally positive and negative connotations, depending of your personal capacity.  Consider “The Birth of a Nation” to be the antithesis to “Selma” two years ago.  This film’s depiction of violent retaliation reverberates far differently than Martin Luther King’s example of nonviolence.  Audiences will wrestle with that polar opposite being empowering or troubling in justification.  

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