by Jesus Ibarra
Special coupon for Dinuba Platinum Theatre at the end of this review.
The only reason I became remotely interested in Beautiful Creatures was seeing Emmy Rossum be a bad ass witch in the original trailer. Once I saw that Jeremy Irons, Viola Davis and Emma Thompson were involved as well I was completely sold. My only misgivings were the constant comparisons to Twilight because it was based on a popular young adult book series. And having watched both movies, I can tell you Beautiful Creatures is no Twilight. Whereas Twilight was drab, boring, with a poor script and some of the most horrible acting today; Beautiful Creatures is colorful, funny, sweet, where things actually happen and the acting pretty much sustains the poorer aspects of the script.
Taking place in the south, following the old age premise of boy meets girl, Ethan meets Lena and is immediately intrigued. The great thing though is that these actors have actual chemistry and Ethan as a character has a some great lines. As Ethan becomes more infatuated with Lena even against the wishes of his peers who shun Lena for being a “Satan” worshipper he is drawn into Lena’s exceptionally weird and contentious family drama. Lena and her whole family are witches, and the females of the family face an event when they turn 16 where their powers are either claimed by the light (good and more human) or the dark (evil and now only concerned with power).
Ethan resolves to help Lena choose what she wants to become and try to break an old curse that says witches cannot love a human lest she becomes a witch of the dark.
The film is such a fun quirky ride that can really be enjoyed by anyone who likes supernatural films. Though it does have its dose of young romance, it isn’t boring or presented in a way that would make you role your eyes. It could have been slightly better by exploring some of the feminist themes it brought up, but overall the movie didn’t suffer.
The special effects that show off the witch’s powers were really cool to see. Also, the various creative usages of different magic were original and great. The two things that I absolutely loved about this movie were its creative set design and the fantastic acting by the ensemble cast. The art, set, costume, and overall creative design absolutely made this film much better, especially juxtaposed against the deep southern setting to produce a Gothic feel that shines on the screen.
Now the acting was probably the best thing about this movie. Everyone one was on their a game. They sold the cheesier lines of the scripts and gave life to some incredibly archetypical characters. This isn’t a bad movie just because its based on a YA novel so don’t miss a funny quirky movie.
Learn more and watch the trailer on the movie website.
Beautiful Creatures is currently playing at Dinuba Platinum Theatres 6. Showtimes for other shows playing in Dinuba can be found on their website.
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Great blog, thanks for sharing it.
H’mm, I might go see this one after all. Good review.