Such a frustrating disappointment

A Major Disappointment

In truth, there is barely enough story here to make a film.

The acting in this movie is really good.

If it is not fit for television, it is not fit for anything! It was just such a painful experience to watch the most real and believable characters from one of the greatest animated movies ever created being torn apart with every word they uttered. There is simply no magic at all in this shameless effort to cash in on the first animated movie nominated for an Oscar for best picture. The animation is cheap and the dialogue is stupid. They should have called it "Belle and Beast's Endless Arguments", because there is no other way to describe it! Beast does something mean, Belle talks him out of it, that's it. It is so stupid! The first follow-up, The Enchanted Christmas, was at least passable with a good Tim Curry performance, but now with this stupid script and also the absence of Angela Lansbury, this poor excuse for a "movie" should have never existed.

When I started reviewing on IMDb, I began to watch all the Disney direct to video sequels. It was almost torture for me to watch all of them (I have seen 6 of them at the moment I wrote this review), but this one I only could watch 10 minutes of it before I turned of the PC and have to watch the first Beauty and the Beast to remind me that it was one of my favorite Disney films.THIS THING IS A DISCRASE TO THE ORIGINAL ONE!!! The story is the bland, predictable plots of 3 failed episodes from a failed attempt of a TV- series (that is exactly what this is, and they ask $19.48 for it at eBay!!!!), the animation is just cheap and awful, the characters are nothing from what they were in the original (especially the beast), and the songs make Howard Ashman roll in his grave.This is one of the WORST Disney DTV sequel I have ever seen (the worst one being Hunchback of Notre Dame II). Skip this movie, PLEASE!!!!!

The first Beauty and the Beast film is for me one of the best Disney films ever and while the second(the enchanted Christmas)was perhaps not as strong it still maintained all the warmth and humour of the first instalment.This film again has all of these traits but while The enchanted Christmas would not have looked out of place as a cinema release Belles' magical world does looks and feels like the straight to video film that it is.The short stories feel like chapters from a fairy story and the links in between are sweet with some classic Disney songs included. Interestingly for a third sequel most of the original cast return and this I think is what raises this film above other straight to video films in terms of quality.Overall this is a worthy part of the classic Disney series.

The original is a masterpiece, and The Enchanted Christmas is actually not that bad at all. This film is alright, but a lot of the animation is shoddy, and the songs are instantly forgettable. At least Enchanted Christmas did more than adequately in those two aspects. The storyline was merely a series of vignettes, like the sequel to Cinderella. If I had a preference to which I prefer, storyline-wise, this one raises the bar. Lumiere (though less elegant and debonair) and Cogsworth are funny here thanks to the brilliant voice overs of Jerry Orbach and David Ogden Stiers, but why was Belle changed? She did very little, other than preach to the characters. As for Mrs Potts, the reason why she was ruined, was because Angela Lansbury didn't voice her. The stories are okay with nice ideas, with a bit of humour from Lumiere particularly, but the essence of the original was lost. The best was "Fifi's Folly" but all three stories had problems of their own. The message was laid on way too thick, and in general the writing was uninspiring. And there were some bits about Beast's character that was unnecessary, like him hating birds. I can swear that wasn't mentioned in the original! Though I will admit that the bird was really cute. I will give this a 6/10, in respect to the voice actors. Bethany Cox.