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TARRING in a “tale as old as time” has not been a seamless role for Emma Watson, who in 2014 became the face of the UN Women’s HeForShe campaign which urges men to stand alongside women in calling for equal rights.

After all, the story of Beauty and the Beast, which came from a traditional fairy tale written by novelist Gabrielle-Suzanne Barbot de Villeneuve, published in 1740, was meant to prepare young girls in 18th-century France for arranged marriages. Some commentators have pointed to Belle’s courageous feats in the 1991 animated film as examples of the agency she has, and say this makes her a feminist hero in a world of fairytale women who are constantly being saved by handsome princes. In the new film they believe this goes further, with Belle being made an inventor, and helping girls in the provincial town where she lives to read. But other critics say this doesn’t change the ending of the story, where Belle essentially falls for her captor, and the Stockholm syndrome issues it poses. Director Bill Condon says he worked with Watson and co-star Dan Stevens on their dialogue in hopes of refining their complicated affair in an attempt to steer it away from victim and kidnapper. — Nadia Neophytou