Your childhood comes to life in the first trailer for Disney’s Beauty and the Beast, starring Emma Watson

The first full trailer for the lavish film was released overnight.

Due for release in Australia on March 23 next year, the movie follows in the footsteps of other animated classics Disney has revisited in recent years, turning them into live-action hits.

This year Jon Favreau rejigged The Jungle Book by melding CGI animals with real settings and a child star, Kenneth Branagh previously captured the romance of Cinderella by pairing a Downton Abbey dame with a Game of Thrones hero, and Maleficent saw Angelina Jolie don the horns of the famed Sleeping Beauty villain.

Those three films alone have grossed $3 billion at the worldwide box office.

It was also revealed last month that Guy Ritchie is in talks with the studio to put a contemporary, live-action spin on the 1992 animation Aladdin.

The animated Beauty and the Beast was released in 1991 and won two Oscars for its music, including Original Song for the titular composition.

This new version of the musical about a young woman taken prisoner by a beast in his castle — and who learns to see the kind-hearted Prince behind the hideous exterior — stars Harry Potter graduate Watson as Belle and Downton Abbey’s Dan Stevens as the Beast.

The enchanted objects that fill the Beast’s home are voiced by actors including Sir Ian McKellen (as mantle clock Cogsworth), Emma Thompson (as the talking tea-pot Mrs Potts) and Ewan McGregor (as candlestick Lumiere).

Director Bill Condon has reassured fans of the original that none of its classic songs will be dropped, but some will be “expanded” or “enhanced”.

Speaking to News Corp Australia while filming was underway on Beauty and the Beast in the UK last year, American funnyman Josh Gad said being a part of the production was “beyond my wildest dreams”.

Gad plays Le Fou, the bumbling sidekick of the story’s villain, Gaston (played by Luke Evans).

“I was very fortunate to grow up in what they called the ‘second golden age’ of Disney animation. So my childhood was defined by Little Mermaid, Aladdin, The Lion King and Beauty and the Beast — it’s crazy.”

Gad added that, from his vantage point, the new movie looked “outrageously good” and was “coming to life in an incredible way”.

“I was on set watching that iconic moment which is the waltz to Beauty and the Beast and I actually started tearing up because seeing it on this incredible sound stage where the ballroom has been recreated, it’s like your childhood coming to life. So I’m really excited to share that with people.”

Originally published as Emma Watson is Belle of the ball