THB #376: The Little Mermaid

I did a clev-ah song rewrite… but it really didn’t say what i needed to say about this film… so find it after the review.

So…

There were 2 major challenges with bringing The Little Mermaid animated classic to live-action. First, you have to fill out the story of Musker & Clements’ 83 minute movie (a perfect length for the beloved songs and story) and deal with changes in how society sees love and gender and more. Second, you need a director who has an exciting take on this material and how to shoot it as a musical.

Sadly, this film fails on both counts.

But I don’t hate it. I am just very frustrated by it.

It has become another on the list of movies that have great bones and mediocre execution, leaving audiences leaving the theater both fulfilled by the IP but somehow disappointed.

The most odd element for me was the Rob Marshall of it. I am not a fan. But I do see a consistent voice in his work. But not here. Here, he seems kinda lost in the swimming of it all. Much of the time, it feels like he told his Visual Effects team, “Okay… move the camera really fast through the water and film the frame with sea life!” “Anything specific you want to see, boss?” “No… tell me what you come up with.”

Of course, Marshall is known for musicals. Chicago is a very good movie, but talk to Richard Gere about how he learned to tap for it and Marshall cut away from his dancing legs constantly. Imagine what it could have been had a truly inspired director worked that Bill Condon script. Imagine Fosse.

But since then, it has become very clear that his strength is staging song and dance numbers in small boxes, styled like proscenium arches in the theater. It’s what he does. Over and over and over again. Lots of style stealing. He so longs to be Fosse… but he isn’t. His Memoirs of a Geisha is a kitschy mess and his Pirates of the Carribean movie is torture. Aside from that, 5 musicals, of which this is the fifth.

To be fair, Chicago was the one slam dunk, in terms of material to be converted. Very tight story. Great characters. Nine was a challenge. Into The Woods is a challenge. Doing a sequel to Mary Poppins is a bit suicidal. And now, The Mermaid.

The one sequence that really delivers is “Kiss The Girl.” Why? Because he pretty much imitated the original… like, almost exactly.

Under The Sea is the number here that you feared that Be Our Guest would be in the live-action Beauty & The Beast… and was not.

Thing is, what Marshall does - not great for film - is make big moments small… intimate. He turned Nine into a series of vingettes… which is exactly the problem going-in with converting Nine from the stage. There was charm to many of those vingettes. But he couldn’t figure out - maybe didn’t think he needed to - how to make the musical feel like a fluid, compelling story.

He turns Under The Sea into a giant visual mess here. Relentless. Unintellegible. Not an experience that makes you love being under the sea.

The 3 beloved songs from The Little Mermaid remain undeniable. Halle Bailey can sing. She is pretty. She is a mermaid here. “Part of Your World” is - like “Let It Go” and “Do You Wanna Build A Snowman” - an unstoppable force. But it should be more, not just the power of a great song and a beautiful voice.

Want some more bad news? All 3 Lin-Manuel Miranda songs, with music from the great Menken, don’t work much at all. Two power ballads… which is not Miranda’s strength. What he does so brilliantly for songs from Moana and Encanto, including their power ballads, is mixing things up, changing speeds. Alan Menken is great to all fields. But the combination just doesn’t work… partially because the lead male and lead female aren’t really interesting actors and the way Marshall shot them in these ballads is very flat… turn on the camera and let them bury the audience… but these 2 are not those kind of singers… they are just pretty, not very compelling.

I’ll just note here… Halle Bailey is gorgeous and has an amazing singing voice. But she is not an exciting actor. Pure paint by numbers. One of the things about the original’s animated Ariel is that she is quirky. The live-action one, not so much. The movie feels more like American Idol than a living, breathing musical way too often.

But I digress…

The third Lin-Manuel Miranda song is a rap sung by Awkwafina. And it’s… okay. But it is trying so hard to be lovable. Much worse, it really makes no sense when it comes up in the movie. I don’t think I am spoiling anything by noting that the rap is meant to inform Ariel and Sebastian that there is talk about marriage in the castle and not about Ariel being The One. Ok. Didn’t need a whole song for that. But literally 5 minutes later, there is a bump of exposition about what is happening that is really needed… but the rap that might have fit was not in that spot, where it was really needed. So odd.

Anyway…

The directing was relentless and uninspired. But it also faced another huge problem… the script changes needed to bring this 33-year-old movie about something centuries before into 2023.

This was always a “girl power” story. Ariel was not willing to be held down by her father who wants to keep her, literally, in a bubble. This remains true.

But in this version, screenwritten by David Magee, there are all kinds of odd additions… not things like Flounder looking like a real flounder, which was fine by me, though he does become a very marginal character.

Remember how she is a hoarder in her secret sea place? Now Prince Eric is a hoarder too. It becomes their bonding activity… which is weird.

All the sisters and no mother? Still true. But now its highlighted that Neptune has a daughter from each of the Seven Seas… so he went to each sea and got someone pregnant and then left her and took the kid? Are all the moms dead? It’s opening a bag of worms and not ever really closing it.

(Side Note: He has very weak genetics, apparently. Not one of the girls looks like her father.)

I am perfectly happy for Ariel to be Black or mixed. But Javier Bardem, who I adore… and gets to do another classic hair performance, doesn’t square that circle. Not to be too Variety, but what color was the mom? And what sea was she from? Etc, etc, etc.

The setting is now what seems to be The Caribbean (albeit shot, mostly in close-up, in Italy). So the island is multicultural… but kinda too the point of absurdity. Eric couldn’t be whiter… but his mom is black… and in charge. The male sidekick to royalty is Indian. But more than the casting, what is the fuller story? They reset all this stuff and then, instead of taking the risk of making Eric in any way political, feeling something about being the whitest human ever on a mixed race island, it’s just left sitting there… to he point where it manages to feel colonialist, when that clearly is the opposite of the intent.

One of the oddest additions - SPOILER ALERT FOR THE REST OF THIS PARAGRAPH, KIND OF - is that they have added the idea that Ursala’s spell includes some side rule of not letting Ariel know she needs to be kissed to break Ursala’s vocal spell. WTF? I kept looking for this to matter to the story. It sticks out like a sore thumb. Maybe someone gave a note, “Why doesn’t she just kiss him?” But it has to be mutual, right? True love’s kiss? Isn’t taking the burden off of Ariel to “just kiss him” a reflection of the bad idea that its all on him to kiss her to save her?

Anyway, the additions to the script are really odd. They do add 30 minutes to the movie. But the movie is too long now. The story is still not rich enough to carry the weight of the extra “story.”

At one point - ANOTHER KINDA SPOILER PARAGRAPH - Ariel takes the reins of the carriage ans almost kills a bunch of locals… is this a show of her being reckless and dumb or independent? Then they visit a local village where everyone just keeps giving her free stuff… because they a merchants on a Caribbean island and wild, mute, pretty girl gets everything for free? Eric, in some cases, follows to pay the merchants… not that a single one complains. Just so weird!

similar to this

And then, the finale’, which is drawn out and, of course, is now so complicated that it makes even less sense than the original… but most shocking, they managed to turn the big visual moment into the worst looking effects moment I have seen in a looooong time. I mean, kinda shocking.

worse than this

So… the movie is a mess. The PC filler is unnecessary and doesn’t address the giant low-hanging questions this take on the story has had for over 30 years. The acting wasn’t bad… just not special in any way. The singing seemed more American Idol than musical theater. Rob Marshall is a terrible director who seems more lost here than ever before.

BUT… the three big songs. Hummed them going in. Hummed them going out. Sung them more than a few times.

I watched the animated original before going to this screening. It was better. Because it knew what it was. The directors understand character and how much to use or not to use. Quick and to the point.

Would I have made some “corrections” to the politics? Yes. But they didn’t solve what needed to be solved. I mean, the movies both point to “the grass being greener on the other side,” but that doesn’t excuse not solving for the question of why we should want her to end up on land. She’s not explored all the sea and found it lacking. She just wants that other thing. Why does Eric want her? Because her voice is healing and bewitching? Not enough… if you are going to make a point of it… which the new script does.

And perhaps the biggest needed solve of all… the protective parents are not wrong. But they have a limited view of their worlds. But somehow it is addressed and made even more simplistic than not addressing it at all.

I wouldn’t tell anyone NOT to see this movie. It is all about fan service and if you are a fan who wants this, you should try it… in a theater.

But it’s not a good movie.

I wish Disney had hired someone who the inspired visual skills to make this fly. And were a little less careful in making the story “more safe” for today’s kids. It just kind of misses every opportunity.

And now, a song!!!!

The only way to get what you want is for Disney to remake every animated film as a live-action hybrid, trying to adjust for the moral progress of society.

Can Disney do that?

My dear, sweet fan. That's what they do. It's what they live for.
To service unfortunate fans like yourself.
Poor films for those with no other content to turn to.

I admit that in the past these films were classic
They weren't kidding when they called them, well, the best
But you'll find that nowadays
Originals have lost their way
Repeating, IP content, there is no rest
To this
True? Yes.
And I really like to pay for CG magic
It's a button that I always loved to press
And dear reader, please don't laugh
I use it on behalf
Of the fanciful, the lonely, and obssesed

Pathetic.

Poor unfortunate films
In style, in greed
This one scheduling the summer
That one wants to get a bil’
And do I help them?
Yes, indeed

Those poor unfortunate films
So sad, so true
They come flocking to Rob Marshall
Crying, "Spells, Chicago, please!"
And he “helps” them!
Yes he do

Now it's happened once or thrice
His directing isn’t very nice
And I'm afraid it left the movies with big holes
Yes they make critics irate
But at the box office they rate
With those poor unfortunate souls

The audience out there don't like a lot of changes
They think a score that varies is a bore!
Yet live action is preferred even if the film’s a turd
And after all folks, what is classic IP for?

Come on, they're not all that impressed with innovation
True fan bases avoid it when they can
But they dote and swoon and fawn
On a character once drawn
It's the big hit number’s sold with great elan

Come on you poor unfortunate film
Go ahead!
It’s not tough!
I'm a very busy exec and I haven't got all day
It won't cost much
Just your love!

You poor unfortunate soul
It's sad but true
If you want to see it live, my sweets
Adjustments are the toll
Take a gulp and take a breath
And accept how they fill the holes
Wasted Lin-Manuel Miranda, boys
IP is on a roll
This poor unfortunate soul

Until tomorrow…