Jim on Film:Enchantment: A Survey of Disney's Feature Film Live-Action Musicals
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Popeye�It doesn�t get much worse than Popeye. I�ve seen a great number of Disney movies, and this Paramount co-production takes the cake as the worst Disney movie ever released under the Disney banner (followed closely by another Robin Williams entry, Flubber). It�s been many years since I�ve seen it, and it is not one I would willingly endure again for any reason, but my memory is that the songs were mumbled and were utterly forgettable. Shelley Duvall as Olive Oyl and a cute baby were the only effective pieces of casting in the film and the only smart creative decisions made. The decision to have Popeye mumble a swear word speaks volumes for the mess of filmmaking this dud is.
Leonard Maltin�s Movie Guide sums it up best, saying that Popeye a �so-called� musical. I think it hedges on being a �so-called� movie.
Newsies�I have a soft spot in my heart for Newsies. As one of the few people who actually saw it in theaters, not once but twice, I�ve been singing the praises of the Kenny Ortega film long before the rest of the kids in the country saw it. Despite the massive negative reviews, Newsies has survived with a cult following among young people over the past decade, due largely to middle school and high school music teachers who incorporated it as a high-interest part of their curriculum. Kids love this movie�boys and girls. It�s also a musical one often hears of reaching out effectively to people who don�t like musicals.
The reason for its creative success is the integration of energetic music with the script. People don�t like musicals because of the perception that actors break into song and dance out of nowhere and in disconnect from the rest of the movie. Because, as evidenced by his earlier The Little Mermaid and Beauty and the Beast, Alan Menken is such an expert dramatist (and I�m sure he had the help of other members of the filmmaking team), the songs naturally flow from the narrative. When Jack Kelly sings �Sante Fe,� something is established; the audience learns information they didn�t know before. It�s also a great song, which always helps.
It�s also important than Alan Menken and Jack Feldman wrote songs that speak to modern audiences. While the songs are not rock, they are up-tempo (with the exception of the one ballad, �Sante Fe�). Just as the songs of State Fair were in a style the audience of the time liked, the music of Newsies works similarly. This, coupled with Kenny Ortega�s energetic dancing, makes for a very contemporary and appealing work.
For a film so bashed by the reviewing community, Newsies has survived, warranting a special edition DVD, when many other films released that year have barely seen the light of day since their original video release. It�s worthy soundtrack CD is also available.
The Muppet Christmas Carol�Released the same year as Newsies, The Muppet Christmas Carol is usually categorized more so as a Muppet movie than a musical, but it features a full score by Paul Williams.
For many families I know, The Muppet Christmas Carol is the definitive film adaptation of the Charles Dickens book and a yearly tradition. Not only is it hilarious with a script that has spawned its own fair share of quotes (�Light the lamp, not the rat!�), but it keeps in tact the depth of Dickens� original intentions, not cheating Scrooge of his greed and bitterness, his pain and heartbreak, or his ultimate salvation.
Musically, the Williams score does a beautiful job of fleshing out the story. Not only are they effortlessly enmeshed in the score, they are memorable and very effective in telling the story. The opening song �Scrooge� gives all the needed information about the main character with great humor, and �Marley and Marley� is appropriately spooky and funny. The two greatest gems in the score are the memorable �It Feels Like Christmas� with its simple theme of Christmas as an expression of love, and Belle�s melancholy �When Love is Gone,� a song that deserves a life outside the movie. It is full of vivid yet simple lyrics of the dissipation of the love between Belle and Ebeneezer, making for a beautiful, emotional song.
Muppet Treasure Island�Another full score was written by Barry Mann and Cynthia Weil for Disney�s second Muppet musical feature, Muppet Treasure Island. Because the film doesn�t succeed on the same level as The Muppet Christmas Carol, the music hasn�t survived as strongly.
Fortunately, Mann and Weil�s songs are as strong as those of the previous Muppet film. �Shiver My Timbers� is an appropriately spooky intro, while �Sailing for Adventure� and �Cabin Fever� are full of fun and laughs. One of the oddest entries in the Disney musical cannon is �Love Led Us Here,� which is between Kermit and Miss Piggy. Musically and lyrically, it�s on par with many love songs of the pop genre, but, out of the context of the film, it�s almost unbearable to hear because it is performed by Kermit and Miss Piggy, who are no Celine Dion and Peabo Bryson, which is also part of the humor of the moment.
While The Muppet Christmas Carol and Muppet Treasure Island have always been Disney movies (their copyrights read Disney), the soundtracks were not owned by Disney until its acquisition of the Muppet characters. Fortunately, the soundtrack for The Muppet Christmas Carol has been reissued, and it is a worthy addition to any Disney music collection. The CD for Muppet Treasure Island has not yet been reissued, but copies from its original release can still be found online.
Because of the ownership of the movies, should Disney choose to sell the Muppets, let�s hope they are smart enough to retain the rights to the music related to the Disney-produced Muppet movies and television specials, for they are good enough and deserve to be included as part of the Disney music catalogue and for inclusion in Disney music retrospectives.
Enchanted�There were many reasons why I was psyched for Enchanted. First of all, Disney joined two musical powerhouses to create the music. Stephen Schwartz (the talented composer and lyricist of Godspell, Children of Eden, Wicked, The Prince of Egypt, and Gepetto) and Disney stalwart Alan Menken, who together created the superlative scores to Pocahontas and The Hunchback of Notre Dame, wrote the music. That alone was enough to stand up, cheer, and line up on opening day for.
Then we get the added bonus of, gasp, seeing traditional animation from Disney on the big screen. Make that a triple gasp. While the animation was farmed out to James Baxter Animation, a few Disney greats got to work on the film, including Mark Henn. I don�t know how many gasps that works out to be, but it�s an awful lot.
Seeing traditional animation again was more exciting that I expected it to be. No, it�s not the same as seeing a completely sincere character in traditional animation like the original fairy tales, but it is nonetheless exhilarating for the few minutes were are given. I want to go back and see it again on the big screen for that reason alone.
I leave the actual critique of the film to Kirby Holt and his Toon Talk, except to add that I echo his sentiments on direction. Kevin Lima�s A Goofy Movie and Tarzan (which he co-directed) were strong, but his first live-action effort, 102 Dalmatians suffered from his inexperience. There�s much to enjoy in that movie, very much to enjoy, but it also suffers from some clunker moments that, in animation, would have been cut out of the storyboard process very early on. Enchanted is a step up, but it is by no means inspired direction.
While it does feature five songs by Menken and Schwartz, Enchanted is more of a brush with the musical format. Its songs are generally used to establish Giselle�s fairy tale past and fairy tale character without engulfing the New York characters.
And yet, when Giselle calls her New York animal friends, I couldn�t help but cheer for hearing a live-action Disney character sing on the big screen again.
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-- Posted December 26, 2007