Mamma Mia!

Every time someone sees this movie, an angel dies

2008

Review: August 8, 2008

Director: Phillida Lloyd

Starring: Meryl Streep, Pierce Brosnan, Amanda Seyfried, Colin Firth, Christine Baranski

You might have a seizure.

THE SETUP:

As many Abba songs as possible crammed into a story with very little resemblance to reality.

DISCUSSION:

So as it was raining and I had just seen The Dark Knight, so I had to give in to my friend and see Mamma Mia. And I must admit that I was a little curious. And I would still be ruing my $12 lost if, by some bizarre miracle, the ticket kiosk hadn't inexplicably printed out two extra tickets for the guy in front of us, for precisely the showing we wanted to see. Free! Anything is good for free, right? Alas, we were soon to find out otherwise. Or at least I was.

So we begin with this girl Sophie, mailing letters to the three guys who might be her father as she sings "I Have a Dream." We then fast-forward to the day before the wedding, when all three guys, Pierce Brosnan, Colin Firth and Stellan Skarsgard all show up. Sophie explains [while singing "Honey Honey"] that her mom slept with all the guys in close succession, and has no idea that she invited them. Then her mother welcomes her friends, the always-welcome Christine Baranski and often-welcome Julie Walters, and runs around singing how the place is a dump while singing "Money, Money, Money." Then she sees that the ex-boyfriends are there and freaks. Then there's some sitcom-type misunderstandings as Mom doesn't know Sophie knows the guys are there, and Sophie doesn't know… you know what, I can't even go into it. There are about 78 more levels of misunderstandings and complications and a billion more Abba songs, and soon enough it's time for the wedding. Then there's a huge scene at the wedding, there's two additional songs as the credits roll, and finally you're allowed to leave.

Suffice to say I am not the target audience. I would say a movie like this is really its own genre—it's not even a musical—and as such there's really no way to critique it by conventional standards. Or you could try, but I guess you'd be missing the point, which is to have a "good time" at all costs. Only woe to those whose idea of a good time is not that of—to say this in the only polite way there is to say it—the people who enjoy something like Mamma Mia!

Let's just have some random thoughts, which will approximate the way this movie was thrown together. The director, Phillidya Lloyd, directed the original London incarnation of the show, but has never directed a movie before. I did not find the edits and camera movements / angles to be all that bad, but was surprised to find that the whole thing was supposedly filmed entirely on location, as it was lit in such a flat way that I would have SWORN all of the sequences at the villa were shot on a set in front of a green screen, with the backgrounds filled in later.

Meryl Streep THROWS herself into the whole spirit of the thing with abandon—which I guess is the only way to do it, you can't hold back here—but one is a little embarrassed for her. You kind of want to say "Meryl, honey, you don't have to do this." Pierce Brosnan cannot sing, and looks like he's passing a kidney stone when he tries. I guess I generally appreciate that they didn't dub in good voices or something, but I think one or two lessons in the basics wouldn't have hurt anything. Amanda Seyfried as Sophie is a bright light of bubble-headed enthusiasm, but we still have no idea whether she can act or not. The one who fares best is Christine Baranski, since she has arch irony built into her persona anyway, so she is able to cut through all of this unscathed.

To say that there is a story to be told here would be incorrect. There are also no real characters. There is just connecting tissue—often only lasting a few seconds—between songs. We have a song, someone comes on and blurts out a general emotion, then we have a song about that, then two other people might have a four-line conversation, and we might have a song about that, etc. And one thing this movie revealed for me is that one of the things I like most about musicals is to hear NEW songs, NEW music, and a NEW musical perspective. Hearing old familiar pop hits butchered by non-singers in the context of a story invented to contain them at all costs is not my idea of something I want to sit through. Every time a song started—and they sometimes follow within the minute of when the last ended—I got a little deflated feeling of "Again?" But I guess that for the majority of people out there, the problem with a musical is that they DON'T know the songs going in. Perhaps the money-making genius behind this show and movie is to rectify that situation.

Back to the point of there being little to no overarching story, or only what can be indicated in a line or two between songs, there are major fights and love affairs that erupt between characters with NO buildup or indication whatsoever. We find out that one of the fathers was having much more serious feelings for Meryl than we ever could have known. We find out that one of our characters is gay. We find out that the bride and groom are having much more serious misgivings than we could have known. Each of these situations might have one line or exchange placed earlier in the movie, and that is what passes for consistent characterization here.

About the character who turns out to be gay… Well, I guess it's good that now, in mainstream entertainments, it's considered a perfectly acceptable and understandable option that you might discover that you're gay at a certain point in your life, and just go for it. I guess… although they always have to go for a demure clean cut handsome fellow with two-days stubble and a bright smile with brilliant teeth. I mean, would everybody be so accepting if you decided that you really wanted a leather daddy with a uniform fetish who would make you lick his boots? Or ANYTHING that isn't in the tiny little acceptable range of good little homos who support the economy through incessant trips to Bed, Bath and Beyond, the Lancome counter and 2(x)ist underwear nook at Lord and Taylor? I'm just asking.

Part of what I was saying about how this is its own genre, impervious to criticism, is the vague feeling that if you don't like it, you're just a big, elitist, over-serious party pooper. Which is fine. This is not a movie as we know movies. If you want to watch this, go right ahead. When it was over and I asked my friend how he liked and he said he did… well, I decided to just leave it right there. I told another friend I had seen this and he said "Thank you for throwing yourself in front of the projector beam for me."

You're welcome.

SHOULD YOU WATCH IT?

I don't know, are you willing to sit through complete shit in order to have "the world's greatest time?"