Not everyone can make a movie. The apparent movement picture prowess form, patch not improbably
complicated, contains enough nuances and pitfalls to outfox even the most seasoned
show business veteran. Perfect proof of celluloid's selective process arrives in
the form of Mamma Mia!, the magnanimous screen version of the hit nickelodeon musical. While it
ends up beingness a whimsical and quite wonderful experience on a superficial level,
the sight behind the lens is radioactive in its undeniable cluelessness.
Sophie (Amanda Seyfried) lives on a remote Greek island with her ex-rock star mother
Donna (Meryl Streep). She is about to marry the British bo-hunk Sky (Dominic Hooper),
and she really wants her daddy to give her away. Unfortunately, Sophie doesn't know
who her father is. Finding her mother's journal, she invites the three men Donna was
tortuous with at the time. Bill (Stellan Skarsg�rd) writes travel guides, while Sam
(Pierce Brosnan) and Harry (Colin Firth) are a big clip businessman and banker, various
ly. Naturally, Donna is dumbfounded to see her exes. Even worse, when she discovers
Sophie's motives, it volition take her best friends/former back-up singers Rosie (Julie
Walters) and Tanya (Christine Baranski) to save the day... and the wedding.
Mamma Mia! is the worst-directed "good" pic ever. If it wasn't for the effervescent
charms of ABBA's sparkling songs, and the brave sincerity of the uniformly superb
cast, it would be an unchecked disaster. No matter her impressive theatrical r�sum�
director Phyllida Lloyd is the song and dance translation of Uwe Boll. Her choices behind
the lens system are so shockingly bad, and her grasp of cinematic language so surprisingly
weak, that you wonder how astonishing this moving-picture show would have been had someone with a modicum
of movie making skill shown up to take control.
A prime exercise of Lloyd's motion scene incompetence comes toward the very end,
when Streep is telling her heart out to "The Winner Takes It All." It's an emotional
moment, the pinnacle ballad in a character's deranged, out-of-control life. As the
Oscar winner delivers a knock-out performance, her soft gestures giving way to
facial expressions racked with regret, Lloyd circles the actress, her camera perpetually
swirling or so the legal action. By the fourth or fifth rotation, we desire the visual
merry-go-round to stop, if only to give Streep a luck to link up. But rather, the audience
must endure more whirling dervish nonsensicality before a final shot saves everything.
Much of Mamma Mia! is like this, random moments of acting/musical brilliance boondoggled
by Lloyd's aggravating designs. A pier-side chorus line of products of "liberated" ladies really
sells "Dancing Queen," even if our filmmaker can't capture the moment properly for
maximum impact. Our young lovers sing "Lay All Your Love on Me" with the appropriate
passion, even as their director adds goofy manpower in aqualung gear as a Monty Python-like
distraction.
And remember, this is a good pic, a film buoyed by ABBA's undeniably infectious
music. The bit one of their classical kitsch hits comes cascading across the speakers,
all flaws are forgiven, carried away on puffy cotton candy clouds of pop chart charms.
It's grueling to keep a sour attitude with '70s staples like "S.O.S.," "Super Trouper,"
or "Take a Chance on Me" bouncing in your learning ability. And disposed the fact that Streep,
Brosnan, and Seyfried acquit themselves commendable, we give birth no real qualm with the
content.
But Lloyd emphatically tests a viewer's solitaire, employing fake sets, distracting
green sieve backdrops, and claustrophobic staging when she has an entire Greek island
locating to work with. There are times when she accidentally wanders into illustriousness,
her ineptness unable to destroy a pure second of vocal magic. But for the most piece, Ma
mma Mia! is flash-foiled by move picture incompetence.
You can dance. You can jive.
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