Jean-Paul’s rating: 4/5 stars
Bottom Line: Colorful and lively. Magical and whimsical.
I have not been much of a fan of the Disney live action retellings of their classic animated films. One was horrible and the others range from just fine to decently made. So when I saw that the blue cartoon genie made popular by the voice of Robin Williams was going to be reprized by and equally blue live Will Smith, I, like the rest of the interwebs, met the news with mockery. To be fair, the early previews really did make Will Smith look silly in the completely wrong way and there are still moments in the movie where there is a bit of creepy weirdness to CGI Genie, but for the most part Will Smith absolutely nailed it. He gets back to his roots as a singer and dancer and hams up Genie just so in a way that would surely have made Robin Williams proud.
The story of this “Aladdin” is pretty much the same as the cartoon one only with an added Oscar bait original song (and it will likely be nominated) and a much more woman empowering theme throughout. There are plenty of other minor changes, but nothing terribly important. The only real disappointing part is that Jafar (Marwan Kenzari) seems more watered down than I remember him in the cartoon. The third act where Jafar’s evil plans come to fruition seems kind of hurried and anti-climatic. Besides that, though, everything was absolutely delightful! The musical numbers were incredibly well choreographed. Aladdin (Mena Massoud) was remarkable in all acting and singing and dancing. Jasmine (Naomi Scott) was maybe a bit off at times, but still brought lots of magic and strong-willedness. Dalia (Nasim Pedrad), the handmaiden to Jasmine who wasn’t in the cartoon was also a wonderful addition to the story with her comedic touches.
The movie was directed by Guy Ritchie of all people. Not remotely who you would expect to be directing a Disney musical, but he did quite a wonderful job. The movie also pretty seamlessly blends true live action with CGIed moments throughout, not just with Genie, but all the moments where Aladdin is doing his acrobatics that even stuntmen couldn’t pull off. It would be very interesting to slow motion parts to see if the transitions are more apparent.
If you haven’t taken your kid to see this movie yet, you should. It is a wonderful delight and will hopefully replace “Frozen” (ugh) as the movie of choice for children everywhere for the next few days. The movie is beautiful in both costume design and art direction and the scope and color of the scenes make it well worth watching it on the big screen with a good sound system.