Despite the controversy before the release, The Little Mermaid could surprise everyone!

News culture Despite the controversy before the release, The Little Mermaid could surprise everyone!

The Little Mermaid, Disney’s new live action remake is out!

For some years, Disney Brings Its Classics to Life Using Modern Animation Techniques and Live Actors. Halfway between live action and 3D animation, these feature films adopt a more realistic aesthetic and generally work very well in cinema. The Lion Kingdirected by John Favreau in 2019, is the 9th highest-grossing of all time with $1.6 billion at the box office, while The beauty and the Beast by Bill Condom with Emma Watson generated 1.2 billion. However, and despite this overall success, films are often strongly criticized.

For many, realistic aesthetics completely destroys the magic of the classics animation, causing a lot of uncanny valley (the principle that the more realistic a fictitious element is, the more the spectator realizes that it is not). It is therefore with great apprehension that critics have received the announcement of The little Mermaidwho is released in cinemas on May 24. This time, beyond the technical considerations raised during the broadcast of the various trailers and the criticism of Disney’s policy, the reactions were strong and numerous about the choice of the actress to embody Ariel.

For this film, Disney chose Halle Bailey, who became known for her covers, including that of Best Thing I Never Had by Beyonce Knowles. African-American, the actress has, by her simple skin color, unleashed whole waves of racist comments, which accompanied all the communication of the film to the point of eclipsing the release. A hashtag #NotMyAriel, with which we fall very quickly on terrible comments, has even found itself in trend under the guise of defending the original vision of Hans Christian Andersen. Rob Marshall, director of the 2h15 film, regularly spoke out in order to defend the choice of production:

I didn’t think it was such a big deal to choose a woman of color, director Rob Marshall reacted on Deadline I think it’s just an archaic way of looking at the world. When this controversy arose, from narrow-minded people, I immediately thought it was reactions from another century. Are we really still at this stage? he said on Deadline.

A lukewarm critical reception, a visibly conquered public

Shortly before and just after the release, the professional reviews were published and, Overall, the movie disappoints. We are talking in particular about a lukewarm production which happens to be longer than the original by removing sequences deemed important, from a feature film that manages extremely poorly its lightand a Disney that takes little risk.

However, the qualities noted are numerous. Most of the river reviews evoke actors who bring their characters to life, and in particular of a Halle Bailey who manages to cause a sensation thanks to her playing and her songs, while remaining silent for a good part of the film. In short, there are pretty things to remember and the magic works quite a bit, but thehe film would be just a “drop of water” in the Disney ocean. On Rotten Tomatoes, the Top 60 reviewers give it a measly 47%, while the Tomatometer is at 67%. However, on the public side, it seems to work very well! With over 5000 verified reviews, the audience score is 95% :

Beautiful cinematography and effects. Great new songs. (Alan) Menken and (Lin-Manuel) Miranda are an incredible songwriting team.
Great movie! I loved the updated surprises mixed in with the classic movie.
The underwater visuals were awesome. I loved the songs! The casting was amazing and precise. My daughter really enjoyed it. She laughed and cried.
It was amazing. We loved it. The acting was so good. I took my teenage sons who have never even seen the cartoon and they loved it too. Really moving too. So good.

Very positive reviews from the public, which should logically be felt when the figures for the first weekend are published. We already know that The little Mermaid a generated $38 million on US soil on release day, and that we could be close to 100 million over the whole weekend. Despite the controversies and a number of negative reviews, the thread could therefore be another box office success for Disney.

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