Disney's The Little Mermaid (Live-Action)

[Ben]

Part of it is probably that he did indeed want to just not copy himself, since he’s been vocal about being a little dismayed at just doing rehashes of old stuff before, but part of it is likely the direction he would have taken from the film's director…

Interview with Rob Marshall and producer John DeLuca, in which they make a same old, age old mistake. Problem No 1 — not knowing the difference between the terms "medium" and "genre":

https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/movie ... 235499193/

[Farerb]

As a result, Sebastian and Chef Louis’ (René Auberjonois) animated showdown to the tune of “Les Poissons” also had no place in a more realistic live-action story.

“It’s literally a Saturday morning cartoon section. If we had filmed it — I don’t know how we would’ve filmed it — it never would have played. It’s also a vacation from the story and has nothing to do with the story, so you can’t do that in a live-action film,” Marshall says.

And replacing that with Scuttlebutt make so much more sense right?!

[Bill1978]

I remember reading an interview at the time of Tangled's release that Menken was advised to limit the use of the songs' melody in the score to increase the chance of getting the movie an Oscar nomination. At the time (not sure if its changed) scores that used too much song themes would be ruled ineligible - because how dare people have the audacity to hum along to score and then give the Oscar to the song because they were humming the songs throughout. I have no problem with this, because that's how a musical's score should work. And I think an award-winning score should at least have one memorable theme to hum. But of course, the Academy isn't a fan of giving awards to silly little children's film when you can give the award to some serious adult drama that uses the score as background atmospheric noise.

I imagine Menken has been given similar direction from TPTB for the live action film because if he used the themes from the original film too much in the score, then it would be deemed ineligible for the use of previously released thematic material. Basically, can't get a nomination if you are sampling another movie's score - even if it's the same composer.

And because of the lack of the use of song melody, the scores for his live action adaptations come across as very generic and lesser work of Menken unfortunately.

There are moments in the score when a song begins to sneak in, and it sounds good and then bang it stops and you are left with something not memorable or hummable.

[ShyViolet]

“It’s literally a Saturday morning cartoon section. If we had filmed it — I don’t know how we would’ve filmed it — it never would have played. It’s also a vacation from the story and has nothing to do with the story, so you can’t do that in a live-action film,” Marshall says.

I understand that “Les Poissons” wouldn’t have been appropriate for the kind of film they were aiming for, but just because it’s from a different tradition (“bits of business” from the classic Walt era) doesn’t make it crud. Dismissively referring to it “a Saturday Morning Cartoon” is not very respectful of the original film (or John Musker and Ron Clemens).

[Ben]

…how dare people have the audacity to hum along to score and then give the Oscar to the song because they were humming the songs throughout. I have no problem with this, because that's how a musical's score should work.

Exactly. In musical terms, the "score" includes *all* the music, including the songs. On stage, and in film, when you say "score", you are talking about everything. This is as it should be.

[Farerb]

And because of the lack of the use of song melody, the scores for his live action adaptations come across as very generic and lesser work of Menken unfortunately.

I don't think this was an issue with his score for Beauty and the Beast. As much as I disliked that movie, and the way the actors sang the songs (with auto tune and all), I thought the score was excellent.

Aladdin didn't have this issue as well, but I found its score lacking in energy compared to the original.

[Randall]

There has never EVER been a live action musical with a song that didn't progress the plot. Got it.

Sarcasm.

With a comment like that, one must question Marshall's knowledge of film musicals. Losing Les Poissons may have been the right choice for him, but his rationale is lacking.

[ShyViolet]

Also, if you think about it, Under the Sea is a WONDERFUL song, but doesn’t exactly advance the plot either, (other than just showing us how much Sebastian loves his home). Ariel smiles through it and everything, but it’s pretty clear she’s already made up her mind about the human world being the place she wants to be.

[James]

There has never EVER been a live action musical with a song that didn't progress the plot. Got it...

One of my least favorite things is when they basically stop the entire show for a song like that. I've actually coined a term for them: musical-delayers. Hmmm. Now that I've written it down it just isn't exactly right. Plot-halters? I'll workshop it some more.

[Daniel]

Plot-stoppers? Plot-pauses? Toughie.

[Bill1978]

Also, if you think about it, Under the Sea is a WONDERFUL song, but doesn’t exactly advance the plot either, (other than just showing us how much Sebastian loves his home). Ariel smiles through it and everything, but it’s pretty clear she’s already made up her mind about the human world being the place she wants to be.

Although it doesn't actually advance the plot (technically you could cut the song like Les Poisson and not lose any of the story), it still contributes to the story because Sebastian performs it to distract Ariel from her thoughts about The Up There and convince her that hanging out under the sea is better than anything up there. His goal is by the end of the song, Ariel will have seen the light, changed her mind and will be content living under the sea. It's a distraction song that fails, unlike I Just Can't Wait To Be King which is a distraction song that succeeds. From a plot point, it gives Sebastian's plot a bit of suspense because he failed and now has to find her before Triton does. So, in the end the song is more about character plot than big picture story arc.

And sometimes a song is present because it is fun and bright and colourful and appeals to the children haha

[ShyViolet]

Good points!

[Ben]

Not *every* song has to progress "plot", but the good ones do, or at least define a character or give us some useful information. You can, in fact — shh! — lose most or even any song from a musical and replace it with two lines of dialogue, minimum.

Ariel: I want to live up there.

Sebastian: Don’t. It’s awful, they’ll kill you. It’s much better down here.

Ariel: Oh, okay.



But then they wouldn’t be, and there wouldn’t be, musicals…!

[James]

Plot-stoppers? Plot-pauses? Toughie.

Plot-stoppers is pretty good... We're close. I'm sure we'll get it right eventually!

[James]

Some great quotes from an article in the Atlantic:
https://www.theatlantic.com/culture/arc ... ey/674223/

One of the most baffling patterns of these “live-action” remakes... is the choice to transmogrify every cartoon animal into something scientifically accurate... The Little Mermaid, of course, has more fantasy elements, given that it focuses on a world of underwater mer-people. Still, that hasn’t stopped the director, Rob Marshall, and his team of visual-effects wizards from rendering Sebastian the crab (voiced by Daveed Diggs) as something you might pluck out of the tank at a supermarket... Why does poor Ariel (played by Halle Bailey), the fish-tailed sea princess, have to carry out whole conversations with a vacant-looking damselfish and a beady-eyed northern gannet? She’s a mermaid, for Pete’s sake, whose father, Triton (Javier Bardem), wields a magic trident and runs a royal court where his second-in-command is an orchestra-conducting crab. Plus, the entire film is a musical, a genre in which ecstatic artistic truth is far more important than aquatic anatomy. Nothing about this needs to be realistic!

When the remakes dutifully copy their predecessors, they seem embarrassingly rote, but any small changes or additional songs come across like lazy bits of padding. The new Little Mermaid is somehow 135 minutes long, a whopping 52 more than the lean animated version, but it adds almost nothing of note to the mix, largely spending that extra time on stretched-out action sequences and slightly more plot context.

The would-be showstopper “Under the Sea” is a particular crime; Sebastian’s ode to ocean life is filled with detailed depictions of sea creatures wobbling around, but they’re not allowed to sing along with him or do anything remotely cute or silly. In the original, when Sebastian brags of his “hot crustacean band,” the film cuts to a group of fish playing instruments. Here, viewers are served a procession of faceless starfish wafting by. I can think of nothing more apt for this whole bleak affair.