Disney's The Little Mermaid (Live-Action)

[Daniel]

First look at Sebastian:



About what I expected. Still.

[Ben]

Oh.

Bigger eyes would have at least given him a little bit more personality. This looks like something out of Pinocchio or B&TB.

[Daniel]

Trailer will debut during the Oscars! New poster:



Talk about gloomy...

[Dacey]

Looks fine to me?

[Ben]

Understated logo too, but that pose is very intentional for being evocative of the famous statue to be found in Hans Andersen’s town of Copenhagen. Nice nod!

[EricJ]

I guess I'm just too used to Disney making Ariel black, as "Let's make it diverse!" is their default excuse for doing a pointless remake, all the way back to their "Rodgers & Hammerstein's Cinderella".

I can even take Awkwafina as a female BFF Scuttle, since I'm convinced Disney has long since forgotten why they cast her in things, they just do.

As to making Scuttle a gannet for no apparent reason, however...somebody finally needs to slap them upside the head.

[Bill1978]

Firstly, the trailer didn't make me throw things at my screen or well throw my phone away in disgust like the Beauty and the Beast remake did. On first watch, I'd place it with Aladdin, in that it makes me curious enough to want to at least check it out. I am super keen to hear the songs orchestration, cause one of the things that the original suffered from was a small orchestra for its song and score so I am keen to hear the music with a much larger orchestra on hand.

The reprise of Part of Your World sounds gorgeous, and I am enjoying Melissa McCarthy's voice for Ursula (and the actor for Floudner as well). Which brings me to one of the main issues I have with these remakes, putting things in that instantly makes us compare it to the original. Melissa's voice is very much like Pat Carrol's take, the silhouette of Ariel bursting through the water - although dreadlocks don't have the same response to a head flick as the original hair.

My big issue with this movie at the moment is the animals (and I had a similar issue with the enchanted objects for different reasons). There is something off putting seeing 'real' looking animals talk. I think it was Roger Ebert who said one of the great advantages of using animation to tell your story is you can do unrealistic things and it feels natural ie talking animals who have been basically humanized in their style without being anthropomorphized. Sebastian and Flounder work better in animation than what I have seen in the live action version so far. Flounder really doesn't have that 'cute and cuddly' look of the original because well real fish aren't.

And am I the only one that feels Hallie's line readings are quite flat in the trailer?

[Ben]

Well, colour me fairly impressed all around. I was no fan of the no-sea shells in photos I’ve seen, but the choice works pretty seamlessly in movement, and Halle comes across much more softer than in that awful initial promo picture that made er brow look odd. Some parts look too close to the original — I’d have loved Queen Latifah to go with Ursula to keep in with the quasi-Caribbean setting (and how does that work with Bardem again?), but they used that trick up in that live special. I’m no McCarthy fan, which will make it easier to "hate" her villain, and she’s looking like she’ll do the whole Divine thing just fine.

Thought all the readings came off as expected and what you’d hope. As I say, I was pleasantly surprised by Halle's take and it looks like it’s going to work, but then again we ran Chicago at the weekend and I have faith in Marc Platt and Rob Marshall. The only thing is, yes, aren’t we hearing a bit too much Awkwafina in these things lately? The lack of a different tone doesn’t help her characters all sound the same…

[Daniel]

Trailer for convenience:



I'm pretty much indifferent. Thought Halle sounded amazing, everything else not so much. There's the scene where she's being confronted by King Triton. In the original, Ariel was both frightened and angry. From that little snippet Halle isn't showing as much emotion and feels like she's just phoning it in. Triton is almost laughable. The way Javier Bardem reads his lines... He already ruined Desi Arnaz for me, don't have much hope here. Kenneth Mars had such presence. Melissa McCarthy, too soon to say. Didn't hate what I saw so that's something. Sebastian's voice reminds me of Futurama's Hermes. I'm not liking Scuttle at all. The design for one, but yes the voice. I still have issue with the lack of bubbles. It just looks like they're floating in space!

[blackcauldron85]

I still have issue with the lack of bubbles. It just looks like they're floating in space!

Could the film still be in post-production and maybe we'll get bubbles?

I can't make it through the remakes- the original Aladdin and TLM are in my Top 3 favorite films- I tried watching the live-action Aladdin 3 times and just couldn't make it through (the jerky filming of "One Jump Ahead," sigh). So I'm sure I'll have issues with TLM. But I think Halle is beautiful as is her voice.

[Daniel]

Hey, long time no see!

[blackcauldron85]

Hi Dan!!!!

[Bill1978]

Considering the original was able to have heaps of bubbles in an era where that would have been extremely time consuming are even arduous (I'm assuming computers weren't helping back then), ley's hope the film is still in the process of getting the computers to add bubbles.

[Farerb]

They made the bubbles with Xerox as far as I know.

[Ben]

Yes, there was a whole STX department that was just bubbles. Much of it was hand-animated tailored to specific shots, and then many of those were Xerox copied and applied to other shots (meaning they could double up on them and add more in a faster way). It’s kind of weird that they wouldn’t wait for full VFX shots to come back for the trailer, or add rudimentary ones to just the trailer shots for now, as they do seem a bit conspicuous by their absence. Even Aquaman had bubbles, so I do agree that I hope these aren’t fully finished shots. We’ll probably get some reasoning to keep the cost down, like "we found the bubbles were too distracting"…