Second Look - Moana

When I first watched Moana in 2016, I will admit that I wasn’t quite sure what to make of it at the time, but I did at least like it enough to get a copy on Blu-ray to watch it again in the future. Although the Blu-ray went untouched for years, the arrival of its theatrical sequel on Disney+ gave me an excuse to revisit the movie, as well as re-evaluate it for more than just the animation. After watching it again for the first time in nearly a decade, I found it to be far better than I remembered it being. Barring maybe Encanto (which I thought was okay), I would even go so far as to say it was Disney’s last good animated movie in years.

Hercules (1997)

Note: This review contains spoilers for Hercules (1997).

Towards the end of the Disney Renaissance, Disney released their 35th animated feature, Hercules, to good reviews from critics, but underperformed at the box office, especially in comparison to the Disney films that came before it. At the same time, the liberties taken with Greek mythology, especially the Hercules myths on which the film is based, angered Greece enough that the film didn’t have its planned premiere in the country. As a kid at the time, however, I was completely unaware of this and only remember watching it through someone else’s VHS copy, though only certain parts of the film stuck with me. Growing up, however, I got more familiar with the different elements of the film through the heavy representation in the Kingdom Hearts series until, eventually, I finally rewatched the film in time for its 25th anniversary. While I can see now how it’s not that great as an adaptation of the Hercules myth, I did still find it a great film in its own right.

Treasure Planet

Since first being published in 1883, Robert Louis Stevenson’s Treasure Island has gone on to become one of the most ubiquitous novels, receiving a number of adaptations in the coming centuries while also arguably setting the initial default for pirate stereotypes; one of the most famous of these adaptations is Disney’s live-action film adaptation of the same name in 1950, with Disney’s own Pirates of the Caribbean from 2003 arguably overwriting the pirate stereotype into Jack Sparrow clones. The year 2002 would see Disney adapt Treasure Island again, this time fully animated and given a space/steampunk aesthetic under the name Treasure Planet. I had somewhat of an interest as a kid when it first came out, however I never ended up actually being able to watch it until recently, after having heard how good it actually was. Though it’s not without flaws, I did find myself enjoying it for what it was.

Stubs - Aladdin

Aladdin (1992) Voices by Scott Weinger, Robin Williams, Linda Larkin, Jonathan Freeman, Frank Welker. Narrated by Robin Williams. Directed by Ron Clements, John Musker. Produced by Ron Clements, John Musker. Screenplay by Ron Clements, John Musker, Ted Elliott, Terry Rossio.  Run Time: 90 minutes. U.S.  Color, Animated, Fantasy, Musical, Comedy

For most of the 1990’s, Disney Animation went through what has been called a renaissance. After a disappointing run in the 1980’s, a new creative team took over and turned things around, starting with The Little Mermaid (1989).

On the cusp of that era, in 1988, lyricist Howard Ashman pitched the idea to Disney to turn Aladdin into an animated musical film. After writing a treatment and some songs with his partner Alan Menken, Linda Woolverton was brought in by the studio to write a screenplay. Directors John Musker and Ron Clements were given a choice of three projects to pursue: Swan Lake, King of the Jungle (later to become The Lion King) or Aladdin.

They chose the latter and wrote their own screenplay. Jeffrey Katzenberg, then the Disney studio chief, had issues with it and gave it to Ted Elliott and Terry Rossio to rewrite. They made the changes to not only the Musker and Clements script, but to the original story itself.

While Aladdin and the Magic Lamp may be an ancient Arab folktale, it actually takes place in China. The plot of the original story is far more complicated than the story most of us remember and certainly what is depicted in the Disney Aladdin:

In the original tale, which dates back to the One Thousand and One Arabian Nights, Aladdin is recruited by a sorcerer, who passes himself off as the brother of Aladdin’s deceased father, Mustapha. Aladdin, who is young, poor and ne'er-do-well is convinced, along with his mother, that the sorcerer is going to set Aladdin up to be a wealthy merchant. However, the sorcerer is really only interested in having Aladdin retrieve a wonderful oil lamp from a booby-trapped magic cave.

After finding himself trapped in the cave, Aladdin uses a magic ring, given to him by the sorcerer as protection. Rubbing his hands in despair he releases a genie from the ring. The genie takes Aladdin home to his mother. Aladdin is still holding the lamp and when his mother tries to polish it, a second, more powerful genie is released, who is bound to do the bidding of the person holding the lamp.

With the aid of the genie, Aladdin becomes rich and powerful and marries the Emperor’s daughter, Princess Babroulbadour, after foiling her marriage to the vizier’s (advisor) son. When the sorcerer returns, he offers the Princess a new lamp for old exchange. Not knowing the lamp’s importance, the Princess agrees and gives him the genie’s lamp. The sorcerer orders the genie to take Aladdin’s palace, along with all of its contents to his home in Maghreb.

Aladdin still has the magic ring and while that lesser genie cannot undo what has been done, he can transport Aladdin to Maghreb. There, he recovers the lamp and kills the sorcerer in battle and returns the palace and princess back home.

The happy ending has to wait. The sorcerer’s more powerful and more evil brother tries to get revenge. He kills Aladdin’s brother and disguises himself as an old woman known for her healing powers. Babrouldbadour is once again duped and commands that the woman stay in the palace. But Aladdin, who has been warned of this danger by the genie, slays the imposter. Aladdin eventually succeeds his father-in-law to the throne and now everyone can live happily ever after.

Changing a story or book for its cinematic treatment is nothing new in Hollywood. Call it poetic license or whatever you want, many times the Hollywood treatment has made a story more palatable and accessible to a wider audience.

Moved from China to an unidentified Middle Eastern location, the Disney Aladdin opens with a Merchant (voiced by Robin Williams) who tries to sell us goods but ends up offering to tell us the story of Aladdin.

Jafar (Jonathan Freeman) and his parrot assistant Iago (Gilbert Gottfried).

Jafar (Jonathan Freeman), Grand Vizier to the Sultan of Agrabah, and his wisecracking parrot assistant, Iago (Gilbert Gottfried), are waiting for a petty thief who has stolen half of an asp that bring forth the head of a panther whose mouth opens to the Cave of Wonders (Frank Welker), in which lies a magical oil lamp.

Jafar offers to let the thief keep all the treasure inside in exchange for retrieving the lamp. The thief’s attempt fails as the cave swallows him whole, but the voice from within tells them that only a “Diamond in the Rough” can enter.

We’re shown this “diamond in the rough”, Aladdin (Scott Weinger), a “street rat” who is being chased by authorities for stealing a loaf of bread. His only pal is his pet monkey Abu (Frank Welker), who helps him escape as he runs through the marketplace and up on the rooftops. But once he’s safe, this thief shows he has a heart of gold and gives his hard-won food to some starving street urchins.

Meanwhile, the Sultan's daughter, Jasmine (Linda Larkin), is frustrated with her life in the palace. She is tired of her father’s (Douglas Seale) attempts to find her a prince for a husband and flees to Agrabah's marketplace. There she meets Aladdin and the two begin a friendship. Jafar has Aladdin arrested. When Jasmine orders him released, Jafar lies and tells her Aladdin has already been executed.

In the disguise of an elder, Jafar releases Aladdin and Abu from the dungeon and leads them to the Cave of Wonders, promising a reward in return for retrieving the lamp. This time the cave allows them to enter but warns Aladdin to not touch anything but the lamp. They discover a magic flying carpet, but it is Abu’s attempt to steal a gem that causes the cave to collapse. The carpet flies them back to the entrance and Aladdin delivers the lamp to Jafar. His reward is that Jafar tries to kill him. Once again, Abu comes to Aladdin’s aide and thwarts Jafar, stealing back the lamp just as he, the carpet, and Aladdin fall back into the closing cave.

Aladdin frees the Genie (Robin Williams) from the lamp.

Aladdin rubs the lamp and unexpectedly unleashed Genie (Robin Williams), who reveals he will grant Aladdin three wishes with the exception of murder, romance, the revival of the dead or additional wishes. But Aladdin is clever and tricks the genie into magically freeing them from the cave without actually using one of his wishes. Genie tells Aladdin that he won’t receive any more magic help unless he explicitly states "I wish". While contemplating his wishes, Genie tells him he would wish for freedom, since he is a prisoner to his lamp. Aladdin promises to free Genie as his last wish. Aladdin’s first wish is to become a prince so he would have a chance to win Jasmine’s heart.

Jafar using mind control on the Sultan (Douglas Seale).

Meanwhile, Jafar uses mind control on the Sultan and convinces him to arrange a marriage between himself and Jasmine. Jafar then would have legal claim to become Sultan himself. But before he is able to succeed, Aladdin appears and parades into the Sultan's palace as "Prince Ali Ababwa". While the Sultan is impressed by the new suitor, Jasmine rejects Ali.

Aladdin takes Jasmine (Linda Larkin) on a magic carpet ride.

The Genie suggests to Aladdin to tell the princess who he really is, but Aladdin keeps up the act and takes Jasmine around the world on the magic carpet. Jasmine begins to suspect that Ali is actually the man she met in the marketplace and during the trip tricks Aladdin into admitting it. She demands the truth from Aladdin, but instead, he fabricates a story about sometimes dressing as a commoner to escape palace life. The couple kisses as Aladdin returns her home.

The Genie tries to convince Aladdin to tell Jasmine the truth.

Afterward, Aladdin is kidnapped and thrown into the ocean by Jafar, who makes a second attempt to arrange a marriage. Genie rescues Aladdin as his second wish, even though he can’t say the magic words himself. Aladdin returns to the palace and exposes Jafar's plot to the Sultan. After noticing the lamp in Aladdin's possession and realizing who Aladdin is, Jafar flees.

Despite his promise, Aladdin has second thoughts about freeing Genie with his third wish. He believes without Genie he is "just Aladdin". Meanwhile, Iago steals the lamp and brings it to Jafar. Now that he is the Genie's new master, Jafar uses his first two wishes to usurp the Sultan's throne and become the most powerful sorcerer in the world, enslaving Jasmine and the Sultan and exposing Aladdin as a street rat, before exiling him and Abu to a frozen wasteland.

Using the magic carpet, Aladdin and Abu return to the palace and Aladdin tries to sneak in and steal back the lamp. Jafar proposes using his third wish to make Jasmine his queen, but Genie protests that he cannot grant that wish since it involves love. Jasmine, however, has decided to feign interest in Jafar, allowing Aladdin to make a grab at the lamp. But Aladdin gets caught and has to battle Jafar, who turns himself into an enormous cobra and traps Aladdin.

Jafar claims to be "the most powerful being on Earth", to which Aladdin argues that Genie is more powerful. Jafar uses his final wish to become a genie himself without realizing genies are not free. As he is sucked into a lamp of his own, he drags Iago with him. The Genie sends Jafar's lamp flying into the Cave of Wonders.

Despite Genie’s urging, Aladdin doesn’t use his third wish to become Prince Ali again. Instead, he keeps his promise and frees Genie. Upon seeing his daughter’s love for Aladdin, the Sultan changes the law to allow her to marry whomever she wants. The newly free Genie leaves to explore the world while Aladdin and Jasmine celebrate their engagement.

Genie goes out to explore the world.

Like most of the films of the Disney Renaissance, Aladdin is a wannabe musical. Fourteen songs were written for the movie, though only six were actually used. All the music for the film was written by Alan Menken, with Howard Ashman and Tim Rice providing lyrics; the latter replacing Ashman after he died of AIDS in 1991. For the most part, the voice actors in the film do not sing their parts. The exception is Robin Williams, who is prominently featured on two of the movie’s songs: “Friend Like Me” and “Prince Ali”. The former was recently used in a sing-along tribute to Williams on Broadway. (Aladdin was turned into a musical, which opened on Broadway in 2014, after playing other venues for about three years prior.) The movie would win two Academy Awards: Best Music, Original Score, and Best Music, Original Song for “A Whole New World” and another nomination for “A Friend Like Me.”

Robin Williams also voices the Narrator of the story.

Despite his billing, Williams is the star of the movie. Known for his manic improvisational style of humor, the film seems to take advantage of Williams’ ability to change his voice and accent at the drop of a hat. During the song “Prince Ali”, Williams is called upon to be a woman swooning over the prince, a small boy in the crowd as well as commentators treating the princely parade as if it were the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day or Tournament of Roses Parade. The film even seems to incorporate his ability to mimic other actors and personalities including Jack Nicholson, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Rodney Dangerfield, Ed Sullivan, and Peter Lorre. Likely, because it is an animated film, many other improvisations and impersonations never made it to celluloid, but in so many ways Aladdin showcases Williams’ versatility.

Robin Williams impersonates Jack Nicholson amongst others.

For a number of reasons, the film was a huge success grossing over $500 million on a budget of $28 million. This is mostly hand-drawn animation, but there are CGI elements and Pixar Animation, then it’s own independent studio does receive a credit. The film’s success spun off two direct-to-video sequels, The Return of Jafar (1994) and Aladdin and the King of Thieves (1996). On the first, Williams was replaced by Dan Castellaneta, who is best known as the voice of Homer Simpson.

After his performance as Genie, Williams had a falling out with Disney. Having done his voice work for scale out of gratitude for his success in Good Morning, Vietnam (1987), Williams only had a couple of conditions. First, neither his name nor image could be used to promote the film and his character from the film could not take up more than 25% of the image on a poster. He had another movie, Toys (1992), scheduled for release a few weeks after Aladdin’s release and didn’t want to be in competition with himself. But Disney went back on both of Williams’ conditions.

When Disney wanted to make a trilogy out of the story (three is a magic number in Hollywood), Castellaneta was hired to voice the Genie in The Return of Jafar and the animated television series which followed. However, a change in studio management and a subsequent apology from the then-new studio head Joe Roth brought Williams back for Aladdin and the King of Thieves. Even though Castellaneta had already recorded the Genie part, his work was replaced by Williams.

Even though the film might be aimed at children, this is definitely a film the whole family (meaning adults) can enjoy, too. While there are definitely some dark elements at play (Jafar), the comedic elements are its equal thanks in large part to Williams’ performance. Like most films from the Disney Renaissance, I would highly recommend this film. You may even find yourself watching this film more than once.

Moana

I will admit I first had some hesitation to see Moana, if only because of the bits that the trailers decided to focus on, which gave me the impression it would be extremely silly. However, after attending a seminar about the movie featuring animation legend Eric Goldberg, who had a hand in the movie’s production, my opinion changed and I became very interested in seeing it. Though I wasn’t able to actually see it until the very end of 2016 due to the high number of movies I had seen that year, I still didn’t expect a perfect movie going in, however I came out having seen what turned out to be a very well-executed musical about Pacific Island mythology.

From a young age, Moana Waialiki (Louise Bush) has been attracted to the sea, wishing to explore the ocean beyond the island shores of Motunui in spite of constant warnings from her father, Chief Tui (Temuera Morrison). Years later, Moana (Auli’i Cravalho) makes the discovery that her tribe once explored the ocean, however that changed once the heart of island goddess Te Fiti was stolen by the demigod Maui (Dwayne Johnson), causing darkness to fall upon the ocean and slowly destroy all life. After having received the heart of Te Fiti, a magical stone, from her grandmother Tala (Rahcel House), Moana makes it her mission to find Maui so he can return the heart to its rightful place and restore balance to the world.

The story itself is told at a good pace and there’s some pretty clever humor throughout, although it does only once briefly resort to a bladder joke for a quick laugh. A lot of the humor is otherwise found involving the actions of Heihei, an idiot rooster that ends up as a stowaway on Moana’s journey. While I’m not an expert on Pacific Island culture, I can say that, from whatever I do know, the story is an interesting take on Pacific Island mythos while still having its own identity as a well-written plot.

The animation of Moana is really amazing, particularly in the animation of hair and water (especially the latter). During a section of the story involving a fight against a giant coconut crab, there is a really interesting display of shining and glow-in-the-dark effects, fitting in with the mood set by that segment’s song (more on that later). Even more impressive is the animation for Mini Maui, a smaller figure within Maui’s body tattoos that acts as Maui’s conscience, considering that all of its actions are actually traditional animation. Having gone in with that knowledge, I was amazed by how Mini Maui was able to interact with not only Maui’s other tattoos in what presumably a combination of a traditional and CG space, but also Maui himself, who is animated in CG, and so it made me appreciate the effort that must have gone into making these seamless interactions possible.

Maui (Dwayne Johnson), animated in CG, with the tattooed Mini Maui,
animated traditionally.

Being a musical, you’d expect the music to be good, and in this case that is correct. While there seemed to only be a handful of songs, each of them is well-done and help explain things about the characters without interfering with the plot; a particular favorite of mine is “You’re Welcome,” a song about Maui that explains his view on the world and reveals Dwayne Johnson’s singing talents (plus, in context, it shows another impressive blend of traditional and CG animation). While also pretty okay, “Shiny,” sung by the coconut crab, Tamatoa (Jemaine Clement), seems to drag a little (it overall lasts about 3+ minutes), though it still doesn’t do any major harm to the narrative flow. The voice acting itself is also well-casted, especially since most of the voice actors they did cast could also sing in scenes that required it (the exception being Chief Tui, as Christopher Jackson provides his singing voice). One interesting behind-the-scenes tidbit is that actual Pacific Islanders were among at least a majority of the voice cast for authenticity (I only found out through hearing this that Dwayne Johnson is himself a Pacific Islander, specifically Samoan).

Preceding the main feature is a new, Inside Out-esque short titled Inner Workings, about the goings-on of a man’s body as he prepares for a normal working day while simultaneously wishing to indulge in outside pleasures along the way. The short itself is actually pretty good animation-wise, as it tells the entire story without any dialogue, and it manages to be pretty funny throughout. My only issue is with the presence of a couple bladder jokes, including one similar to the one present in Moana, though this didn’t take much away from my overall opinion.

Overall, Moana is a very enjoyable Disney movie. It’s truly amazing to see what can be done with CG in terms of water physics, plus it’s nice to see the integration of traditional animation in an interesting way. The songs in the movie are also well-written and largely memorable, making for one of Disney’s better musical features and one of their better movies in recent years. There is also an after-credits scene in this one, so be sure to stay until the end.

Stubs - The Little Mermaid

The Little Mermaid (1989) Starring the voices of: Jodi Benson, Christopher Daniel Barnes, Pat Carroll, Samuel E. Wright, Jason Marin, Kenneth Mars, Buddy Hackett, Ben Wright. Directed by Ron Clements, John Musker, Screenplay by John Musker, Ron Clements. Based on the novel by The Little Mermaid by Hans Christian Andersen. Produced by John Musker, Howard Ashman. Music by Alan Menken. Run Time: 83 minutes. U.S. Color, Animated, Musical, Fantasy

From Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937) through The Fox and the Hound (1981), no studio dominated animated features the way the Walt Disney Studios had. The first 44 years and 24 animated features is an envious streak. So much of what it means to be a child dates back to these films. What would it be like never to have seen Snow White or Bambi or Alice or Peter Pan? It wouldn’t have been the childhood many of us remember.

Disney was also synonymous with high quality hand-drawn animation that both set the standard and pushed the envelope. The studio even seemed to survive the death of its founder and guiding light Walt Disney in 1966. However, the wheels seemed to come off with the release of The Black Cauldron (1985). The word flop was not something associated with Disney up to then, but The Black Cauldron cost twice as much ($44 million) as it made ($22 million).

The next film, The Great Mouse Detective (1986) was a moderate success, but the bloom seemed to be off the rose. The next theatrical release, Oliver and Company (1988) was a box office success, but did not get a great critical response, especially when measured against the legacy it was a part of.

A new rebirth of Disney animation would wait until the release of The Little Mermaid (1989). Disney’s interest in the story dates back to the man himself. The concept of vignettes from Hans Christian Andersen stories was worked on soon after the release of Snow White, but for whatever reason never made it off the storyboard. In 1985, Ron Clements, then working on The Great Mouse Detective, rediscovered the story and suggested it to then Disney CEO Jeffrey Katzenberg. Initially rejected in favor of a sequel to Splash (1984), Katzenberg corrected himself and greenlit the film the next day, along with Oliver and Company.

Interestingly, while Clements and John Musker were working on the film, the staff came across the original story and visual development Kay Nielsen had done for Disney’s original concept and found that many of the changes they were making to Andersen’s story planned in the 1930’s were the same ones writers in the 1980’s were also proposing.

The Little Mermaid may mark a new beginning for Disney animation, but it also marks the end of traditional hand-painted cel animation at the studio. Even then, computer animation was creeping into the production. A digital method of coloring and combining scanned drawings, known as CAPS (Computer Animation Production System), developed by some upstart called Pixar for Disney, was used experimentally in the film.

The story of the Little Mermaid starts with a concert being thrown in honor of the King Triton (Kenneth Mars) which features Triton’s daughters with the showcase reserved for his youngest daughter, the 16-year-old Ariel (Jodi Benson), only Ariel is missing.

Rather than sing at the concert, Ariel and her fish friend, Flounder (Jason Marin), are off exploring shipwrecks, something Ariel has done many times before. She has a treasure trove of salvage, including cork screws, utensils, books and assorted thingamabobs. She oftentimes doesn’t know what it is she’s found and takes them to Scuttle (Buddy Hackett), a seagull who is sort of know-it-all-know-nothing. But Ariel’s treasures make her yearn for more and above all to get out of the ocean.

Ariel and Flounder take items they find to Scuttle to explain.

King Triton is not a happy merman. He doesn’t want his daughter to be associating with humans, who are, after all, barbaric. He assigns his advisor, Sebastian (Samuel E. Wright) to keep an eye on Ariel and keep her out of trouble. But Sebastian gets drawn into Ariel’s world and ends up going with her and Flounder on their next trip to the surface. There they see the birthday celebration of Prince Eric (Christopher Daniel Barnes) complete with fireworks. What Eric is prince of is never explained, but he is handsome and Ariel falls in love with him on the spot.

A storm comes, quickly turning the celebration into near tragedy. Eric is thrown overboard and plucky Ariel comes to his rescue, dragging the unconscious prince to safety on shore. Naturally, Ariel sings to him, but must retreat when he comes to as to avoid detection.

Watching all of this is Ursula (Pat Carroll), an octopus/sea witch. She wants to control the undersea kingdom and sees Ariel as her best chance to take power from King Triton. She dispatches two eels, Flotsam and Jetsam (both voiced by Paddi Edwards) to keep tabs on her.

Ursula with her evil eels Flotsam and Jetsam.

Meanwhile, Eric tells his manservant Grimsby (Ben Wright) and his sheepdog Max (Frank Welker) about how fascinated he is by the voice of the woman who saved him and vows to find and marry her.

Prince Eric can't stop thinking about the voice of the woman who saved him.

Triton quizzes Sebastian about Ariel and he tells his king about her love for the human, Eric. Frustrated, Triton does the one thing that will certainly drive his daughter away; he goes to her treasure cave and, using his trident, destroys all the human artifacts she has collected.

Alone and hurt, Ariel is approached by Flotsam and Jetsam, who tell her that Ursula can help her. The deal Ursula proposes is that she’ll give Ariel legs in exchange for Ariel’s lovely voice, which she captures in a nautilus. She gives Ariel three days to get Eric to give her the “kiss of true love”.  If he kisses her before the sunset on the third day, Ariel can remain human. If she fails, Ariel becomes a mermaid again and belongs to Ursula (think prisoner/slave/polyp).

Ariel trades her voice for a pair of human legs.

With human legs, Ariel goes to the surface, accompanied by Flounder and Sebastian. Eric finds Ariel on the beach and takes her back to his castle. Eric is still thinking about the voice and since Ariel can’t talk, she has an uphill fight to win his love. And just when it looks like on day two she’ll succeed, Ursula shape shifts into the beautiful Vanessa (Jodi Benson) and, armed with Ariel’s voice, appears onshore singing. The voice captures Eric and he tells Grimsby that he wants to marry Vanessa the next afternoon.

Ariel goes to the surface, transformed into a human.

Ariel wakes up to the news that Eric is marrying someone else. Scuttle discovers that Vanessa is really Ursula and tells Ariel, who immediately goes to the wedding barge. Sebastian goes to tell Triton, while Scuttle does his best to break up the wedding with the help of other animals. The nautilus shell around Vanessa’s neck gets broken, giving Ariel back her voice and relieving Eric from his enchantment with Vanessa. Eric now realizes it was Ariel who saved him, but before they can kiss the “kiss of true love”, the sun sets.

Vanessa uses Ariel's voice to win Prince Eric's heart.

Ariel transforms back into a mermaid and Ursula reveals her true self and takes Ariel back into the sea as her prisoner. Triton confronts Ursula, but a deal is a deal, that is until Triton offers to take Ariel’s place. Ariel is released as Triton is transformed into a harmless polyp in Ursula’s garden. Ursula declares herself to be ruler over Atlantica. There is a struggle in which Ursula accidentally kills Flotsam and Jetsam.  Enraged, Ursula grows into enormous size.

Triton becomes one of the polyps in Ursula's garden to save Ariel.

 Ursula takes control of the ocean and creates a storm that causes shipwrecks. Just as Ursula tries to kill Ariel, Eric rams her with his ship, driving his bowsprit through her abdomen, killing her. With Ursula dead, her powers are broken. Triton, like all the other polyps, is turned back into their original forms.

Ursula is a formidable foe and takes control of the ocean.

Now seeing how much Ariel loved Eric, Triton turns her back into a human and lets them marry on the ship and they depart.

Ariel leaves everything behind for a happy ending with Eric.

The Little Mermaid was just what the doctor ordered for Disney, becoming the first animated film to earn more than $100 million. The film was Disney’s first animated fairy tale since Sleeping Beauty (1959) and heralded a return to musicals, something that had been de-emphasized during the 1970’s and 80’s. The Little Mermaid ushered in a new golden age of animation for the studio, with subsequent productions being even more successful. The animation division grew from 300 employees in 1988 to 2200 by 1999. The era from The Little Mermaid until Tarzan (1999) is often referred to as the Disney Renaissance, a return for the studio of making successful animated films.

The Little Mermaid has a lot in common with Sleeping Beauty, in that perhaps the most interesting character is the villain. Ursula is in many ways a waterlogged Maleficent. Like her predecessor, Ursula is a shape-shifter (though the expression didn’t exist in 1959) and like Maleficent she can grow into enormous size. And ultimately, she is killed when she is pierced through her torso. Pat Carroll’s portrayal of Ursula is definitely one of the highlights of the movie.

Ursula is reminiscent of an earlier Disney villain, Maleficent (Sleeping Beauty).

Until The Little Mermaid, Carroll was best known for her work on television starting with The Red Buttons Show (1952-1953). She won an Emmy for her work on (Sid) Caesar’s Hour in 1956, was a regular on Danny Thomas’ Make Room For Daddy and appeared as Prunella in the CBS production of Rodger’s and Hammerstein’s Cinderella in 1965. While she played some small bits in a few live action films, most of her recent parts have been working with Disney and mostly doing Ursula’s voice. As such she’s appeared in several Direct to Video features including The Little Mermaid II Return to the Sea (2000), Mickey’s Magical Christmas: Snowed in at the House of Mouse (2001), Mickey’s House of Villains (2002) and in the Kingdom Hearts video game series: Kingdom Hearts (2000), Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories (2004), Kingdom Hearts II (2005) and Kingdom Hearts 3D: Dream Drop Distance (2012).

The other acting is good, but doesn’t rise to the level of Carroll’s performance. Jodi Benson, who voiced Ariel, also has continued to voice the character in many of the same productions as Carroll and has also voiced the Barbie character in Toy Story 2 (1999) and Toy Story 3 (2010). A versatile voice actress, Benson continues to voice Ariel in the Disney TV series Sofia the First, a 3-D animated spin-off of the Disney Princess franchise.

For a musical, the songs are all right, not great. The film did win for Best Score and “Under the Sea” did win the Academy Award for Best Song, beating out “Kiss the Girl”, also from the movie, for that honor. The other competition was “After All” from Chances Are, “I Love to See You Smile” from Parenthood and “The Girl Who Used to Be Me” from Shirley Valentine. (A virtual dollar if you can hum any other of the nominees not from The Little Mermaid.) “Under the Sea,” like “Hakuna Matata” from The Lion King (1994), was unavoidable when the movie was first released as it seemed to play everywhere.

Considering the movie mostly takes place under water, the animation is really very good. With a few physics exceptions aside, like pages of books turning underwater, I kept waiting for a clown fish to swim by asking if anyone had seen his son, Nemo. In order to get that look right, Disney had to use such processes as airbrushing, backlighting, superimposition and some computer animation.

Not all of the work was done at Disney or went according to plan. The drawing of the million or so underwater bubbles was farmed out to a Chinese animation house in Beijing. And an attempt to use the famed Disney multiplane camera for depth of field focus failed because the device had been allowed to fall into disrepair and that work, too, was farmed out to an outside facility.

Overall, The Little Mermaid is a film worth seeing, if for no other reason than to figure out why so many girls were named Ariel. While the film fits under the banner of “family entertainment” this is really more a movie for little girls than for little boys, though enjoyment is not restricted to gender.