By Marc S. Sanders
What I hearken back to most when I watch The Little Mermaid is my junior year of high school in 1989. If you were around at that time, then maybe you realized how much of an impact the characters of Ariel, Sebastian, Flounder, Scuttle and Ursula The Sea Witch had on kids, but teen pop culture as well. Batman was big that year. Disney’s underwater, romantic, musical adventure was at least as large. Driving home from school, everyone I knew were singing along to celebrated numbers like Kiss The Girl, Les Poisson, Under The Sea and Part Of Your World. My drama class couldn’t get enough of Poor Unfortunate Souls. Oh, how overdramatic we would get in Mr. Locklair’s class while emulating Pat Carroll. I still harmonize Ariel surrendering her voice. Yes! I can hold the tune!!!! There is no denying The Little Mermaid cast a spell over the student body at Berkeley Preparatory School in Tampa, Florida.
The Little Mermaid is an important entry in the Disney lexicon. Disney films were considered substandard, tired and stale before this release. However, the adored fable based upon a story from Hans Christian Anderson awakened something that still carries on. The music within the film from beloved writers Alan Menken and Howard Ashman were delivered like Broadway showstoppers. The quality of the songs was elevated with gorgeous calypso and reggae harmonies, and vocal characterizations as colorful as the underwater life depicted on screen.
Ariel (Jodi Benson) is the title character who dreams of what life is like above the surface. Her father, King Triton, strictly forbids her from going above the water. In his eyes, humans are ghastly. That’s a problem because his daughter is enamored with handsome Prince Eric (Christopher Daniel Barnes). Like a sixteen-year-old who sneaks out of the house through a bedroom window, Ariel visits the nefarious and alluring sea witch, Ursula (a rapturous Pat Carroll in one of the best fantasy villain roles to ever appear in the movies). The deal is Ursula will turn Ariel into a human for three days. In exchange the little mermaid must surrender her gorgeous singing voice. If Eric does not give Ariel a kiss of true love by the time the sun sets on the third day, then her soul belongs to Ursula for all eternity. Ariel gets some help from Sebastian the crab (also a sea-life orchestral conductor), innocent Flounder, and a zany seagull named Scuttle (Buddy Hackett).
The animators at Disney use everything at their disposal to burst wondrous color within the film. There’s life brought to the sea life within the backgrounds from a blowfish who BLOWS, to the Octopus and the shrimp and swordfish. Even the random bubbles that float around are marvelous to look at. Nothing is off limits and life under the sea seems so much more enticing compared to the ho hum activities that we humans endure each day with traffic jams and junk mail.
Other Disney productions like Alaadin and Beauty And The Beast that followed, offer some life lessons for the protagonists to consider. The Little Mermaid doesn’t actually. It rests upon wishes and dreams for Ariel. I’m thankful for that. It’s such a glorious picture that I coast through on the fantasy of it all. Ariel takes me on adventures to explore shipwrecks and her grotto where her human collectibles are stashed. I get to carefully approach the dark imagery of Ursula’s caverns where countless, slimy, pitiful souls suffer, while the tentacled monster delights in her vanity with Pat Carroll’s gleeful voiceover. It’s just enough for me. Disney doesn’t always have to preach, and I think it’s why The Little Mermaid is my favorite of all of their films.
Every moment is beautifully drawn in shape and color. Still for a film that came six years before the Pixar evolution, the expressions of the characters come off so naturally. Look at Sebastian’s fear and frustration as he tries to keep up with an independent Ariel. Pay attention to Ariel’s nervous reaction when she encounters Eric on the beach after she’s become human. She’s animated to try and straighten her hair and grin her teeth because its as if the popular kid in school is walking across a disco lit gymnasium to ask her for a dance. The animation is purely inspired by natural, human behavior that we are all too familiar with. When drawn like this, we can’t help but be impressed.
The songs are the highlights though. The compositions are so lively and easy to pick up and sing along to, like we all did in high school. The lyrics are equally impressive like the most brilliant of dialogue. When Ursula makes her campaign for why this trade would be advantageous for Ariel (Poor Unfortunate Souls), I can’t help but believe her. She’ll have her looks and pretty face. It’s only her voice! You got a point there Ursula. The best villains always have the most sound reasonings behind their motivations.
Sebastian (Samuel E Wright) makes a strong argument for why life Under The Sea is so much better than living on land. His enthusiasm in song is completely convincing. Life under the sea is nothing but a party. Let’s go.
Jodi Benson gives a strong voiceover performance as Ariel. I’m hearing a firm and independent young woman who stands her ground and will defy any orders to go after what she desires. Her rendition of Part Of Your World is one of Disney’s most treasured and celebrated moments in film history when accompanied with the setting of Ariel’s towering grotto of props that we humans take for granted like fish hooks and dining utensils, especially a dinglehopper…you know…a fork! This is what a kid dreams of becoming when alone in her room with no one there to judge her true feelings and desires. It’s truly glorious.
The one scene that does give me pause is the dramatic discovery King Triton has of Ariel’s secret vault of collectibles. By the end of the moment, his temper has grown so big, that he unleashes the power of his trident to destroy everything she’s treasured. I’ve always said this looks brutally familiar to how a father might take a baseball bat to a kid and her room, teetering on domestic violence. The scene is memorable but unnerving all the same. Still, I have to remind myself that this is a fantasy, and this is only a movie.
Nonetheless, The Little Mermaid is a timeless film filled with magic and whimsy and daring escapes and big laughs that are not just relegated for eight-year-olds. As adults, we remember those butterfly feelings of our first crush and what held us back from pursuing it further. We can relate to what the characters do for, and towards each other. Again, everyone from the deliciously wicked villain down to the defiantly brave protagonist and her sidekicks have a point and very human understandings for why they exist and what they want out of life. Being a mermaid or a crab or a sea monster doesn’t make any of these people any less human.
2 UNPAID MOVIE CRITICS!!!! 