Radio Lady Reviews: “Mamma Mia!” The Movie (Opens 7/18/08)

[Radio_Lady]

A spoken duet review from the two of us… DUers Radio_Lady and husband Audio_Al and the music of ABBA (READ ON)

(Prior to the preview)

Ellen: Al, guess what? They’ve made a movie out of “Mamma Mia!” the Broadway musical that’s been on stage in New York since October 2001. Actually, it was first produced in London in 1999. The stage version has played all over the world in multiple languages. Can you believe it? I know I saw it here in Portland at the Keller Auditorium. I don’t think you saw it on stage…

Al: I can’t remember exactly where or when, but I have seen “Mamma Mia!” – maybe in New York or Las Vegas…or here in Portland?

Ellen: No, I don’t think so. I took Natalie to see it when the touring company Broadway Across America brought it to Portland.

Al: Is it set in Greece on one of the islands? Is it about a single mother and her daughter who is about to get married and has never met her father? And she invites the three men -- who were in her mother’s life around the time she was conceived -- to her wedding?

Ellen: (Laughs) Well, I guess you did see it. So, we’re invited to the live action movie, set in Greece, with Meryl Streep as the mother (Donna) and Pierce Brosnan as Sam, one of the possible fathers… Colin Firth is the second probable Dad. Christine Baranski is in it. Remember her from the TV show “Cybill” – in the mid nineties? All the actors are doing their own singing!

Al: Really! I’m glad! If they’re halfway decent, it will make it more real.

Ellen: This is the music from ABBA, a Swedish singing group from the 1970s and 1980s. Two women and two men. The music doesn’t drive the story along – it’s supposed to be the other way around. The music was popular during the time we were raising kids. You probably don’t know it that well…

Al: I remember on stage there is a big dress-up scene at the end and the audience sings and dances around as well. You and I were positively dancing in the aisles!

Ellen: OK. You convinced me you’ve seen it. I’ve called all my women friends and nobody’s available. So, you want to come with me and give me the male take on the movie? Yes? Let’s go!



(After the preview)

Ellen: It was definitely Greece. Just like we left it -- after our trip to Athens on the M.S. Triton years ago! Beautiful! Remember Athens? We stayed in that grungy hotel across the street from the Temple of Zeus, near the Plaka marketplace. We had to complain because the room had terrible air conditioning and the tour leader authorized a change of room. Al, do you remember how you got scammed that first day in Athens? A guy who said he had been to Houston as a petroleum engineer enticed you to have a beer with him and some young female bartender! You paid $30 for that beer!

Al: That was the most expensive beer I’ve ever had. It was dumb, too. I know Houston well. If I had questioned him more thoroughly, I would have known if he had really been to Houston.

Ellen: I remember the islands of Santorini… and Mykonos. So beautiful but so touristy. I wonder where they shot this movie? We’ll have to look it up, because I think they made up the island name they’re using… It started with a “K” and sounds Greek. Remember Bali Hai in “South Pacific”? Hawaii substituted for that mysterious and fictional South Sea island.

Al: I remember Crete. I left my camera in a store and didn’t discover it was gone until we got back to our ship’s cabin. But insurance covered the loss and I got all my money back.

Ellen: Amanda Seyfried plays the daughter, Sophie. She’s radiant, beautiful and she has a wonderful voice! I love her singing. The male lead, Sky, played by Dominic Cooper, has a smaller role, but he carries it along very well. This is like the story of my life in a way. A child with three fathers… my daughter has three fathers. The biological father was known, but left us to marry another woman and take care of her two kids. Now he is gone forever. You’re Linda’s stepfather since she was tiny. You and her father-in-law Bob end up having more to do with her today! Remember all the feverish discussions about who would walk Linda down the aisle? This movie touches my soul. “It takes a village to raise a child.” It’s not a political statement here.

Al: I wish Melina Mercouri, the Greek actress who starred in “Never on Sunday” -- and Anthony Quinn who played in “Zorba the Greek” -- were here to see this! Actually Anthony Quinn was born in Mexico! I’m not totally sure but I think he did his own singing in “Zorba”.

Ellen: I’ll bet they would both enjoy “Mamma Mia!” today. I certainly did. Besides, it’s the perfect antidote to that dark Batman movie.

Al: Yeah, that was one long movie and you got motion sick. Just like you did on that Greek ship years ago.

Ellen: What about the singing and dancing? We knew Meryl Streep could sing from her performance in “A Prairie Home Companion” in 2006 with Lily Thomlin…but she also dances well. I identify so much with her. A 59-year-old actress with a husband who is a sculptor and a clutch of four grown children in real life. She's fabulously wealthy, but still working past mid-life. I’ve loved her since “Kramer vs. Kramer.” Maybe even before that! She takes chances all along the way – it’s an amazing performance – energetic and enthralling.

Al: Her voice is fine. All of the actors and actresses singing their own songs are great. You don’t always need trained singers. Remember Rex Harrison in “My Fair Lady”? He played Professor Higgins for years on-stage, and then in the film. They got around his average voice nicely by having him more or less talk the lyrics. I think that “Mamma Mia!” is bigger than its singers – and credit the movie with spreading Greek island scenery out before us in a way that will make everyone want to book their next vacation in Greece.

Ellen: Richard Gere sang and danced in “Chicago” – and so did Renee Zellweger. Catherine Zeta-Jones just picked up on her singing and dancing career which started when she was a child. I can completely accept all of the performances in “Mamma Mia!”.

Al: Pierce Brosnan is fine as Sam Carmichael… a hoot! He fits the part physically and helped play the story for laughs. We saw Brosnan scruffy in “The Matador” and absolutely brilliant in the movie “Evelyn”. Colin Firth plays Harry Bright, a second possible Dad, and the third, Bill, is Swedish actor Stellan Skarsgård. He was in “Pirates of the Caribbean” and “The Hunt for Red October” – that’s why I remember his face! The three older men might have used a little more musical support, but they come across as real people.

Ellen: This is so hard to do in opera, but no one minds it. The traditions are totally different. Remember when we saw a 50-year-old woman play Cho-Cho-San, the fifteen-year-old ingénue in “Madama Butterfly”? It was a regional production somewhere in Massachusetts. That old woman could sing but she didn’t fit the part to be sure.

Al: Right, she was miscast. But “Mamma Mia!” is about middle-aged women remembering their lives and a young girl just beginning hers. Three middle-aged men play it for laughs. It’s campy and there are some references to the Boomer generation trying to keep itself alive. I liked it.

Ellen: One reviewer suggested they might have done this in a concert format! No way…that would have never worked!

Al: Here’s how I see this movie. “Mamma Mia!” can be a huge success with the movie audience for the same reasons that the play was a success. It comes down to the fact that they don’t destroy the play in the movie – they enhance it. The movie is as good as the production on stage – or maybe better. You go to the theater and then vicariously let yourself go – are you enjoying it enough? From the Adriatic around to the Aegean, it’s the sun-drenched Greek islands that help bring this beautiful movie to life.

Ellen: It made me remember my first love and those who followed, my three husbands and the five children who have shared our lives, now grown up and some grown away. There are echoes from when I was a child in Florida – the sparkling blue sea, the sun, the romance of my young life down by the ocean. I’ve seen it twice on stage, and this screen version moved me from laughter to tears to laughter again. I sniffled and blubbered my way through “Slipping Through My Fingers.” Thanks for letting me use your handkerchief. By the way, the woman reviewer next to me… didn’t like it at all!

Al: You can’t please everyone. Except for Heath Ledger’s performance in “The Dark Knight”, I hated it. So I’m checking in with a thumbs-down on the guy flick and a thumbs-up on the chick flick.

Ellen: Who would have guessed? I’m rating “Mamma Mia!” a solid B+ on Ellen’s Entertainment Report Card. Thanks, my dear. (Ellen and Al hug.)

Overview:
Director – Phyllida Lloyd
Writer: Catherine Johnson
Release date: July 18, 2008
Genre: Comedy/Musical/Romance
Trailer: http://www.mammamiamovie.com /
MPAA rating: PG-13
Runtime: 1 hr. 48 mins.
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Radio Lady Ellen Kimball is a TV and radio pioneer. She was first selected as a co-host of a local, live television show at WTVJ, Ch. 4 in Miami, Florida, during her freshman year in college. She has been in broadcasting for more than three decades. Ellen is also one of the first women in the U.S. to host her own daily radio call-in talk shows at AM stations in both Miami and Boston. She and her husband, Al, now a retired software analyst, married in 1973 and raised five children in a “blended” family. The couple moved to Beaverton, Oregon in 1998. Ellen contributes her reviews on films, books, and theater to KGW.com and also on the Democratic Underground website. Read her complete web journal here: http://journals.democraticunderground.com/Radio_Lady

In London, in love - West End 2006

[stevedeshazer]

1. Great picture of you guys

:thumbsup:

[Radio_Lady]

3. Thanks for noticing it. My birthday in England. May 31, 2006.

:toast:

[Trajan]

2. Hey .. There you are ... BOTH of you ...

We miss you both .... GREAT pick ...

And a GREAT review as well .....

Now I wanna see it ....

[Radio_Lady]

4. Many thanks.