Mamma Mia: The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly

The Good

• Beautiful scenery.
• Some nicely shot scenes (e.g., “The Winner Takes It All”).
• A wet, bare-chested Colin Firth (OMG!).
• And at least two numbers that did precisely what they were supposed to–inspire in the spectator a feeling of utopia (“Dancing Queen, “The Winner Takes It All”). NOTE: I claim this not only because I felt it, but also because the audience with whom I watched the movie actually clapped after one of these numbers.

The bad

• Way too much scenery-chewing (such exaggerated facial expressions are for the stage, and of all people Meryl Streep should know this).
• The simplistic and, thus, mostly ineffective choreography.
• The couple of actors who shouldn’t have sung (nope, I won’t name names).
• Several numbers that fell flat (e.g,. “Super Trooper” and “Take a Chance on Me”). Hollywood has conditioned its audiences to think of 50ish-year-old women as “old” and non-sexual, so when women of that age are attempting to be sexy–as are Streep, Julie Christie, and Christine Barinski in the two numbers mentioned above–they don’t come off quite like they’re probably supposed to. (This all works fine in the stage production since it is, of course, an entirely different animal.)

The Ugly

Considering the scenery and the shiny and mostly good-looking cast, there wasn’t much ugly in the movie–except for the women’s costumes, Julie Walters’s in particular. I’m still not sure why she was dressed in that Bangles shirt or those camouflage pants. As one critic asked, “Is Christie supposed to be a lesbian?” If so, that doesn’t make much sense during her number “Take a Chance on Me,” does it?

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