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MAMMA MIA! HERE WE GO AGAIN
Director: Ol Parker Cast: Amanda Seyfried, Lily James, Pierce Brosnan, Julie Walters, Christine Baranski, Stellan Skarsgård, Colin Firth, Jeremy Irvine, Jessica Keenan Wynn, Alexa Davies, Josh Dylan, Hugh Skinner, Dominic Cooper, Andy Garcia, Cher, Meryl Streep MPAA
Rating: Running Time: 1:54 Release Date: 7/20/18 |
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Review by Mark Dujsik | July 19, 2018 To say that Mamma Mia! Here We Go Again is both a sequel and a prequel is to be quite generous toward its story. It's better to call the movie both a reunion concert and an encore. The movie brings back all of its original cast (eventually but inevitably, in one significant case) for reasons that have little to do with continuing the plot or even the interpersonal relationships established in the original. They're here to sing and occasionally dance to some ABBA songs yet again. As for the encore part of the story, the screenplay by director Ol Parker replays everything we learned about the love quadrangle between Donna (Meryl Streep) and a trio of guys while she was making her way toward her destiny on an island of Greece. All of that story already has been told through dialogue and song in the first movie, but this time, we get to see it play out with a younger Donna (Lily James, capturing the energy of Streep's performance in the first movie) and younger actors (Jeremy Irvine, Josh Dylan, and Hugh Skinner) playing her love interests. If one were being generous, one could say that the dual nature of the narrative, in which a daughter's struggle to be successful in love and business plays alongside a similar story involving her mother, is a way to have the two stories complement each other. In reality, it's mostly an excuse for more and new actors to get in the game of singing and dancing to some ABBA songs. On an objective level, the movie is pointless. We don't get anything remotely interesting in the present-day story, as Sophie (Amanda Seyfried), the daughter of the now-deceased Donna, is re-opening her mother's hotel on the island of Kalokairi a year after Donna's death. Parker tries to add some drama to this section of the story, as Sophie and her husband Sky (Dominic Cooper) have hit a rough patch. He's in New York, learning the trade of a hotel manager, and has been offered a job there. He's seriously considering it. There's also the drama between Rosie (Julie Walters), one of Donna's best friends, and Bill (Stellan Skarsgård), one of Sophie's three potential fathers (The others, as one might recall, were and are played by Pierce Brosnan, whose character is now Sophie's stepfather, and Colin Firth). The two had gotten together at the end of the first movie, but now, they're separated. This is about the extent of the conflict of the present-day story, but is it really conflict if every issue is resolved with a reunion and a song? There's a simplicity to this movie that's almost admirable. The present-day scenes don't give the characters anything to do. The conflicts don't matter. The flashbacks to a younger Donna in 1979 are retelling a tale of love and heartbreak that we already know. Even so, the movie exists, because it's not about continuing the story or adding anything of value to thoughts on the past. It's solely about getting these actors together again to attempt to reclaim whatever made the first movie and, before it, the original stage musical a minor cultural phenomenon. Yes, an audience who enjoyed either or both the movie or the stage show might want to know what happened after and before that story. Mostly, though, they want more of those songs, as well as reprises of the most notable ones, and a game cast to perform them. That's what the sequel provides, and for those who aren't quite as enamored with the story and the characters of the original, the good news is that Parker brings a marked improvement to the movie's musical ambitions. There's some actual choreography here, as the occupants of a French restaurant accompany a rendition of "Waterloo" and a whole lot of people groove to "Dancing Queen" while on and running toward some boats heading into port. More importantly, Parker actually seems interested in letting us see the cast and background performers do their thing. You have to grant the cast some praise for not letting such a thing as pointlessness or redundancy get in the way of having a good time. They're clearly having a ball, especially as the slight trappings of a plot fade away into nothingness because it's time for another song. Once Sophie's hotel re-opening party is on, the movie basically gives us about five one-last-songs that could reasonably end the story. Nobody seems to want to let go, so the movie introduces Cher as Sophie's grandmother (giving her a chance to sing with Andy Garcia, whose character's true name is kept a secret until the moment before Cher breaks into song) and eventually has Streep's Donna return as a singing ghost. Parker and his cast just want to put on a show, and for better and for worse, they do. The "better" part of it is that no one in Mamma Mia! Here We Go Again seems to realize or gives away that the movie has no discernible reason to exist. The "worse" part of it is that the movie has no discernible reason to exist. Copyright © 2018 by Mark Dujsik. All rights reserved. |
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(for some suggestive material)
