Movie review: 'The Little Mermaid' – Something to "sea?"

“The Little Mermaid” is showing in theaters across the country. (photo by Rakiyah Lenon)

By Clara Sorrow | Staff writer

“The Little Mermaid,” with an official release date of May 26, 2023, has made big splashes in the cinema box office, bringing in $117 million in its first weekend alone.

This success was not uncalled for. With a brilliant cast including Melisa McCartney, Halle Bailey and Daveed Diggs among them, amazing CGI and a twist on the original story that leaves the audience satisfied, it is very difficult to find a reason to dislike the production.

I saw this movie at the Conyers AMC theatre, a small building in need of renovation, in early June. I had already understood the excitement that was shrouded around it. As someone who was obsessed with the Little Mermaid franchise from a young age, I was ecstatic to see what it had to offer.

The first part of the movie that was blatant to notice was the CGI effects. The realism was uncanny in the movie.. While some disliked how Flounder and Sebastian had been turned hyper realistic, bordering creepy, it is clear to see how disjointed their presence would have been were it any other way.

Behind-the-scenes footage shows Bailey, who plays Ariel, carrying Jonah Huaer-King playing as Prince Eri) through a chaotic whirlpool. In another shot, she is pretending to be swimming effortlessly while hooked to a machine that will substitute in her tail after the fact. She, along with her mermaid sisters and other actors, is able to do these artificial performances but make them feel real and tangible for the audience.

There was not a second that I doubted the emotion in the performances. Huaer-King’s “Wild Uncharted Waters” blew away me and the crowd alike with its tangible longing.

The song, along with many others, is lacking in the animated version. These songs that are added in create so much clear depth for the characters that is otherwise unexplored. The audience can now feel Prince Eric’s desperation and search for Ariel and her voice. We get to experience Ariel’s excitement about potentially marrying Prince Eric. We get to see her friendship with her underwater confidants in “The Scuttlebutt,” a song in which the pelican Scuttle, voiced by the comedian Awkwafina, breaks the engagement news to Ariel.

These elements, while straying further and further away from Hans Christian Andersen’s original, darker story, help the story to dive ten times deeper into the world of Ariel.

It is no coincidence, though, that they included a quote from the man himself: “But a mermaid has no tears, and therefore she suffers so much more.”

The quote is demonstrated in a twisted, yet beautiful new way in the movie. The only tear Ariel cries is at the very end, when she realizes her family accepts her and her decisions moving forward. This happy spin on an otherwise sad story, while still adding darkness an complexity, is what the new Ariel is all about.

Contact Clara Sorrow at csorrow@augusta.edu.