Finally, FINALLY saw the movie. Finally. It wasn't bad, but I… wasn't floored either. I backtracked and looked at what others had to say, and my opinion is basically the same as others have already said, but I know at least one person wanted to see my take on the movie.
! Its… impossible to review this without comparing it to the big three from the same team 20 years ago, Mermaid, Beast and Aladdin, since it tries to conjure that same feeling of energy and fairy tale and momentum and uses a lot of the same story hooks and bits and pieces. Which is unfortunate and completely unfair to this movie, because I think if I hadn't seen the other three, I would have liked it a lot more.
! The visuals were great, especially the colors. No complaints there. I especially liked all the stuff with the lights and fireflies and magical stuffs. Its very Hercules. Loved the villain, was indefeerent to a lot of the rest, but came to like it more later.
! The music was allright... but forgettable. I won't compare the music to older films, because thats unfair, those have had 10 or 20 years to sit on my brain and get engrained. (And in the comentary for... Aladdin I think, they directors said early reviews had the problem that "the music isn't as memorable as that in Mermaid or Beast" excep... those were ingrained and this was new, so thats only natural.) But then I remember leaving Cats Don't Dance and needing to get the soundtrack right after... Friends on the Other Side was of course the show stealer and the legitimate catchy one, right down to its reprise at the end. (Oh villain songs....)
! The movie's pacing seemed a little odd. From the very start, I felt they could have cut the opening childhood scene, since all that information comes in exposition later anyway, and you just can't get attached to Tiana's expositioning Dad in 3 minutes. (Well, maybe if it had been the people behind the opening sequence in UP...) Starting the movie with him dead and just saying "he always told me this" would have worked extra well, and then been even more touching when we start to randomly see him in flashback montages at the end.
! They whipped from scene to scene, quick cut, without ever taking the time to slow down and really appreciate a moment or scene for a few more seconds, or develop a secondary character beyond their one main quirk. The instant a thing was done, they were onto the next thing. (It was kind of like they had 50 ideas, but only had time to show and develop 30. But they did 50 ideas anyway) From the akward tounge kiss tangled up thing, to right into a short song number to being chased by frog eaters to the alligator being scared of brambles... Characters jumped into things, without really setting up WHY they would do things and you never quite had time to breathe from one situation before immediatley being in the next. This is something Emporer's New Groove did extremely well, where it had a lot of random goofy events on the road that kept escalating, but after a couple minutes of solid wacky, you got a break after each of them for some slow down and real characterization.
! A major example of going too fast was the prince and his sidekick being INTRODUCED and then accepting their transformation deals pretty much all within the course of the Friends song... Whereas with say, Ariel, you saw her desperate longing for half an hour and what she was going through with her longing, and her father, and what her normal life was like, and several songs, before she sought out Ursula and made the deal.)
! Or when Naveen decides to propose after knowing Tiana for like, 3 hours. And she's been trapped as a frog much of the time. (So when he gets that DAAAW moment and the expression of looking at her and falling in love, and you KNOW that expression, its a little wierd because she's obviously... being sexy as a frog.)
! I know Disney romances move fast, usually being in love after a single dance or getting married within three days, and there's usually a lot of love at first sight or a fall in love song number, (The instant Aladdin saw Jasmine he went "wow", and then she showed she was capable of handling herself as well), but here it felt... fast. Because they DIDN'T have that love at first sight thing, and were antagonistic at first. They didn't even meet until what? 25- 30 minutes into the movie? And their first 5 minutes of interaction are "eww, I won't kiss a frog, well, okay maybe" and they didn't really spend time living in each other's world. (Again, going to Aladdin, Jasmine spent a few hours as a street rat and Aladdin spent a few hours as a prince before they realized both worlds ha their freedoms and problems.)
! On the other hand, Tarzan and Jane don't meet for like 30 minutes into their movie either, but its absolutely besmitten love right off the bat with them, and with Jane constantly blushing and such.
! By the end of the movie I was feeling for them so I guess somewhere along the way the interactions clicked for me and I bought them as a couple, but it seemed fast. (though the fake out "oh no he's marrying Charlotte and now my heart is broken" moment felt really heavy handed, and straight out of Little Mermaid's sequence. But there Eric had been activley looking for "that girl with the amazing voice that saved my life", here... not so much. And since WE knew it was the transformed sidekick... that scene lacked some oomph. Maybe if it had been Facilier more activley trying to muck things up for his... whatever reason. If it had been JUST Facilier, and not Facilier and Naveen's sidekick, maybe it would have come together more strongly?
! I understand why things were paced as quickly as they were, keep the energy and momentum going, but it also felt a little rushed as a result. Maybe more viewings will settle it down some or add more appreciation, or maybe I've gotten used to anime which will stop and actually take in the beauty of scenery for a couple moments before moving on (which Lion King especially did). I mean, you didn't know what Naveen or his sidekick's situations were until Facilier's song number, which was actually... when all three characters first showed up really. There wasn't enough time with either of them as they WERE to appreciate them as what they became. (The sidekick becoming an imposter prince was fun though, didn't see that coming.) And near the end, when Facilier showed Tiana her fantasy come true, including her father again for what must have been the first time in years, I expected a little more reaction to that.
! Also, we never got a motivation for Faciler really. He was a great villain, great facial expressions, voice, musical numbers, and showmanship, and his interplay with his shadow was fun, but his screentime was short. He kept starting to say "Well, I'm making this deal because... no, can't mention that." so I kept expecting a payoff later. And every time he was in a scene, just when it was getting good and building up to him doing SOMETHING... it cut away. With say, Ursula, we got the throwaway line of "Well, the king banished me and I've hated him ever since." With Gaston, we get to see him being to toast of the town who actually IS the best at everything and thinks he's entiled to everything. With Jafar, the movie OPENS with him trying to get into the cave of wonders and the magic wishes. Here, Faciler just.. has friends on the other side and is doing this... because! So its a little wierd when as the movie becomes progressive, he then becomes hesitant, and then scared of dealing with them. I guess he made some sort of deal with them forever ago and needs to pay up every now and again. Or something. (His reveal of getting all the souls in the area seemed more for appeasing the spirits than for himself) Shun Yu in Mulan was scary and menacing and was only onscreen for like 3 minutes before the end of the movie, and he pulled that off well, but this guy was demanding to be a scene stealer that filled the movie, like Jafar.
! The girl in pink... Charlotte? She was a lot of fun. As was her father, John Goodman, for all 3 seconds he was on screen.
! Tiana was well done and she had the screentime she needed to develop properly, though I don't really know that we needed the 5 minute starter of her childhood. We get the same motivations and expositions just starting from her working and the random flashbacks nears the end that show glimpses of her father... but again, wierd pacing. Her interactions with Naveen were great, and they had good chemistry together once they started properly interacting, and the payoff on all of that was good.
! I... did not like the firefly. His design was just incredibly offputting to me, the same way Nater in Cars is offputtng to me. With the nasty teeth, heavy eyes, and at least 4 or 5 fart/butt jokes, combined with the heavy gumbo accent, just... bleh. And because said design was offputting to me, I just could not get behind him as a character, regardless of him being in love with a star, which was kind of interesting. If a less blah character had said the exact same things, I think I would have found that incredibly romantic and sweet and poetic. And I wasn't at all moved when he died, since it was a fart joke death "I'm gonna get you with my butt!" and it was quick.
ALSO, being a Disney film, I didn't expect him to actually... die. I was assuming he'd get back up once the danger was over and make another butt joke. (similar the the conceit one gives to death in OP at this point.) So, it didn't hold any weight for quite a few minutes. Was sweet that he got to be with his love interest though.
! (Similarly, the three rednecks that wanted to eat the frogs.. did nothing for me. I just kept thinking of Lester's Posum Park, and how intentioanlly awful that sequence was. I also had flashbacks to the Tiny Tunes Summer Vacation movie.)
! Alligator was kind of, just there. Fun enough, I liked his voice, but he showed up, said "I want to be in a band" walked them a ways, and then went "hey, I'm in a band!" and left. Maybe if he and Ray had been a comedy duo and introduced at the same time it would have worked better for both of them, instead of introducing one, and then introducing the other five minutes later.
! I realize this review is pretty negative, and I'm not trying to make it so. I didn't dislike the movie, I loved the visuals and the nods to the old Disney stuff and the music, while not terribly memorable and quick, did fit the mood and atmosphere they were trying to create, and I loved the interactions between the two leads once they started properly interacting, and Facilier for all his unexplained-ness, was awesome.
! I guess really, I felt the movie needed to be frontloaded a little better. Another say… 5 or 10 minutes at the start getting to know Naveen, his sidekick and Facilier before their deal was made. Have Tiana meet Naveen in human mode and interact a little more there while he's still a complete jerk. (I know, they met for like 5 seconds and she paid him no heed.) Or maybe just another couple minutes DURING the movie where it slowed down and breathed for a moment.
! Also, wacky transformed buddy comedy was done to perfection in Emperor's New Groove... and then played to death in its tv series. So the entire... main plight... of the movie did little for me.
I dunno. I guess the movie's biggest problem isn't its own fault, but the fact it DOES have the weight and expectations of other Disney movies (and Pixar at this point!) behind it and its only natural to compare it and think of scenes from other movies, especially when some of the scenes and motifs are SO similar, and the other movies have done some of these things a lot better. (And it really needed Alan Menkin instead of Randy Newman.) If this had come out from say, Dreamworks, I think I would have loved it as a surprise. My first viewing it had that exta weight behind it, and that's not the movie's problm, but mine.
Maybe once it comes to DVD and has had some time to settle, and I've heard the songs a few more times and learned the lyrics, and I've seen it some more I can process it better.
But I wouldn't be surprised to find there are a LOT of deleted scenes when the dvd comes. Little moments or things that were cut just to make it move faster.
 
