This week’s guest review is from crackcinema_.
We can sit here and compare this to the far superior original all day, it’s obviously not even in the same category. However, trying to separate them from each other completely would be nearly impossible and makes no sense for many reasons. So we’ve got to find a nice middle ground between the two, and that’s what I want to try to do here.
On that note, Aladdin is one of my favorite Disney movies— second only to Lilo & Stitch, so obviously I went in with my fears. Major fears in fact, from the— in my opinion— terrible marketing that this movie had. I’ve got a theory though, a conspiracy theory that they knew it was bad marketing. Why? So they could make us think they made a better movie than they actually did. Which worked, I think, considering my immediate reaction was, “Hm, this isn’t as bad as I thought it would be.”
Before this I hadn’t seen Naomi Scott in anything since Lemonade Mouth when it played on Disney Channel. So it’s safe to say it’s been a while. But I found her super enjoyable to watch here, and I don’t just mean how she looked.
Touching on that really quickly, the clothes, especially hers, were just absolutely gorgeous. Vibrant colors and beautiful folds; it was all just stunning.
Back to her performance though, she gave Jasmine the strength she’s always had and the voice to fit. Surprisingly, Aladdin here is much more cartoonized than the actual cartoon version of himself. What I mean is, he seems to be a lot more clumsy and genuinely dorkier than I remember. Now that could just be my memory failing me (I was going to rewatch the animated one, but I’ve been very short on time) but his personality seemed so heightened, and that’s not a negative.
His nervousness around Jasmine and his uncertainly was really charming, despite my initial apprehension with his casting. Though, I was apprehensive on the whole thing so that’s not saying much.
I don’t want to spend too much time on this, but— Will Smith. No he’s obviously not Robin Williams. He had some big shoes to fill, and I think he does a genuinely respectful and charming job at doing so. Adding his own hip hop flair to the character and keeping the strong attitude he’s always had, I actually laughed and found him to be quite fun to watch.
I could be alone on this one but the jam scene was super funny to me, especially since we get to see Aladdin be a completely hot mess and Genie be the sassy, second-hand embarrassed onlooker. I will say though, I felt the same way about the “Friend Like Me” scene as I did about the “Be Our Guest” scene in the Beauty and the Beast remake— excruciatingly overdone.
I didn’t completely despise any of the songs here. Did I particularly like any of them? Not really, but I won’t go on a song comparison deep dive because 1) the overall consensus is the animated versions are impeccably better, and 2) that’s an entire conversation in itself. To sum it up, Will Smith’s “Arabian Nights” was actually good in his voice, his voice was just god awful in in “Prince Ali,” and “A Whole New World” should have been shot in way where I didn’t have to struggle to see where they were. I also thought it was a pretty odd choice to have everyone just *poof* away during Jasmine’s empowerment song, I clearly understand the meaning— it just seemed so blunt and out of place.
Guy Ritchie’s Aladdin did a splendid job at making me believe it would be a lot worse than it was. It’s not quite peak cinema of course, but it’s a serviceable adaptation that does an adept job at staying true to its source material while still having its own sense of self. None of the changes made felt unnecessary or ridiculous, and I didn’t walk out of the theater fuming. It’s possible that my love for the original fogs my brain up and makes me cut this more slack than I should, so I wouldn’t be surprised if these opinions change after some time.
Have you seen Aladdin? Thoughts?
Crackcinema_ is a self-proclaimed opinionated teenager and movie buff in training. Find more of their reviews here.