It is disappointing to learn that, after critics and cynical audiences everywhere had sharpened their fish knives in the expectation of the new live-action Little Mermaid film being a catastrophic disaster, early reviews have suggested that it is… fine. It attracted a great deal of attention, and some criticism, for the casting of the black singer-actress Halle Bailey in the lead role of Ariel, on the grounds that sea-dwelling mermaids must, after all, be white-skinned redheads, as she was in the seminal 1989 animated film. Yet Bailey’s performance has been universally acclaimed, with her delivery of ‘Part of Your World’ being singled out for particular praise.
The reason why so many are disappointed that we do not have a Cats-level disaster on our hands is twofold. Firstly, the trailers promised a truly terrible film, complete with frightening, oddly andromorphic crabs. That the results are merely acceptable has produced a reaction in connoisseurs of bad movies a little like sitting down for a five-course feast of lobster and being served pickled herring in its stead.
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