Into the Woods

I saw a stage version of Into the Woods a long while back. As I happen to have a minor knowledge of musicals, and a little bit of a knowledge of Stephen Sondheim, I thought Into the Woods the movie, was definitely a film worth seeing, especially done by Disney. Into the Woods has a reputation of taking childhood fairy tales and putting a weird Sondheim theme to them. Think Sweeney Todd + Fairy Tales, then you get Into the Woods.

Since I had not seen the show for many years, I knew the general plot and sort of an outline for what happens, but I figured there would be some scenes and songs cut so I went in with an open mind. I had a couple of songs that I really wanted to see in the show, but for the most part I was just there to see a movie musical.

The result... not bad. Not bad at all.

The movie begins by following the stories of five individuals. A Baker (played by James Corden), his wife (played by Emily Blunt), Cinderella (played by Anna Kendrick), Jack from Jack and the Bean Stock (played by Daniel Huttlestone), and Little Red Riding Hood (played by Lilla Crawford).

In the first ten minutes of the show, namely the prologue, all of the characters are sent into the woods for certain goals. Jack is sent into the woods to go to the next town over in order to sell his cow because it hasn't been producing milk. Little Red Riding Hood is going into the woods to go to her grandmother's house. Cinderella is going into the woods to visit the grave of her mother so that she can get a dress to go to the festival/ball from the traditional story.

Where things differ, is the story of the Baker and his wife. They are visited by the witch that lives next door (played by Meryl Streep). The Baker and his Wife have not been able to have children and the witch reveals its because she put a curse on the Baker's family when his father stole her magic beans. But if the Baker and his wife can gather four items, the cow as white as milk, the hair as yellow as corn, the cape as red as blood, and the slipper that is gold (I forgot the mysterious title) then the witch will be able to reverse the curse and the Baker and his Wife should be able to have a child.

So the Baker and his wife go into the woods to find those items and there you have the set up.

So you've got all these fairy tales colliding. The problem with this is that this is not the first time we've seen this happen. Sure Into the Woods was a novel idea when Sondheim first produced it in 86 but since we've seen the Fairy Tales colliding story line, that's not a novel thing.

With shows like Once Upon A Time (obligatory link to review of Season 1) and a lot of other mediusm telling the story of fairy tales and how many times its very possible for Rapunzel and Cinderella to be in the same world, this is not anything new.

I don't think Disney, of all people (people?), was trying to make it new though, which was a good thing.

Instead I think Disney focused on the music of Sondheim, the brilliant casting, and the visual effects that the show lends itself to, to create something that I could argue is one of the best movie musicals ever done.

Honestly, after watching Les Miserables last years, which don't get me wrong, wasn't bad but it had its problems, I don't think there was a weak link with this film. I think the casting was done really well and the singing was great. I'm not one to jump on the bandwagon of saying that Russell Crowe was the worst thing about the Les Miserables movie. I actually don't think his singing is... well that bad. But there's really nobody in this film that I wanted to stop singing. I think the only case of that was maybe Johnny Depp or Chris Pine. Both of which had one song. Again, I don't think these two were bad, quite the contrary, especially in Pine's case which was a fun surprise. But I think if there was a weak link, it would be one of those two. And again, they only have one song and these songs are pulled off really well by them that even if the singing isn't that great, they're still entertaining.

By the way, let's talk about Johnny Depp for a second.

I truly forgot how small of a part the Wolf is in this story. Which wouldn't be strange, if it wasn't Johnny Depp playing the wolf. I kept on thinking that he was going to show up again but no, he's on screen for maybe five minutes. Then he's gone. Its more of a cameo of Depp than an actual credit. In fact by the end of the movie you kind of forget that Depp was even in it. Again, he did a decent enough job, its just strange how short his part is for how high caliber of an actor he is.

Another fun surprise of this movie was the featuring of James Corden.

I'm sure Corden is a more well known actor than I give him credit for, especially in Europe. I mean the guy is taking over for Craig Ferguson's late night show.

But honestly, the only thing I've seen Corden in is Doctor Who as Craig Owen.

I don't think its unfair to say that a lot of audiences, especially American audiences don't know who James Corden is, and suddenly he's the star of a Disney film along side Meryl Streep, and Emily Blunt. And I love it.

I loved him in Doctor Who, and his character is very much the same in this film. However, its fun to see him get these big roles and show off exactly what he can do. Now I'm not sure if he'll do another film like this for a while, especially being taking over for Craig Ferguson, but hopefully we see him around again.

Emily Blunt, fantastic. Anna Kendrick, fantastic. Meryl Streep, fantastic.

Again, there weren't any blatant Russell Crowes in the film. Everyone in the film acted well and it was just a fun time with everyone. The visual effects were another thing that was incredibly fun.

I went with my sister and she was surprised that this hadn't been made into a film before because its such a visual show. Even the high school production I went to 9 years ago had incredible sets and visuals. And that's what you have to do with Into the Woods. However, I never felt like the visuals were over the top or taking away from the acting or action. I felt they were sprinkled in perfectly and done very, very well.

So that covers the acting, the visual effects. But what about the story. Did the story deliver...

For the most part yes.

The first two thirds of this movie are done very well. I say two thirds because the majority of the movie is set in the first half of the show. In my opinion, that's the good part of the show. The first time I saw the show, again it was a high school show, but the intermission came and I thought the show was over. I nodded, saying I enjoyed the singing, thought it was a little short, but I thoroughly enjoyed what I got... and then the second half started. I was very, very confused.

This time around I knew what would happen... but that doesn't make it any less confusing. Its like Sondheim or whoever wrote the book wrote a combination of all the fairy tales he knew of. Everything was wrapped up, everything was ready to go, then he did a read through... and said, This isn't Sondheim enough. This isn't dark and fucked up enough, let's throw everything we had out the window and throw these well established characters and story arches just out the window. And you know what else we need to do? Make the second half incredibly long and drawn out.

Now to be fair to this film. I think Disney toned down the dark a lot. Which is to be expected, Disney can really only go so dark. But I think they also shortened the last half of the musical by a lot. So much that I feel like the first half is actually the first two thirds.

But even though its shortened, I still just have the feeling that the second half of this musical is just not as good as the first half.

I think its the part when the Witch starts singing "The Last Midnight" where I started squirming in my seat thinking this musical was going on too long.

And unfortunately, its the same trap that a lot of musicals fall into. That moment where its half way through the second act and the songs start to drag the musical down.

Maybe its a song that really wasn't needed, or a song that really wasn't as good as the song in the first act that makes you kind of cringe a little bit. I think the movie did a lot of good edits, cut a lot of songs in order to lessen that feeling, but in the end, I did have the musical fatigue waying in on me. Its a combination of that fatigue, and characters dying, that suddenly makes the final third of this movie just not as good as the first stretch of it. I feel like this musical could have been made into two if both acts were flushed out a little bit more. But with what we have, the end really isn't that great. The good part is, that despite some of the songs feeling a bit long and creating that fatigue I was talking about, I did have to take a moment and despite feeling like the movie needed to end, I had to applaud the great singing and harmonies done, especially by the main cast.

However, I think the edits and changes made by Disney make the ending at least tolerable and I still maintain that this is probably the best movie musical I've seen in a long time.

So that's what I thought of Into the Woods. Have you seen the film? What did you think? Where does it rank in movie musicals for you? Comment and Discuss below!

I'll leave you with this. This is probably my favorite song in the show. I also thought it was very well done in the movie by Daniel Huttlestone, here's the Broadway version of "There are Giants in the Sky". Enjoy!