First thing I'm going to say before I get into this is that I realise that this film is not for me. I understand that I am definitely not the target audience for a film like this. Also, after finally seeing the film, I can understand the appeal of the film for its target audience. Now, all that said, let’s get into the review. This film is crap. Not shit, just crap. And that somehow makes it harder to watch. I went in to the film expecting it to be an absolute dumpster fire, and it's not, its just a bit crap. This made it less entertaining than I expected it to be because I was half expecting it to be a so bad its good kind of deal, along the lines of Grease 2 (1982). There are moments of this, mainly from the ever-great Pierce Brosnan, but the majority of the film is competent and so I just found myself a little bored more than anything else. The film opens with Sophie (Amanda Seyfried) sending three wedding invites in her mother's name to her three potential dads, Sam Carmichael (Pierce Brosnan), Bill Anderson (Stellan Skarsgard) and Harry Bright (Colin Firth). They all arrive for the wedding, very much to the surprise of Donna (Meryl Streep). The film is basically a lot of "comedic" situations where Donna is attempting to deal with three of her exes all reappearing at the same time, and Sophie dealing with the stress of a wedding whilst trying to find out which one of the three men is her father.
First of all, look at that bloody cast list. It is a brilliant cast. Meryl Streep is a massive get for this film, and although she doesn't hit the ball out of the park with her performance, it's Meryl Streep she is always going to be good. All three dads put in decent performances. Brosnan is the most entertaining for reasons I will get into, whilst Colin Firth is doing a good Colin Firth performance, but it is Stellan Skarsgard who puts in the best performance of the three, even getting a couple of legitimate laughs out of me in a film where the comedy goes mostly in one ear and out the other, due to the truly terrible comic relief characters. These characters come in the form of Rosie (Julie Walters) and Tanya (Christine Baranski), Donna's best friends who are used solely as comic relief in the film. And I don't think I'm exaggerating when I say I wanted to claw my eyes out anytime these two were on screen. Their performances aren't even bad per say, but the so-called comedy they have to do is painfully unfunny and I feel like my sense of humour took a serious hit from even associating with these two characters. Amanda Seyfried puts in a good performance as Sophie, but I can't say the same for Dominic Cooper who plays her fiancé, Sky. He is so wooden in this film. There is so little change in emotion no matter what he is doing, and it is a poor, poor performance. However, I don't particularly blame him for this. The character himself is so poorly written and it is given nothing to work with other than being heartthrob guy that 'm not sure anyone would have done much better with it.
The film is technically competent, but it is in no way a brilliantly made film. This was director Phyllida Lloyd's first studio film and it is a decent first film, although it does have a couple of hockey moments, with slow motion being used when there is really no need for it. The choreography is fine, again nothing spectacular, although I suspect a lot of the choreography is not particularly spectacular so that the audience can dance along without having to attempt any death-defying stunts (although I would have appreciated a Meryl Streep backflip, just saying). And now we come onto the music. The music in the film is, of course, strictly ABBA songs which is both a positive and a negative for the film. The positive aspect of this is that it is ABBA and you can't argue with their track list. Does Your Mother Know, Voulez-Vous, S.O.S, bangers one and all. The problem with it being solely ABBA songs is that the story is forced to be written round the songs, rather than the songs be written for the story This leads to a couple songs feeling like they don't fit the situation they are being used in and leads to scenarios being written just to fit in songs. This goes for the Does Your Mother Know scene, where Tanya is hit on by a much younger man who has been seen only a couple times before in the film and is only seen then to justify this moment in the film. As for the singing performances, most are passable. Amanda Seyfried is a great singer and so all her songs are good, whilst most others perform theirs to a fine standard. And then there is Pierce Brosnan. Oh good lord is Pierce Brosnan's singing the best bit of this film. He is shockingly bad, and I love him for it. His rendition of S.O.S is a beauty to behold and I just can't praise his terrible singing enough. It is the best bit of the film easily, hands down, nothing beats it. Forget the so call comedy, his singing is the real laugh riot of the film, and I recommend seeking them out because they are something else.
I will reiterate what I said in my introduction, that this film is clearly not for me and I understand why it is so popular. But that being said, it is not a good film. It is a competent film in a genre full of films that are much worse, but there are also films in this genre which blow this out of the water. Everything about it is just so bland. The story is dull, the performances are fine but nothing exceptional, the filmic techniques are all very basic and the comedy is about as funny as being castrated. I can only really recommend the Pierce Brosnan scenes from the film. Seriously, YouTube his songs, you will not be disappointed. And finally, let’s hope that the sequel is much better than this film, because I don't want to put myself through seeing two crap films with these actors whose work I enjoy (also I'm paying for the sequel, so it has a lot more to prove).