FilmSnobReviews

Title: Aladdin
MPAA Rating: PG
Director: Guy Ritchie
Starring: Will Smith, Mena Massoud, Naomi Scott
Runtime: 2 hrs 8 mins

What It Is: Aladdin (Massoud) is a thief living on the streets of Agrabah. When he runs into another thief, who turns out to be the princess Jasmine (Scott). When Aladdin discovers a lamp in an attempt to assist the Sultan’s Grand Vizier Jafar (Marwan Kenzari) and somehow impress Jasmine. When the lamp turns out to be magic Aladdin now has the Genie (Smith) at his disposal. But Jafar is not who he claims to be, and Aladdin plans to expose just that…and maybe win the girl.

What We Think: Do you ever just get annoyed by a movie? Because I got like…really annoyed by this movie. We’ve already seen it. They added one new song, which for her credit Naomi Scott absolutely nails! The songs that were there already don’t have the same level of pomp and circumstance that their animated counterparts do. Likewise what worked on the animation cell doesn’t translate well enough to live-action. Let me be clear though Scott and Massoud are not to blame for the poor quality of this adaptation. It is the very nature of its existence that does all the work there. This is such an unnecessary bore. Overly reliant on CGI, and I’ve excluded the Genie from that because that would be unfair.

Our Grade: C+, So bland and lacking that Disney magic. Everything done here comes off rather bland. That’s not to say though that our two young leads aren’t going to be huge stars because they absolutely are. Visually stunning to a fault this film is in no way worth spending any more time and effort. Thusly I do not and cannot give it a recommendation outside of children…and maybe families that need a movie night.