The Little Mermaid (1989)

June 10, 2018

Let's finish up this weekend with one more jump into the ocean, The Little Mermaid.

The Movie:

The Little Mermaid is the 28th picture in the Disney Animated Canon and the one that kicked off the Disney Renaissance. It marked a return for Disney to classic fairy tales, 25 years after Sleeping Beauty, and it set the tone for animated movies done in the style of Broadway musicals.

The title mermaid is Ariel, the youngest daughter of King Triton, ruler of the sea. She falls in love with the human Prince Eric after rescuing him during a storm, in defiance of her father's rules. After her father destroys her treasures as punishment, Ariel seeks out the sea-witch Ursula, who turns her into a human for three days, but at the cost of her voice. With the help of Sebastian, Flounder, and Scuttle, Ariel must convince Eric of who she is and to fall in love with her.

Ok, I will confess, this movie came out when I was in 2nd grade, and my inner 7-year-old still finds joy every time I watch this movie. I can't say for sure but this might have been my most watched movie on home video when I was in elementary school, and I must have listened to the soundtrack countless times.

All these years later, does the movie hold up? Yes, it does. The story is engaging and well told and the animation is still gorgeous. If anything, even though at the time it broke a lot of clichés, it also set the pattern for many new tropes that more recent Disney films have begun to play against.

The soundtrack is wonderful. This was the film that brought Alan Menken and Howard Ashman to Disney, and Ashman even heavily influenced the story and served as a producer of the movie. The songs definitely show the writers' Broadway background - "Part of Your World" is the quintessential I Want Song, "Poor Unfortunate Souls" is a wonderful Villain Song, and "Kiss the Girl" and the Oscar-winning "Under the Sea" are earworm Crowd Songs. Menken also won an Oscar for his score.

Presence in the Parks:

Ariel can be found several places throughout the Disney Parks. In Florida she first found a permanent presence at the now Hollywood Studios. Back when the park first opened as Disney-MGM Studios in 1989, one of the main attractions was a 2-hour long tram and walking backlot tour. One of the final stops on this tour was a soundstage off what is now the Animation Courtyard. The following year, this soundstage became the home of a live show called "Here Comes the Muppets," which ran until 1991. In 1992, The Voyage of the Little Mermaid opened. The 17-minute show features tells a short version of the movie using a mix of live actors and puppets.

Entrance to Voyage of the Little Mermaid, May 2015

Also at Hollywood Studios, Ariel and Eric are one of the three couple that appear on floats in the princess medley in Fantasmic! Several other scenes from the movie also appear in the show.

In various parks, Ariel is available as a meetable character in what is known as Ariel's Grotto. In the Magic Kingdom, this area was originally located at the former queue of 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, using the lake as a background. (A Triton statue was also placed in the lake.) This location lasted from 1995 to 2004. Ariel's Grotto was moved to a different side of the lake after that when the former area became a Pooh themed play area located across from the Winnie-the-Pooh ride. That location closed in 2010, and a new grotto opened in 2012 next to the ride in New Fantasyland.

There was also an Ariel's Grotto in Disneyland from 1996 to 2008, but that was replaced by Pixie Hollow. The west coast also had a restaurant by the same name at DCA that closed earlier this year as part of the revamp of Paradise Pier. Tokyo DisneySea also has an Ariel's Grotto.

One of the special features found on the DVD shows computer animation of a Little Mermaid ride that was planned right when the movie came out, but was never built, despite being planned for use in parks in Florida, Paris, Tokyo, and Hong Kong. A different version of the ride finally was built as part of the DCA 2.0 revamp. The attraction is called The Little Mermaid - Ariel's Undersea Adventure. It replaced the film Golden Dreams, and the replica of San Francisco's Palace of Fine Arts that was that attraction's entrance is now the entrance for the new ride, which opened in 2011.

In the Magic Kingdom, the ride is called Under the Sea - Journey of the Little Mermaid and opened in 2012 as part of New Fantasyland. It is very much in the vein of other classic Disney dark-ride attractions where you ride through the plot of the movie.