Movie Review: Into the Woods

Into The Woods (2014)



A witch tasks a childless baker and his wife with procuring magical items from classic fairy tales to reverse the curse put on their family tree.  Short synopsis of Into the Woods taken from IMDb.com

I thought "This is a good idea," when Into The Woods began screening on my TV.  But what started as a good idea seemed then to drag itself to death, and bore me in the process.  First of all, I know this is based on some Broadway play or something, and the idea is good, as I said.  But really, there is WAY too much singing going on.  The lyrics are very clever, and the characterizations of the fairy tale folk works nicely, in theory.  But I got tired of the plot very fast.  I thought it was too much of a good thing in places, and so it seemed to overflow its banks and get messy.  The plot needed tightening up.  Or lose a character.  I vote we kick Rapunzel off the island.  She doesn't do anything anyway!

The plot?  Well from what I recall, all these fairy tale folk are all sad and bummed because their work-a-day lives are so lacking in excitement, and so they all go, with their own particular incentive driving them, into the titular woods, to seek what they need.  But things don't work out as planned, or work out a little too well, and everybody experiences angst and heartache and get a giantess ticked off at them.  Meryl Streep was in there too.  And that gal, what's her name?  Starts-with-an-A Hendrick, isn't it?  I forget.  Really, it was just a bunch of characters thrown into a mess and you had to watch closer than I did to keep up with everything that was going on.  And then they go and sing all the time.  If you've got this much energy to be singing so much, how in the world can your lives be so bad?


Those vocalization exercises are better than three-quarters of the actual movie.

Speaking of singing, I did think the voice work itself was really good.  Everybody who opened their mouth gave an outstanding performance on that level.  And for characterization, I liked Red Riding Hood.  A nice take on the little goodie two-shoes you think of when somebody mentions that little red-cloaked brat.  Oh, and Johnny Depp's cameo was almost the best part of the film. 

You know, to my way of thinking, this flick needed more villains.  Meryl Streep's portrayal of the witch was not half bad, even if the inane task she sets our hapless baker and wife to seems so contrived as to almost have an Exp point level number stuck next to it (forgive the video game reference, if you will).  But still, she can't carry the whole thing by herself, despite her obvious investment in the part.  And everybody else is so back-and-forth, misunderstood, over-done, and... did I say angst already?   A lot of angst.  Or maybe that was just me, feeling angst that this movie would never end.

Tell me this is where they got that part from... what's that movie?  Oh yes, Tangled.  My daughter always calls the character Rapunzel "Tangled," since she saw that movie as a three year old.  Anyhoo, this scene smacked of that scene where the witch sings about "Mommy knows best," and all that.  So which witch was the chicken, and which witch was the egg?  I'm betting stage performance of Into the Woods is the progenitor here.  A needless bit of knowledge I will die possessing, and yet never asked for. / Source: blogs.indiewire.com

I suppose as a on-stage musical, Into The Woods probably works.  Hey, people pay good money to go sit through it.  And then, I am no aficionado of stage musicals.  I'll stick with Phantom of the Opera, personally.  Not the movie, but the original Broadway performance.  Saw that when it came on tour and didn't fall asleep in the middle, so that tells ya something.  And I did hear that the plot of Into The Woods was changed a bit, and maybe the original Broadway version is much better.  My wife didn't want my daughter to watch it, because she'd read that Meryl Steep - err, I mean the WITCH, scared children.  But this adaptation didn't do it for me. 

For instance, at one point, everybody who is left standing near the end of the story turn on each other and begin playing the blame game, via song.  Yes, OK, it's terrifically obvious that there is far than enough blame to go around.  But it could have been tightened up and the point still gotten across.  The song is catchy, but after so much lyrical deluge, it feels like a swing and a miss.  A movie that could have taken an hour and fifteen minutes seemed to drag on at over two hours.  Was it over two hours?  Sure felt like it.

I've got an idea!  Let's come up with an original story that works in the medium of the motion picture, and then make that film.  Enough with poor adaptations, Hollywood.  What, are all screenwriters just morons these days? / Source: hypable.com

It seemed to me like the filmmakers didn't want to shorten Into The Woods, for fear of offending die-hard fans.  I don't know.  Bottom-line, I was already tired from my day, and then the delivery (via so much bloody singing! - see, Les Miserables wasn't just me being a subject snob, it's all that damn singing that seems to go nowhere!), and the constant switching from one perspective to another, and the climax that didn't really feel all that important to me (OK, the giant's wife came down to get revenge.  So what?  Somebody knock the big gal over and break her crown and let's get on with it already!) just made Into The Woods feel like a chore to sit through.  Nothing I'd watch more than once.  Not worth the Redbox price, in this reviewer's opinion.


The parting comment:


We need a video game musical!  I'd watch that.  Maybe it's been done.  But if so, I either missed it, or have intentionally given myself amnesia for that event because it was so bad.  But really, imagine Mario and Luigi singing about...  stomping Koopas.  And there'd be lot's of angst.  Lot's of angst!