In 1988, Disney had enjoyed some degree of success luring adults into seeing the animated feature "Oliver and Company" by hiring Bette Midler, Billy Joel and Cheech Marin to provide character voices. The following year, the company decided to aggressively market "The Little Mermaid" to the over-18 audience, a group that generally shied away from G-rated entertainment. Special screenings of the picture were held in the evenings for adult audiences and an ad campaign was developed to sell the film as a romantic fantasy rather than as a children's picture.
The strategy worked beyond anyone's expectations. "Mermaid" grossed $85 million in the U.S. alone, making it the most successful animated feature up to that time and paving the way for such future smashes as "Aladdin," "Beauty and the Beast," "The Lion King" and "Pocahontas," all of which would bring in grown-ups as well as youngsters.
Seen today, "Mermaid" lacks the visual splendor of those films, although its best moments are certainly as delightful as anything the Mouse Factory has ever produced. The movie's biggest flaw is its tendency to lay on both the humor and the terror a little thick, although the frequent musical numbers are so well-executed it's easy to overlook the plot's missteps.
As written by Hans Christian Andersen, "The Little Mermaid" was a gloomy fable about the dangers of not knowing your place in society. Disney's retelling turns that message inside out: The film heartily advocates exploring new worlds, defying expectations and risking everything in pursuit of your dreams. The title character Ariel (voice of Jodi Benson) is a high-spirited 16-year-old sea princess who longs to explore dry land, an idea her father King Triton (Kenneth Mars) expressly forbids. "As long as you live under my ocean, you'll obey my rules," he bellows when he learns she's been sneaking peeks at the coastline.
Since this is a Disney film, Ariel is required to sing about her yearning, in this case the gorgeous anthem "Part of Your World," in which she wonders "what would I give if I could live out of these waters? What would I pay for just one day, warm on the sand?"
That's what Ursula (Pat Carroll), a meddling sea witch, would like to know. Part Cruella DeVil and part squid, she's willing to turn Ariel into a human so that the girl can find the mortal prince she's fallen in love with. But the witch's terms are severe: To pay for the transformation, Ariel must give up her voice, and if she can't win her sweetheart over within three days, she'll have to take her place in Ursula's super-creepy garden of withered, lifeless "poor, unfortunate souls."
The Oscar-winning score by Alan Menken and Howard Ashman could not be any better, featuring the delirious "Under the Sea" (later to be spoofed in an unforgettable "Simpsons" episode) and the calypso-flavored "Kiss the Girl," both of which develop into full-blown production numbers. And "Les Poissons," sung by a demented chef as he tries to get the unwilling crab Sebastian (Samuel E. Wright) onto the dinner table, must be one of the strangest musical moments in Disney history.
But what truly set "Mermaid" apart from its predecessors was Ariel herself, a strong-willed young woman who set her own course in life, unlike Cinderella and Snow White, whose destinies were determined more by fate and chance than by their actions. In contrast, Ariel is the kind of heroine certain to inspire little girls in the audience to think for themselves -- and the little boys to spend a lot more time fishing. James Sanford
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