Go on an Adventure Under the Sea With The Little Mermaid

Disney had created many wonderful animated movies, but their new movies had lost popularity over the years. Some of their movies were considered to be lower quality as well which didn’t help things. In 1989, that changed with the release of The Little Mermaid.

Ariel was the youngest daughter of King Triton, leader of the merpeople. She was fascinated with humans despite the fact that her father didn’t want her going near what he called fish eaters. She had a collection of human items that her fish friend Flounder helped her collect. Sebastian, the court musician, was assigned to watch over her. She longed to be part of the human world and continued to go topside to observe them when she could. That caused her to rescue and fall in love with Prince Eric. Ariel then turned to Ursula the sea witch to try to make her dreams come true.

The Little Mermaid is based on the story by Hans Christian Anderson. I haven’t read the original story, but I have done some research connected to the movie and learned that the story was changed for the movie. I think the biggest change to the story was to the ending which was turned into a more traditional Disney happy ending. I have read that there was some criticism for changing the ending, but I think the happier ending worked for the movie.

There was some adventure in The Little Mermaid, most of which was provided by Ariel searching for human items and daring to go to the surface to observe humans. Her search for human items did cause her to have a close encounter with a shark. Most of the adventure was fun, but there were certain things that put Ariel and Flounder in danger as well. There were things in a few scenes that could be scary for younger children even though there was only a little bit of mild violence in the movie. Overall, I thought the movie was family friendly. There was also some humor in several scenes. I thought the funniest things were the things that Scuttle told Ariel about human things - like a fork being used to style hair.

The Little Mermaid was created mostly with traditional hand drawn animation with computers being used for certain things as well. This was one of the first Disney animated movies to use a digital process to add color to the animator’s drawings though the traditional method was also used as well. All of the 2D animated movies that Disney made after this movie used the new digital process for adding color to the drawings. The animation was very well done throughout the movie and I think it still looks good today. It doesn’t have the same look as the newer computer animation, but that doesn’t bother me. There is something very special about this type of animation when it is done well that not everyone appreciates.

The Little Mermaid returned to a musical format that had been used in the earlier Disney movies but hadn’t been used for a while. Disney continued to use the musical format for their new animated movies in the future. This movie featured seven original songs by Alan Menken and Howard Ashman. The songs fit in perfectly with what was going on and moved the story forward without there being awkward transitions when the songs began. The score won the Oscar for best original score and the song Under the Sea won for best original song.

The development of the relationship between Prince Eric and Ariel was central to the plot of The Little Mermaid. The love story aspect of the movie wasn’t overly mushy. The fact that Ariel was so young might bother some viewers, but many fairytales have had younger female characters. Ariel had always had a fascination with humans, but she was only driven to find a way to live in their world because of her attraction to Eric. The romance was very mild and not graphic at all. The only thing that was shown was a kiss. The romance was handled in a similar way to the romances in other Disney animated movies, which did make some of the movie predictable. That didn’t bother me and I still thought the movie was very entertaining.

Ariel was a sweet, kind girl with a beautiful singing voice. She was very interested in humans and had a large collection of human things. She didn’t know what the things were, but she enjoyed collecting the things. She did have a tendency to rush into some things, which did get her into trouble more than once. The voice that Jodi Benson provided fit the character very well. Benson also did the singing for Ariel. Prince Eric was the human that Ariel fell in love with after rescuing. He wasn’t as developed as much, something that has happened to male characters in other Disney animated movies. Christopher Daniel Barnes did fine with the voice.

Flounder was a fish and Ariel’s best friend. He didn’t always agree with what she wanted to do, but he usually went along with her plans. He was left behind once Ariel left the ocean. Sebastian was a crab and court musician who was saddled with watching over Ariel. He was able to go with her when she was living as a human, though he did have a run in with Louie, the chef who wanted to cook him. Sebastian was a cute character. Scuttle was the bird that Ariel talked to about human items. He came up with some interesting uses for things that tended to be very wrong.

King Triton was the ruler of the merpeople and he was very protective of his daughter. He tried to be firm with her and went a tad far at one point, which seemed to push her away. Ariel’s six sisters did turn up in a few scenes, but they didn’t do much of anything and weren’t important to what was going on. Like what has happened in many other Disney animated movies, Ariel’s mother wasn’t around and she wasn’t mentioned either. Grimsby was someone who worked for Prince Eric and was just sort of there.

Ursula was a sea witch that King Triton had banished some time before. She was still angry and hoped to get her revenge at some point. She would offer to help merpeople with various issues, but her payments were very high. She was not nice and not someone to mess with. Pat Carroll’s voice fit the character perfectly. Flotsam and Jetsam were two eels who worked for Ursula. They would watch over things and interfere when it would benefit Ursula.

Voice Talent

Christopher Daniel Barnes - Prince Eric
Jodi Benson - Ariel
Pat Carroll - Ursula
Paddi Edwards - Flotsam and Jetsam
Buddy Hackett - Scuttle
Jason Marin - Flounder
Kenneth Mars - King Triton
Samuel E. Wright - Sebastian

Directed by Ron Clements and John Musker

DVD Information

The Little Mermaid was first released on DVD in 1999. That version didn’t have any extras. In October of 2006, the movie was released again on a two disc DVD that is part of Disney’s Platinum Edition series of DVDs. Digital restoration was done for the video and sound and it features surround sound. There was an audio commentary, previews of other movies, and a music video for a new version of the song Kiss the Girl on the first disc. The rest of the extras were on the second DVD.

There were seven deleted scenes, some of which were just different versions of scenes that did end up in the movie. There were four games and activities that included a look at a ride connected to the movie. There were a few featurettes dealing with the making the movie that included some of the people who made the movie. Another featurette looked at the original story. An early presentation reel for the movie and the original trailer were also included. The extras were interesting.

The Little Mermaid is a wonderful animated movie from Disney that has held up well since it was first released. It was the first of their movies to be successful in a long time and it helped to launch a new age in Disney animation that led to several successful animated movies in the next several years. People who enjoy animated movies should give this one a chance.

Animated Movie Reviews
101 Dalmatians ~ Aladdin ~ The Ant Bully ~ Antz ~ The Aristocats ~ Barnyard ~ Batman: Mask of the Phantasm ~ Batman & Mr. Freeze: Subzero ~ Beauty and the Beast ~ Bee Movie ~ Brother Bear ~ A Bug's Life ~ Cars ~ Chicken Little ~ Doctor Strange The Emperor's New Groove ~ Finding Nemo ~ Flushed Away ~ Happy Feet ~ Hellboy Animated: Blood & Iron ~ Hellboy Animated - Sword of Storms ~ Home on the Range ~ Hoodwinked ~ Horton Hears a Who ~ Ice Age ~ Ice Age: The Meltdown ~ The Incredibles ~ Invincible Iron Man ~ Jetsons: The Movie ~ Jimmy Neutron: Boy Genius ~ Kung Fu Panda ~ Lilo & Stitch ~ Looney Tunes: Back in Action ~ Madagascar ~ Meet the Robinsons ~ Monster House ~ Monsters, Inc. ~ The Nightmare Before Christmas ~ Open Season ~ Over the Hedge ~ The Polar Express ~ Ratatouille ~ Robots ~ Shark Tale ~ Shrek ~ Shrek 2 ~ Sinbad: Legend of the Seven Seas ~ Sleeping Beauty ~ Tim Burton's Corpse Bride ~ TMNT ~ Toy Story ~ Toy Story 2 ~ Treasure Planet ~ Ultimate Avengers ~ Ultimate Avengers 2: Rise of the Panther ~ Valiant ~ Wallace & Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit ~ Wallace & Gromit - Three Amazing Adventures ~ WALL-E ~ The Wild ~