Into the Woods: Into the Five Dollar Bin

Into the Woods

By Moriya Bradley

C+

I'd like to preface this review with the statement that Disney has been on a high kick with movies lately, so my hopes for Into the Woods were pretty high.

Into the Woods is a mash-up musical of fairy-tales. The story follows many, many different characters as protagonists in their own stories, but all intersect. In the woods. Saw that one coming. 

It's hard to distinguish any 'main characters' because the story follows multiple, and most get a pretty even amount of screen time. The most frequently followed story is that of Mr. Baker and his wife. They live in a cottage in the village and wish to have a child. They find out pretty quickly that Mr. Baker's bloodline is cursed to be barren because of a spell placed on his father by an evil witch who lives across the street. This is really the starting place of the madness, and from here the story gets so convoluted, it's really hard to distinguish any climax.  At all. 

Some of the stories follow the Disney version of the fairytales and others follow more original (and some of them macabre) story-lines. Some stories included are Cinderella, Rapunzel, Little Red Ridinghood, and Jack and the Bean Stalk. Keep in mind, ALL of these beloved fairy-tales are twisted in some horrible and occasionally humorous way. 

The ending was pretty awful. There were so many loose ends that were never tied up, and the stories that did have an ending, the resolution was so unbelievable or obscure that they might as well have not had one at all. There was absolutely no consistent theme, unless you count obscurity and chaos as a theme (I don't).

As far as acting goes everyone did fine, which isn't really surprising considering how many big names hit the list. (“A” list actors include Emily Blunt, Anna Kendrick, Chris Pine, Meryl Streep and Johnny Depp. “B” list actors include Tracey Ullman, Christine Baranski and James Corden.) 

It wasn't so much the acting that was the problem as the storyline. Surprisingly, Disney didn't even closely follow the original story of Into the Woods, which as I am to believe, is even more strange.  Though, the additions of it give the story some missing elements that the film really needed, even though they aren't enough to fix the insanity. 

Another main complaint is that it was just plain too long. It's understandable that transforming a stage musical into a movie can be difficult, but it just wasn't done in such a way that lends itself to keeping attention. I found myself wishing the movie was over already, wondering where they were taking the story (because 3/4 of the way through, I still really had absolutely no idea) and why the movie was even still playing. All of these ridiculous things were happening but nothing was going anywhere. Also, I was extremely caught off guard at some of the 'suggestive content'. It was a lot a bit much for a Disney movie, and I couldn't believe that they would give it a PG rating. People are taking their kids to this movie (something I can't really advise) and granted, most of the innuendo would go straight over a child's head, but still. Not nice, Disney. 

The only redeeming thing about this movie was that the acting was pretty good, (despite the horrible storyline) the music really was fantastic, and the cinematography was impressive. The number one thing I applaud is the costumes, but then again, Disney never really fails at costumes.  For these things alone, I give it a C+. But just this handful of things do not a movie make! We need real plot. We need relatable characters.  We need character development.  At least something to tie the chaos into the package in a way that isn't completely horrifying. 

Content Overview

There were a lot of adult themes in the movie including infidelity, suggested pedophilia, dismemberment, implied cannibalism and sexual innuendo. It is rated PG for suggestive content. The only reason they could achieve this PG rating instead of PG-13 is because it is all technically implied.