Review: ‘Wicked’ (2024), starring Ariana Grande, Cynthia Erivo, Jonathan Bailey, Bowen Yang, Marissa Bode, the voice of Peter Dinklage, Michelle Yeoh and Jeff Goldblum

November 19, 2024

by Carla Hay

Cynthia Erivo and Ariana Grande in “Wicked” (Photo courtesy of Universal Pictures)

“Wicked” (2024)

Directed by Jon M. Chu

Culture Representation: Taking place in the fictional land of Oz, the fantasy musical film “Wicked” (based on the novel and stage show of the same name) features a racially diverse cast of human characters (black, white Asian, and Hispanic) representing the working-class, middle-class and wealthy, as well as characters that are talking animals.

Culture Clash: Two very different witches become university roommates and unlikely friends, as one of these witches is bullied and persecuted for her green skin and the perception that she is evil.

Culture Audience: “Wicked” will appeal primarily to fans of the stage musical, the movie’s headliners, and big-budget studio musicals that have a good balance of style and substance.

Jeff Goldblum and Michelle Yeoh in “Wicked” (Photo by Giles Keyte/Universal Pictures)

Famous stage musicals are long enough, even with intermission. And so, when it was announced that the Tony-winning musical “Wicked” (a story about “The Wizard of Oz” witches as university students) would be made into a two-part movie—”Wicked” and “Wicked Part Two”—you could almost hear the collective groans of people who might be dragged to see the “Wicked” movie and will have to brace themselves for a bloated film that runs on for too long. Fortunately, the 160-minute “Wicked” is an enchanting cinematic version of the stage musical, with superb production values and entertaining performances. However, it didn’t need to be an overly long movie that will test the patience of anyone who doesn’t like musicals.

Directed by Jon M. Chu, “Wicked” was written by Winnie Holzman and Dana Fox. The “Wicked” movie and stage musical are based on Gregory Maguire’s 1995 novel “Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West,” which features some characters that were originally in L. Frank Baum’s classic 1900 novel “The Wonderful Wizard of Oz.” Holzman wrote the Tony-nominated book for the “Wicked” Broadway musical, which won three Tony Awards: Best Actress in a Musical (for Idina Menzel), Best Scenic Design and Best Costume Design.

The “Wicked” movie is a faithful adaptation of the stage musical, which has two acts. The “Wicked” movie shows the events that happen in Act One of the stage musical. Just like in the musical, “Wicked” begins with Glinda, the Good Witch of the North (played by Ariana Grande), arriving in a pink bubble announcing to the residents of Oz that the Wicked Witch of the West is dead. Everyone rejoices at this news, as a giant Wicked Witch statue made of tree branches burns during this celebration.

But when a woman in the crowd asks Glinda if it’s true that Glinda and the Wicked Witch of the West used to be friends, Glinda looks sad and admits it’s true. She then tells the origin story of the Wicked Witch of the West and how they became frenemies when they were roommates at Shiz University. The movie then switches to flashback mode as this story is told.

The Wicked Witch of the West’s real name was Elphaba Thropp, who was born with green skin. Elphaba’s skin tone is a horror and an embarrassment to her parents Melena Thropp (played by Courtney Mae-Briggs) and Frexspar Thropp (played by Andy Nyman), who are prominent members of Oz society because Frexspar is the governor of Oz. Karis Musongole has the role of Elphaba as a child. Cynthia Erivo has the role of Elphaba as an adult.

Elphaba was conceived from a secret affair that Melena had with another man, whose identify is revealed in the second part of the “Wicked” musical. Even though Elphaba is not Frexspar’s biological child, he is her legal father, but she is treated as a burden by her parents because of her green skin and because there are indications that she has witch powers. Frexspar and Melena later have a biological daughter named Nessarose, who has paraplegia and uses a wheelchair. Cesily Collette Taylor has the role of Nessarose as a child. Marissa Bode has the role of Nessarose as an adult.

Even though Elphaba is treated as inferior to Nessarose, Elphaba is very loving and protective of her younger sister. From a young age, Elphaba experienced bullying and ostracism because of her green skin and because she has obvious magical abilities that have made people believe that she’s a witch. “Wicked” makes a point of showing that whether Elphaba could be considered a “villain” or an “anti-hero,” she probably would have been a different person if she hadn’t been bullied so much in her youth. Elphaba is an example of someone who is repeatedly treated as “wicked” until she eventually decides to become the “wicked” person that other people think she is.

As a young adult, Nessarose enrolls in Shiv University, which has special courses for those who have magical abilities. Elphaba tags along to look after Nessarose on the first day that Nessarose has arrived at Shiv University. But an intimidation incident causes Elphaba to create some chaos with her magical abilities, by making objects get thrown in the air. In order to protect Elphaba from being persecuted as a witch, Shiv University’s dean of sorcery studies Madam Morrible (played by Michelle Yeoh) lies to the students and says that Madam Morrible was the one who caused this chaos through magic.

Madam Morrible decides that she will mentor Elphaba and gets Elphaba enrolled in the university so Madam Morrible can be Elphaba’s private tutor. Madam Morrible also decides that Elphaba will be the roommate of Galinda Upland (played by Grande), who is also a first-year Shiv University student. (It’s explained later why Galinda changes her name to Glinda.) Galinda is privileged, spoiled, shallow and cares a great deal about being the most popular student in the school.

Predictably, Galinda and Elphaba clash with each other while also developing a gradual mutual respect for each other. Further complicating matters is the fact that Elphaba and Galinda both have crushes on a dashing but vain student named Fiyaro (played by Jonathan Bailey), who is very attracted to Galinda and begins dating her. Meanwhile, a Munchkin named Boq (played by Ethan Slater) has a crush on Galinda, while Nessarose is attracted to Boq. Galinda encourages Boq to date Nessarose so that Boq won’t focus so much of his attention on Galinda.

Other characters who are in the movie include a talking goat professor named Dr. Dillamond (voiced by Peter Dinklage), an outspoken animal-rights activist who faces discrimination when Oz officials decide that animals should no longer talk and should be kept in cages. The Wizard of Oz (played by Jeff Goldblum) appears in the last third of the movie, where the majority of the action scenes take place. Providing much of the comic relief are two Shiv University students named ShenShen (played by Bronwyn James) and Pfannee (played by Bowen Yang), who are bullying phonies and gossipy snobs. Original “Wicked” Broadway stars Menzel (who played Elphaba) and Kristin Chenoweth (who played Galinda/Glinda) make cameo appearances as Wiz-o-mania superstars.

“Wicked” has the expected songs (written by Stephen Schwartz) from the stage musical, including “What Is This Feeling?,” “Popular” and “The Wizard and I” (one of the movie’s performance highlights) and the show-stopping “Defying Gravity.” Erivo is the clear standout with her skillful acting and exceptional singing, while Grande gives a worthy counterpoint performance with Galinda/Glinda’s intentionally affected mannerisms. All of the other cast members who have prominent song-and-dance roles handle their performances capably.

“Wicked” has fantastic production design and costume design. The movie’s visual effects are also well-done. Where the movie falters a little bit is that it gets too repetitive in showing the bullying, jealousies and insecurities that affect the interpersonal relationships. At least 40 minutes of this movie could’ve been cut from the film, and it wouldn’t have made a difference to the overall story. Even though the plot gets stretched out for too long, “Wicked” has more than enough to maintain viewer interest for people who are inclined to like musicals.

Universal Pictures will release “Wicked” in U.S. cinemas on November 22, 2024. Sneak previews of the movie took place in U.S. cinemas on November 18 and November 20, 2024.

Review: ‘Jungle Cruise,’ starring Dwayne Johnson, Emily Blunt, Edgar Ramírez, Jack Whitehall, Jesse Plemons and Paul Giamatti

July 27, 2021

by Carla Hay

Dwyane Johnson and Emily Blunt in “Jungle Cruise” (Photo by Frank Masi/Disney Enterprises, Inc.)

“Jungle Cruise”

Directed by Jaume Collet-Serra

Culture Representation: Taking place mostly in 1912, in Brazil and England, the action-adventure film “Jungle Cruise” features a racially diverse cast of characters (white, African American Asian and Latino) representing the working-class, middle-class and wealthy.

Culture Clash: A sassy researcher and her fussy botanist brother, who are both from England, enlist the help of a wisecracking American skipper of a ramshackle cruise boat to go to a Brazilian jungle to find a magical tree which has a petal with the power to save lives.

Culture Audience: “Jungle Cruise” will appeal primarily to people who are fans of any Disney adventure films, but might not hold much interest to people who’ve seen better family-friendly adventure films that take place mostly in a jungle.

Jack Whitehall, Emily Blunt and Dwayne Johnson in “Jungle Cruise” (Photo by Frank Masi/Disney Enterprises, Inc.)

Overstuffed with generic villains and too rambling for its own good, “Jungle Cruise” offers nothing new or exciting to people who’ve seen higher-quality and more unique adventure films with a jungle at the center of the action. It’s a bland misfire that borrows heavily from 1981’s “Raiders of the Lost Ark” and 1951’s “The African Queen.” Viewers already know how a movie like “Jungle Cruise” is going to end, so “Jungle Cruise” needed to have other elements to make it stand out from similar movies that have a wisecracking male hero and his adventurous love interest who wants to be treated as his equal. Unfortunately, “Jungle Cruise” is stuck in a rut of mediocrity that will make this movie forgettable soon after watching it.

At a total running time of 127 minutes, “Jungle Cruise” over-indulges in characters and scenes that weren’t needed for the movie. Children under the age of 8 and people with very short attention spans might get bored or irritated by the unnecessary convolutions to the plot, which just weigh the story down more than stagnant muck in a jungle swamp. Don’t be surprised if some parts of the movie will make you want to go to sleep.

Directed by Jaume Collet-Serra, “Jungle Cruise” was written by Glenn Ficarra, John Requa and Michael Green. The extraneous plot contrivances seem entirely designed to stretch out the movie’s running time, as if the writers were afraid that that sticking to a simple concept wouldn’t work. In addition, too many parts of the movie seem forced and very fake, such as the romance between the male and female protagonists.

There are also some heavy-handed references to sexism and feminism that are repeated to irksome levels, as if the “Jungle Cruise” filmmakers think viewers are too dimwitted to notice the first three times these same references are in the movie. A running commentary in “Jungle Cruise” is that some of the men can’t believe that the female protagonist is wearing pants. The male protagonist even starts calling her “Pants” as a nickname. It’s a tired joke that wears very thin quickly. And the “feminism” messages in “Jungle Cruise” come across as extremely phony when this movie’s cast members who get top billing are several men but only one woman.

“Jungle Cruise” takes place in 1912, but there are flashbacks throughout the story to previous centuries. The movie opens with a voiceover explanation about the ancient legend that serves as the catalyst for this story. (The musical score during this intro uses an instrumental version of Metallica’s 1991 ballad “Nothing Else Matters,” which is kind of distracting for viewers who know this song.)

In the Legend of the Tears of the Moon, a magical tree called Tears of the Moon exists in the Amazon jungle. This tree has a petal that can cure any illness and break any curse. Over centuries, many explorers sought to find this petal. One of these explorers was a Spanish conquistador from the 1500s named Don Lope de Aguirre (played by Edgar Ramírez), also known as Aguirre, who got injured during his exploration and was found by the guardians of the tree.

After these guardians nursed Aguirre back to health, he demanded that the guardians give him a sacred arrowhead, which is believed to be the key to finding the Tears of the Moon. Aguirre and his conquistadors attacked the guardians, and the jungle fought back. (And yes, there are predictable scenes of trees coming to life and using their branches to tie up people.) As a result, Aguirre was cursed and held captive by the jungle trees for eternity.

In London in 1912, botanist MacGregor Houghton (played by Jack Whitehall) is making a presentation pitch to an all-male group of high-society members in a museum lecture hall. He’s reading a speech from index cards that were written by his much-smarter sister Dr. Lily Houghton (played by Emily Blunt), a researcher who is watching nervously from the balcony. MacGregor wants to convince this group of elites that the Legend of the Tears of the Moon is real, so that they can invest in a trip that MacGregor and Lily want to take to the Amazon jungle to find this magical tree.

MacGregor is fairly unskilled at public speaking (or he didn’t take the time to rehearse his speech), because on the index cards, where Lily wrote in parentheses “pause for dramatic effect,” he actually reads out loud the words “pause for dramatic effect.” MacGregor’s speech is not well-received, to put it mildly. He gets a resounding “no” from the group when requesting funding for the exploration trip.

As McGregor verbally flounders and gets flustered on stage, Lily sneaks off into an off-limits room to find the sacred arrowhead that supposedly will lead whoever possesses it to the Tears of the Moon tree. She pries open a crate, sees the arrowhead and steals it. But before Lily can leave undetected, she runs into a museum official named Sir James Hobbs-Coddington (played by Andy Nyman), a stern and greedy bureaucrat.

He’s about to secretly sell the arrowhead to a visiting German royal called Prince Joachim (played by Jesse Plemons), who sees that Lily has the arrowhead and demands that she hand it over. A predictable chase ensues in the room with some unrealistic choreography involving a ladder that leads to Lily hanging out of a window where she could fall and die. Prince Joachim has her cornered and tells Lily that if she hands over the arrowhead, he will rescue her.

Lily gives Prince Joachim a small box that she says has the arrowhead, but he pushes her off the building anyway. Just then, a double-decker bus with an open top drives by, and Lily lands in the bus. Inside the building, Prince Joachim sees that what’s inside the box isn’t the arrowhead but a duck-hunting decoy shaped like a toucan. Meanwhile, MacGregor gets kicked out of the lecture hall with perfect timing to be outside in the same place as Lily when she landed. MacGregor and Lily make their getaway on the bus. Yes, it’s that kind of movie.

You know the rest: Lily and MacGregor find a boat navigator who can take them to the Porto Vehlo, Brazil, where their Amazon jungle adventure will begin. He’s a skipper named Frank Wolff (played by Dwayne Johnson), who makes a meager living as a tour guide to visitors on his run-down steamer boat La Quila. One of Frank’s identifying qualities is that he constantly likes to tell jokes with bad puns. People will either find it charming or annoying.

For example, while ferrying a group of unlucky tourists who have to listen to his bad jokes, Frank points out a pair of toucans and says, “Only two can play.” Frank’s “wink and nudge” tone is: “Get it? The words ‘two can’ rhyme with ‘toucan.'”

He tells another groan-inducing pun joke to the people on his boat: “I used to work in an orange juice factory, but I got canned. I couldn’t concentrate. Yeah, they put the squeeze on me too.” A young girl on the boat tour voices what a lot of viewers will be thinking about Frank and his cheesy jokes: “Make him stop!”

“Jungle Cruise” is very self-aware that the jokes are silly, but after a while it does get very tiresome and comes across as lazy screenwriting not to have anything else about Frank’s personality that’s memorable. In fact, one of the reasons why “Jungle Cruise” is so disappointing is that none of the characters in this movie has an outstanding personality. You know a movie is bad when it has three villains/antagonists, and they’re just watered-down versions of many other movie villains.

The most obvious villain is Prince Joachim, who spouts cliché lines and does everything a stereotypical villain does but twirl his moustache. Plemons struggles with having a believable German accent in this role. It’s like he’s trying to do a parody of a Christoph Waltz villain, but it doesn’t land very well because Prince Joachim’s dialogue is so witless. Prince Joachim doesn’t come across as cunning or dangerous as much as he comes across as a spoiled and stupid royal who wants his way.

Another villain is Aguirre, who shows up later in the movie. The “Jungle Cruise” filmmakers wouldn’t have taken all that time in the beginning of the movie to tell viewers who Aguirre is without him making an appearance. Aguirre could’ve had an interesting personality and story arc, but he mostly just growls his words and gets into fights.

A third villain, who’s in the movie for less than 10 minutes, is Nilo (played by Paul Giamatti, speaking in a questionable Italian accent), a rival riverboat tour operator who is after Frank for debts that Frank owes to Nilo. If Frank doesn’t pay up, Nilo will get Frank’s boat. Nilo is probably the movie’s most useless character that has a well-known actor in the role. Most people who see “Jungle Cruise” won’t remember who the Nilo character is and what he does for a living.

There’s a time-wasting sequence where Frank impersonates Nilo when he first meets Lily, who’s looking to hire a boat navigator. She soon finds out who the real Nilo is, so her first impression of Frank is that he’s a liar and a con artist. The expected bickering between Lily and Frank ensues, which we all know will eventually lead to them feeling romantically attracted to each other.

MacGregor is a high-maintenance dandy who’s upset that he can’t take many of his possessions—such as a large wardrobe of clothes and tennis rackets—with him on Frank’s boat. Frank’s way of dealing with this issue of MacGregor’s extra luggage is to throw away the luggage in the water. How rude. Later in the movie, it’s implied but not said directly that MacGregor is a semi-closeted gay man. MacGregor talks about how grateful he is that Lily is his sister, because she protects him from being persecuted.

Frank has a pet leopard named Proxima, which is introduced in the movie in a very dubious way: Frank has trained the leopard to scare people away in a restaurant. How is that supposed to be funny? The visual effects for this CGI leopard are not very convincing. It looks every inch like the computer-generated animal that it is.

In fact, all of the visual effects in “Jungle Cruise” are very ho-hum or look bogus enough to be distracting to the movie. The hair and makeup are overdone for Lily, who looks too polished in certain action scenes, where realistically her makeup would’ve sweated off of her face, and her hair would be lot more disheveled.

As for the “jungle adventure,” Frank, Lily and MacGregor have the predictable experiences with jungle tribes, as well as chase scenes with Prince Joachim and his henchmen. There’s also the “eccentric exotic person” who seems to be in every jungle movie. In “Jungle Cruise,” this character is a tribe leader named Trader Sam (played by Veronica Falcón), who becomes an ally to these adventurers. And there are more bad pun jokes from Frank.

But when it’s revealed that Frank has a secret identity, that makes the movie go off the rails. Without giving away too much information, it’s enough to say that Frank’s secret identity meant that he grew up in a country where English is not the primary language. However, Frank has a very American accent throughout the movie. This discrepancy can be explained by Frank living enough of his adult life in the U.S. that he now has an American accent.

But the movie’s tone gets a little too dark for a family film when Frank says that he wants to die. (And it’s not a joke.) It puts a weird damper on the rest of the “adventure,” because it’s an unnecessary death wish for the hero of the story to have, after it’s made obvious that he has romantic feelings for Lily. (And yes, they’ve already kissed each other at this point.) Apparently, no one told Frank that telling a potential lover that you want to die is not the way to romance someone.

Anyway, we all know that this “death wish” is a very manipulative part of the story just to create unnecessary drama. After all, why kill off the hero when there are potential “Jungle Cruise” sequels to be made? Do the filmmakers really think viewers are that stupid?

The chemistry between Johnson and Blunt isn’t convincing enough to make Frank and Lily look like they could be in a real long-lasting relationship. Sparring partners in arguments? Yes. But as romantic partners? No. “Jungle Cruise” tries very hard to make it look like Frank and Lily are a great couple. But after this trip is over, it’s hard to imagine that Frank and Lily would enjoy each other’s company and have a lot to talk about in their everyday lives.

In “Jungle Cruise,” Johnson and Blunt do versions of characters that they’ve already played in other movies. There’s nothing fresh or intriguing about their “Jungle Cruise” performances. Johnson just isn’t very good at portraying someone from an era that happened before he was born. The way he talks and his mannerisms are better suited for roles that take place in his contemporary time period.

Everything about “Jungle Cruise” (which is inspired by the Jungle Cruise theme park ride at Disneyland and Disney World) is supposed to be fun, original and adventurous. Instead, too much of it looks and sounds over-calculated and ripped off from other movies. (And the hackneyed “Jungle Cruise” musical score by James Newton Howard is overbearing at times.)

There’s a pivotal scene in “Jungle Cruise” where an entire jungle lights up in purple, but it looks like it was copied from a pivotal scene in Pixar’s 2017 Oscar-winning film “Coco.” Simply put: “Jungle Cruise” takes no bold or creative risks when it could have. “Jungle Cruise” is more like “Jungle Snooze.”

Walt Disney Pictures will release “Jungle Cruise” in U.S. cinemas and at a premium extra cost on Disney+ on July 30, 2021. 

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