It’s no exaggeration to say that the original Disney animated The Little Mermaid changed how I viewed movies. Seeing it when it came out in theaters in 1989 as a little kid (yes, I realize this ages me an older millennial) made me realize that movies aren’t just something you watch to pass the time while recovering your energy between play sessions. Movies could be an entire event, one that you look forward to, even plan your life around. I still can’t quite describe it, but there was just something about this one that made it stand out from my favorite classic Disney films of old. Something that spoke to my generation and sensibilities that made it new and fresh. Obviously, I wasn’t the only one feeling this, as The Little Mermaid is noted by film historians to have started the era known as the “Disney Renaissance”, saving Disney from potential bankruptcy after a string of animated films that did less than stellar in the box office. From that moment on until I was well into high school, I looked forward with earnestness to Disney’s yearly animated offering.

After many attempts to recreate their magic formula through live action remakes (many of which I’ve reviewed), it’s finally The Little Mermaid’s turn. During the “Coral Moon” celestial event, King Triton (Javier Bardem), ruler of the merpeople of Atlantica, meets with his daughters, the rulers of the seven seas. He immediately noticed that his youngest daughter, Ariel (Halle Bailey), was missing while exploring a shipwreck. Due to Triton’s prohibition, she has never seen the surface world, despite her fascination with it. Ariel collects human objects with the support of her best friend, Flounder (Jacob Tremblay), a sergeant major, and Scuttle (Awkwafina), a Northern gannet. She sees fireworks above the ocean and surfaces to take a closer look. Fireworks are fired from the ship of Prince Eric (Jonah Hauer-King), a prince of a Caribbean island kingdom. Eric tells Grimsby (Art Malik), the Prime Minister, that he wishes to explore the unknown and help his people. Triton questions his advisor 1Sebastian the crab (Daveed Diggs) and learns of Ariel’s obsession with humans. In Ariel’s grotto, Triton confronts her; when she refuses to agree not to go to the surface again, he destroys her collection of human objects. Upon Triton’s departure, Ariel is approached by moray eels who show her an image of the sea witch Ursula (Melissa McCarthy), Triton’s estranged younger sister and Ariel’s aunt who was banished from Atlantica 15 years ago. She offers to assist Ariel, striking a deal to give her legs for walking on land in exchange for her voice. The Little Mermaid is directed by Rob Marshall (Chicago, Memoirs of a Geisha, Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides) and written by David Magee (Finding Neverland, Life of Pi, Mary Poppins Returns.)

As always, my expectations for any live action remake is a mix of fear and optimism. And this movie, as previously mentioned, is an extremely important one to get right for me. I can now confidently say, they did a pretty good job at it. I will immediately silence any of the haters and insist that the casting Halle Bailey as Ariel was one of the best things about this movie. She absolutely was Ariel, from her gorgeous princess-like singing voice, her cute mannerisms, and even her rebellious teenage attitude. I absolutely can’t wait to see her in future works, but I’ll admit, it’s going to be hard for me to not forever see her as Ariel. On the same note, I can’t help but to fall in love with Jonah Hauer-King’s Eric. He is every bit as dreamy as little girl me imagined he would be, while adding a much more interesting personality than the animated movies would allow. In general, everyone was wonderfully cast. Javier Bardem was both intimidating, yet gently funny as Triton. And while I will still say Melissa’s McCathy was a great choice for Ursula and nailed the evil aspect well, I do wish she brought in just about 30% more of the sheer fabulousness of the original.

There are some other minor criticisms I have with the film that I couldn’t quite shake, no matter how happy the overall result made me. The underwater animated sequences, mainly during the “Under the Sea” musical number, as pretty as they were to look at, fell somewhat short. I think the problem lies in the difference in the original cartoony design of the sea creatures as opposed to the somewhat realistic design of the remake. The original lyrics and script were written for a much more fantastical direction. Taking essentially the same lyrics and applying them to realistic fish, (as colorful as they still are) just doesn’t have the same impact. I think overall, I enjoyed the parts of the film that took place on land much more than the underwater parts. Ironically, the parts that were on land were much prettier and more interesting to watch, weras the underwater parts just felt like they were paying the necessary homage to the original because fans would have formed an angry protest mob otherwise.

While adding a good 40 or so minutes to the runtime of the original animated film, I was surprised how little they actually changed with the story. I’m even more surprised that the small changes they did make were some of my favorite parts of the movie. Ariel and Eric get far more (and very much welcome) romantic moments together. The two actor’s chemistry with each other was just adorable, and gave me an old school rom-com vibe I didn’t realize I’ve been missing from the media as of late. Quite predictably of me, I loved the additional songs composed by everyone’s favorite contemporary Broadway composer, Lin Manuel-Miranda. Though, besides Scuttle’s song which definitely sounded like a Manuel-Miranda piece, I was pleased how old school Disney/Broadway the other new songs were, fitting quite well with original composer Alan Menken’s style. (Technically they composed the new pieces together, so I guess that makes sense.)

I’ll be honest, by the ending sequence I was tearing up almost as much as I did in the theaters seeing it for the first time as a little kid. Beside’s Mufasa’s death in The Lion King remake (sorry for the spoiler, guys) that is the only time a live action Disney remake has managed to give me as strong of emotion as I felt seeing it for the first time. My inner 5 year old girl was absolutely ecstatic. While I still don’t think remake of The Little Mermaid will give Disney the same renaissance breath of fresh air as the original, it absolutely did justice to the source material. I absolutely recommend it if you want to bring your favorite kids to see a Disney classic on the big screen, or if you just want to sing along to “Part of Your Word” and pretend like you have a fishtail like I did.