Depending on who you ask, Disney Animation had been inconsistent (at best) with the quality of their films between the mid 1960’s and the late 1980’s. Eleven films had been created using exactly the same style of animation, and the ideas were clearly running thin even when they adapting other material. So even though Disney had rarely failed to turn a profit with their films, people were starting to become disenfranchised from the company’s major animated films because it seemed as though the magic had died out aside from a few sparks of brilliance here and there. But then The Little Mermaid happened, and what this single film did for Disney was enough to not only restore faith in the company, but become a trendsetter in the world of animation, and led to what is widely considered to be the strongest ten years of Disney animation of all time. Ladies and Gentlemen, welcome to the Disney Renaissance.
Inspired by the Hans Christian Andersen fairy tale of the same name, The Little Mermaid follows the mermaid princess Ariel (Jodi Benson) as she longs to escape from her life in the underwater city of Atlantica to join the humans on land, dance and sing with them, and fall in love with the handsome prince Eric (Christopher Daniel Barnes) whom she saves from drowning. Seeing an opportunity in this, the sea witch Ursula (Pat Carroll) bargains with Ariel to allow her dream to come true, with Ariel unknowingly putting her family and city in danger by doing so.
Inspired by the Hans Christian Andersen fairy tale of the same name, The Little Mermaid follows the mermaid princess Ariel (Jodi Benson) as she longs to escape from her life in the underwater city of Atlantica to join the humans on land, dance and sing with them, and fall in love with the handsome prince Eric (Christopher Daniel Barnes) whom she saves from drowning. Seeing an opportunity in this, the sea witch Ursula (Pat Carroll) bargains with Ariel to allow her dream to come true, with Ariel unknowingly putting her family and city in danger by doing so.
The Little Mermaid sees Disney’s return to form in many facets. Firstly, it’s the first Disney Princess film since Sleeping Beauty in 1959, with Disney Studio’s Chairman Jeffrey Katzenberg finally being convinced that a film with a female protagonist would not be a box office bomb. Secondly, the film had more money pumped into it than any other Disney animation in years, allowing for an entirely new art style (after the Xerography method Disney had been using for so long had been widely criticised for looking outdated, and even re-using several animation assets from film to film). Thirdly, thanks to the positive reception of Oliver & Company’s musical numbers, The Little Mermaid would double down on original musical numbers with the soundtrack being a core component to driving the film’s success. It was a big risk for sure, but it was one that audiences had wanted for years and it was critically adored and incredibly financially successful as well as even earning itself a couple of Oscars for Best Original Score and Best Original Song for ‘Under the Sea’.
The script is superb to The Little Mermaid, with Ariel being the first Disney protagonist in years to be truly relatable and show true character progression over the course of the story. She is the instigator in all of the events that happen and the drama that occurs because of it stems from her naivety, but she doesn’t take these mistakes lightly and instead is determined to fix things, unlike many Disney protagonists beforehand who simply allowed everybody else to fix the problems and were just along for the ride.
The side characters are just and interesting and Atlantica is given a good amount of development as a place. King Triton, Ariel’s father, is a stern but loving man who will do anything to ensure his daughter’s safety, but he’s also hilariously hopeless at connecting with them. He doesn’t understand them, and all the advice he receives is so awful, but he grows with each mistake just as Ariel does, eventually bringing them both together at the end, finally understanding one another.
Ursula is also a great villain, there’s a reason she has lived on in the hall of Disney infamy for so long. She’s so intimidating, yet also incredibly charismatic. Her musical number, ‘Poor Unfortunate Souls’ is probably my favourite of the entire film with its sinister undertones but deceptively sincere delivery.
The script is superb to The Little Mermaid, with Ariel being the first Disney protagonist in years to be truly relatable and show true character progression over the course of the story. She is the instigator in all of the events that happen and the drama that occurs because of it stems from her naivety, but she doesn’t take these mistakes lightly and instead is determined to fix things, unlike many Disney protagonists beforehand who simply allowed everybody else to fix the problems and were just along for the ride.
The side characters are just and interesting and Atlantica is given a good amount of development as a place. King Triton, Ariel’s father, is a stern but loving man who will do anything to ensure his daughter’s safety, but he’s also hilariously hopeless at connecting with them. He doesn’t understand them, and all the advice he receives is so awful, but he grows with each mistake just as Ariel does, eventually bringing them both together at the end, finally understanding one another.
Ursula is also a great villain, there’s a reason she has lived on in the hall of Disney infamy for so long. She’s so intimidating, yet also incredibly charismatic. Her musical number, ‘Poor Unfortunate Souls’ is probably my favourite of the entire film with its sinister undertones but deceptively sincere delivery.
The film looks fantastic too. The new animation style was the true breath of life that Disney animation needed after using Xerography for so long. The Little Mermaid is rich with colour, the character models move in entirely new and much smoother ways than before, and the dashes of 3D computer animation only add to the experience. The lighting is also very impressive in The Little Mermaid, with the stark contrast between being underwater and being on land being immediately recognisable thanks to the way the light interacts with the environment. It’s a small touch that you won’t notice unless you’re really looking, but for 1989 it’s incredibly impressive.
Whilst The Little Mermaid isn’t in my list of favourite Disney films, it’s easy to see why it is a lot of people’s favourite, and why it was responsible for bringing the studio out of the dark ages. Almost every aspect of the film has had a massive amount of care and attention put into it, more than any other Disney film in many years prior to its release. The little Mermaid was a turning point for Disney animation, and the company as a whole, as it’s this film that triggered the change into what the studio is today. And even when looked at in the wider scope of the film industry, The Little Mermaid signified a movement towards musically driven, near Broadway levels of production value, with an emphasis on characters and how they shape the story around their actions. An incredibly important milestone in the history of animation.
Whilst The Little Mermaid isn’t in my list of favourite Disney films, it’s easy to see why it is a lot of people’s favourite, and why it was responsible for bringing the studio out of the dark ages. Almost every aspect of the film has had a massive amount of care and attention put into it, more than any other Disney film in many years prior to its release. The little Mermaid was a turning point for Disney animation, and the company as a whole, as it’s this film that triggered the change into what the studio is today. And even when looked at in the wider scope of the film industry, The Little Mermaid signified a movement towards musically driven, near Broadway levels of production value, with an emphasis on characters and how they shape the story around their actions. An incredibly important milestone in the history of animation.