Whoever thought 007 should even try to sing, dance, or act, well, I hope they are as embarrassed as I was watching him.
I give the movie one star, which goes mostly to Meryl Streep (one ray to be shared between Stellan Skarsgard and Julie Walters).
It made me want to see again the other ABBA movie: Muriel's Wedding (Australia, 1994), which used ABBA's pure pop melodies as a backdrop for a story of despair, real ugliness, and, whew, thank God, finally transformation, and pulled it off. The twenty-one-year-old Toni Collette, right, (who in 2006 so perfectly played the mother in Little Miss Sunshine), is astonishing as the fat girl Muriel so desperate for love she will sell herself out, who finally gains some dignity. And she acts without showing it.
That's one thing about Meryl Streep's acting I'm not keen about--when I watch her act, I too often think, "Oh, well done!" It's no different in Mama Mia, except that this time I also felt grateful to her.
