★★★★☆
The holiday shutdown at my client site happily coincided with GameFly sending me Mamma Mia! Here We Go Again. I know, some critics give this only 2 stars, but I have to give it a full 4 stars.
This is a big block o’ cheese and it revels in that fact. It is such good cheese too! If you are of a certain age, old enough to remember ABBA actually being on the radio when their songs were new, this is a wistful bit of fun well worth all of the calories and cholesterol one gets from consuming savory cheese.
My only nit with this otherwise happy time was Amanda Seyfried played both her own character and the young Meryl Streep during the flashbacks. The fact we bounce back and forth quite a bit initially made this a bit confusing for me. Okay, I understand. Casting had a bitch of a time trying to find a woman who looked like a young Meryl Street and could sing.
One can almost forgive them for using the same actress for both parts. If they could have made her look different it would have helped those of us walking into the movie cold.
Thankfully they didn’t have Pierce Brosnan sing solo again, only as part of a group for backing vocals. Love most of your roles dude, but, I’m probably the only singer in the world worse than you. Thankfully the creators of this movie didn’t force you into that this time.
I gotta say, Cher appearing at the end is phenom. Nice twist! Nope, not going to give it away. That lady still has pipes.
Thinking about it now, Cher and ABBA are probably the two most enduring sounds for people over Forty. Yes, there are many famous bands, but, you didn’t live at a time when we had only a handful of radio stations across the country. During the late 60s and early 70s if a radio station wanted to survive on advertising it had to be MOR (Middle of the Road). During that time radio stations were basically genre-less. The guiding principle was “if it’s good it gets played.” Nothing too loud, nothing too hard, all middle of the road.
Cher had an awful lot of tunes hitting that sweet spot during that time frame. If you don’t believe me and happen to be over forty, rent yourself a copy of “Cher – The Farewell Tour” where she sings an awful lot of them. Even had a few which pushed the norms of social and political bounds of the day like “Half breed.”
ABBA also managed to hit this sweet spot even during the regrettable disco era. If you don’t believe that then snag yourself a copy of “ABBA Gold” and “More ABBA Gold“.
Until I started writing this I didn’t even know Cher put out an ABBA cover album in 2018.
So, as you beach yourself on the couch with a hang over this New Year’s Day, rent “Mamma Mia! Here We Go Again” and feast on a big block of fantastic cheese with timeless music. You need a bit of Norman Rockwell to make the pain go away and that’s as close as we can get these days.
For more movie rental ideas please see list one and list two.
