Movie Review Into the Woods

Into the Woods (2014) 

Directed by Rob Marshall 

Written by James LaPine 

Starring Meryl Streep, James Corden, Emily Blunt, Chris Pine, Johnny Depp, Anna Kendrick

Release Date December 25th, 2014

Published December 21st 2014 

“Into the Woods" is a shrill, monotonous mess of a movie.

Director Rob Marshall has followed up the self indulgent tragedy that was 2010's "Nine" with an even more full-of-itself, or just plain full of it, musical adaptation. The difference this time is that he has buried a good deal of big money talent under his hack direction. 

"Into the Woods" stars Meryl Streep as an over-the-top street performer - ahem, I mean a fairy tale witch - who tasks a baker (James Corden) and his wife (Emily Blunt), with obtaining several magical items. These objects will help the witch to lift a curse, which is preventing the couple from having a child, is one she placed on the baker’s family years earlier. 

The items include a cow of milky white, a cape as red as blood, hair as yellow as corn and a slipper of … something or other. I lost track as I stopped giving a damn. These items, naturally, already have owners including a boy, Jack (Daniel Huttlestone), who believes his cow is his best friend; a nasally singing, irksome girl, Red Riding Hood (Lilla Crawford); and Cinderella (Anna Kendrick). 

Each of these story threads eventually coalesce into something of a story, but not without various distractions, including the entirely unnecessary inclusion of Rapunzel (Mackenzie Mauzy) and her prince suitor (Billy Magnusson), whose presence has literally nothing to do with the other stories going on. Indeed, the one attempt to rope Rapunzel into the main plot is literally discarded just a few short scenes later. 

Then there is Chris Pine as another prince who is continually abandoned by Kendrick's Cinderella. He too will be discarded from the main plot without much effect before the film is over, but not before he's rendered his entire plot meaningless by turning into a minor villain, a character trait that also has little bearing on the main plot. 

Oh, and did I mention there are giants? Yes, dear reader, this movie that is packed to the gills with needless characters seems fit to toss in a giant in the final act, even after it had reached a fitting, if somewhat abrupt, happy ending. The giant is a tacked-on bit of plot intended to underline something about fairy tales … blah, blah, blah. I truly stopped caring by this point. 

Somehow, I have made it this far without raising the most offensive topic of "Into the Woods," which is Johnny Depp's uber-creepy Big Bad Wolf. Yes, I get that he is a villainous character, but was it necessary for his villainy to carry a child-rape subtext? Just take a moment to ponder these lyrics and tell me I'm overreacting: 

"Look at that flesh, pink and plump. Hello Little Girl" 

"Tender and fresh, (Sniff), not one lump. Hello Little Girl" 

Later, Red Riding Hood herself sings a song that underlines the awful subtext and takes it a step further on the creep-meter:

"He showed me many beautiful things" (What did he show her? Flowers? That's just about flowers?) "Then he bared his teeth and I got really scared, well excited and scared." (Excited? Why would she be excited? She's about to be killed in the surface context, so why is she excited?)

"But he drew me close, and he swallowed me down, down a dark slimy path where lies secrets I never want to know." (What exactly is the context of that?) 

Later Red Riding Hood sings about how she should have listened to her mother and never strayed from her path. The implication: What happened to Red was her own fault. Accuse me of overreacting all you want, but the Red Riding Hood story has long been contextualized as being about a young girl's sexual coming of age. Just ask the French.

Putting aside the creep-tastic Wolf, you still have an ungainly mess of a movie that doesn't know how to end and is overpopulated with unnecessary characters and nonsensical talk-singing. "Into the Woods' ' is a shrill disaster of a fairy-tale musical; one of the worst movies of 2014.