Following the successes of the likes of The Jungle Book and Beauty and the Beast, Disney and Guy Ritchie take on the rather unenviable task of recreating one of the best animated features of the last thirty years, 1992’s Aladdin, one of the diamonds in the rough of the Disney back-catalogue.
Mana Massoud is Aladdin and Will Smith is Genie in Disney’s live-action ALADDIN, directed by Guy Ritchie. Credit: Disney
The film focusses on the titular street-rat Aladdin (Mena Massoud) who happens to meet hit heir to the throne, Princess Jasmine on the streets of Agrabah during market day. They have an immediate bond, though Jasmine doesn’t reveal her true identity to the notorious thief. Meanwhile, back at the palace, Jasmine’s father, the Sultan (Navid Negahban), is attempting to find a suitor for his beloved daughter, eir to the throne of the kingdom. However, the grand vizier, Jafar (Marwan Kenzari) has other ideas and plans to overthrow the Sultan. He finds Aladdin trespassing in the palace one night so uses him to enter the mysterious Cave Of Wonders to locate a precious lamp, one that houses a magical genie who will grant his master three wishes.
Of course, Aladdin becomes the new owner of the lamp, sneaking it away from the grasp of Jafar, in the process gaining three wishes of his own.
Aladdin seems perfectly suited to the style of Ritchie, and the film does absorb and enchants from the off. The film is perfectly cast too, and in that, I include Smith who brings something fresh to the role of the genie. In what couldn’t have been an easy task, Smith puts his own unique stamp and doesn’t try to impersonate Williams’ performance, his own personality seeping through onto the screen.
Aladdin doesn’t differ massively from the source material, but there’s a lot of fun to be had with the new version. It’s always entertaining, well-staged and it’ll have you humming along to those all too familiar songs all over again.
Bonus features:
There are initial trailers for two of Disney’s big cinema releases, Maleficent: Mistress of Evil and Frozen II. These play automatically when the disc is loaded.
Once into the bonus features, there are quite a few features. First up is Mena Massoud’s video journal during the making of the movie. It’s quite an intimate look behind the scenes of the film which lasts for about ten minutes, largely shot by Massoud using a phone given to him by the production. There’s little involvement from Guy Ritchie but don’t worry, he gets his own segment, an eight-minute-long piece documenting his process of directing. The stand-out is a little insight into the ‘One Jump Ahead’ sequence near the start of the movie and his use of fast and slow-motion.
We also have another short bonus item; Alan Menken introducing a cut musical piece from the movies featuring Aladdin (Mena Massoud) and Princess Jasmine (Naomi Scott). The song is titled ‘Desert Moon’ and plays for just over a minute.
Then there’s another short featurette focussing in on Will Smith’s genie and even features footage of the original, Robin Williams. The short film documents Smith’s process in stepping into the unenviable shoes of Williams while also putting his own stamp on the character.
There are also deleted scenes, an unfunny bloopers reel and various music videos, including ‘Speechless’ by Naomi Scott, ‘A Whole New World’ by Zayn and Zhavia Ward, and ‘A Whole New World [Un Nundo Ideal]’ by Zayn and Becky G.
For a Disney release, this pretty decent line-up and worthy of a skip through once you’ve seen the main feature.
Aladdin is now available on Digital in HD and 4K Ultra HD™, 4K Ultra HD, 3D Blu-ray™, Blu-ray™, and DVD.
