'Mamma Mia' exuberant, goofy

Christy Lemire
Associated Press

July 17, 2008 09:10 pm

— ABBA songs are, of course, evil in musical form.
Just try getting “Dancing Queen” out of your head once it’s burrowed its way in there. “Waterloo,” too, is especially pesky. But “Mamma Mia” might be the most tenacious tune in the 1970s Swedish pop group’s canon.
The insanely catchy hit inspired a hugely successful Broadway musical a decade ago and now is the basis for a big, summer movie. “Mamma Mia!” is a massive mess, but it’s fun — exuberantly goofy, sloppily crafted fun, especially if you’re not in the mood for thinking too hard.
Phyllida Lloyd, who directed the stage production, makes her filmmaking debut here, and her years of directing opera and theater don’t seem to transfer well to the big screen. Some shots look totally green-screen fake; sometimes shadows obscure the actors and at other times the lighting is so flat and bright, it makes everything look like some low-budget effort airing on PBS. And the excessive use of zooms was probably unnecessary, unless Lloyd was aiming for a kitschy 1970s vibe — a movie version of an ABBA video, perhaps (although the story is set in 1999).
If “Mamma Mia!” works on any level at all, it’s through the sheer radiance of Meryl Streep, clearly having a blast letting loose as its star, the former rocker chick Donna. Watching the woman who is considered the greatest actress of our time writhing around in overalls on top of a barn or belting out numbers in a sparkly, spandex jumpsuit and platform boots can indeed be a hoot.
Streep was a fan of the Broadway show, and her passion and enthusiasm explode on screen. She can indeed sing, a talent that’s been on display in bits and pieces in previous movies, most recently Robert Altman’s “A Prairie Home Companion.”
Amanda Seyfried (“Mean Girls,” “Big Love”) is also solid as Donna’s daughter, Sophie, who is getting married on a Greek island and invites three of Donna’s former flames to determine which one is Sophie’s father.
And yet the songs are the whole point, the reason crowds have been flocking to this show for years, and the reason the “Mamma Mia!” movie probably will turn out to be an enormous crowd-pleaser. No, most of the actors can’t sing and none of them has anything approaching a Broadway-caliber voice, but they know that, and they know that we know that, and all that knowing gives the film a sort of roughhewn charm.