With a good cast and an enviable and appealing soundtrack, the film promised to be excellent… but it turned out to be much more average than I imagined.
First of all, I think I need to make a note: I can't say that I'm an ABBA fan, but the truth is that I have a great affection for the band and their songs, because they were songs that I remember hearing on TV when I was a kid. It is a childhood memory, which has a sentimental charge, and which cannot be evaluated in a completely neutral way (childhood memories never leave us neutral).
I have yet to say that I had high expectations for the film. I'm not just talking about the music and the various songs I remember listening to, but also the enormous quality of the cast selected for the project, and the active participation of elements of the former band in the production. It was something that promised to have great quality. Well, the film has its qualities, it's undeniable, but the truth is that I noticed some laziness and sloppiness in the production, in several aspects.
The film's biggest problem was the absence of a well-written script that could support the action and songs. In addition to the slew of summer movie clichés, the script copied an old Italian movie called Buona Sera Mrs. Campbell, whose action is based on the dubious parenting of the protagonist's daughter, played by Gina Lollobrigida. I cannot say that we are in a situation of plagiarism because there are many films about children that do not know their parents, but the lack of originality is remarkable. Also, the film seems to almost make the apology of sexual promiscuity! In the midst of an uncomplicated, light, “hippie” environment, the film puts the main character’s mother in an embarrassing situation: she is the single mother of a daughter who grew up not knowing her father because there are three possible “candidates”, with whom she got involved almost simultaneously! And I'd rather not talk about that scene where a mature woman flirts with a guy much younger than her!
Jumping from Broadway to Hollywood, Phyllida Lloyd assured a sincere, but not excellent, effort at the direction. She was not able to demand more from her crew, she allowed a very poor conception of the characters and the choice of actors was not at all happy from the moment they had to sing. The best choices were Amanda Seyfried and Meryl Streep, two solid, charismatic, expressive actresses with an excellent voice. The scenes in which the two are protagonists, speaking or singing, are among the best in the film, which was an excellent bet that Seyfried made in her career. Stellan Skarsgard did reasonably well, but I felt he had little to do, and so Colin Firth... in fact, this English actor, whose voice is not particularly pleasant, already seemed to me to be a dubious choice for a musical. However, he looked like an opera diva when compared to Pierce Brosnan or Julie Walters. The ex-Bond has great difficulty with the treble and sings almost in falsetto, and Walters can't sing without starting to scream.
Technically, the film isn't brilliant either. On the positive side, we have the elegant cinematography, with the sun, the sea and the scenic beauty of the Greek islands favoring the visuals (we have to agree that the filming locations were wonderfully used), as well as the well-conceived sets and costumes. But the film's strong point is the soundtrack, of course, with an abundant list of ABBA songs, so famous that we can sing the entire movie. However, the insertion of each song in the film leaves a lot to be desired, something that, along with somewhat artificial choreography, leaves us with the feeling that the film is almost a gigantic music video clip, with the script being just an excuse for the songs to appear successively.