Knowing Me, Knowing You- Is This The Best You Can Do?

Rating: 4/10 (10 October 2008)

Donna Sheridan is an American expat running a small hotel on one of the Greek islands. Donna's daughter Sophie is getting married, and wants her father to give her away. Unfortunately, Sophie does not actually know who her father is. To make matters worse, even Donna (evidently something of a slut in her young days) does not know who Sophie's father is either, although she has managed to narrow it down to a shortlist of three:- Harry (British), Bill (Swedish) and Sam (American, although you wouldn't think so from Pierce Brosnan's accent). Unknown to Donna, Sophie invites all three men to the wedding. That's all the plot you need to know. The rest is just a series of excuses to sing one ABBA song after another. I'm just surprised they didn't make one of Donna's lovers a South American revolutionary named Fernando and thereby tick off another song.
I have a confession to make. I am probably the only heterosexual British male of my generation who likes ABBA, or at least who likes them in a straightforward way and not in an ironic, postmodernist spirit of "I know they're naff, but then naff is the new cool!" Even in their heyday in the seventies and eighties it was fashionable to sneer at them as uncool, and even I cannot deny that they wore some seriously bad costumes. (But what seventies pop star didn't?) To my mind, however, Andersson and Ulvaeus were in the same league as Lennon and McCartney, or Simon and Garfunkel, when it came to writing unforgettable pop tunes, even though my interest in the group may also have had something to do with the looks of its two female members.
Unfortunately, however, I cannot say I liked this film, and there are three main reasons why I didn't. The first is to do with the basic concept. In all great stage and screen musicals the principle is story first, songs second. The purpose of the songs is to serve the story by illustrating the thoughts and feelings of the characters. "Mamma Mia!" inverts this principle by putting the story at the service of the songs. ABBA's songs, of course, were individual pop songs written over a number of years. They were not written in order to tell a coherent story, so the only way a musical can be based around them is to concoct a very contrived plot.
Not all of ABBA's songs were cheerful ones; they also wrote their fair share of songs like "Chiquitita", "SOS" and "The Winner Takes It All", dealing with the pains of unhappy love affairs. "Mamma Mia!", however, like the song from which it takes its name, is quite remorselessly cheerful, the sort of film in which nothing seriously bad is allowed to happen. We hear all the above-mentioned songs, but in the context not of genuine unhappiness but merely of irritation at some trivial upset, which weakens their impact.
The second reason why I didn't like the film is to do with the songs themselves. Pop singers, provided the music is good enough, can often get away with dodgy lyrics, but in musicals the words take on greater importance. Benny and Bjorn may have been gifted musicians, but few would have considered them gifted lyricists. Contrary to popular belief, most of their songs were originally written in English ("Waterloo", written for the Eurovision Song Contest, was an exception), but all too often they sounded as though they had been written in Swedish and then translated into English by someone with a less than fluent grasp of either language. (Sample, from "When All is Said and Done":-
"In our lives we have walked some strange and lonely treks Slightly worn but dignified and not too old for sex").
Why the lovely Frida, in her mid-thirties at the time she performed this song, felt the need to deny that she was too old for sex is beyond me. Moreover, ABBA's lyrics do not always fit the music well; for example, "Knowing Me, Knowing You" (a song not performed in this film) is about divorce, but one would not have thought so from the catchy, upbeat melody.
My third reason has to do with the performances. It has long been taken for granted in the film industry that Meryl Streep can do just about anything demanded of her, but we now know there is an exception to that rule. She can't sing- at least not to the standard normally required of those aspiring to the leading role in a cinematic musical. Dame Meryl's attempt at "The Winner Takes it All", perhaps ABBA's most ambitious song, was particularly wanting. She was, however, not the worst singer on display here- there was some competition for that dubious distinction, but the honour must go either to Brosnan or Julie Walters. The exception was Amanda Seyfried (Sophie), who has a sweet and melodious voice, but she makes up for her above-average singing with some below-average acting. Her only techniques for expressing emotion are to open her wide blue eyes even wider and to flash her large but perfectly formed teeth. (Incidentally, Sophie's dazzling piano-keyboard dentition seems to give the lie to the idea that she has spent her whole life in Greece; Europeans generally do not share the American obsession with cosmetic dentistry).
No doubt anyone who goes to this film looking to have an undemanding good time will end up having one. Anyone, however, who is looking for more than that is likely to be disappointed. This is not a film that does great credit to those in it or, for that matter, to ABBA. 4/10