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Mamma Mia

Fun movie, though a few weak fundamentals prevented it from being memorable for more than the music.

• Character

Three women and three men in their mid 40s and up are all single, only one (Pierce Brosnan) having had a serious relationship. Do you know what that makes them? Losers. And who cares about losers?

Sophie said her life wasn’t complete as long as she didn’t know who her father was. Problem was, she said this and we didn’t see how exactly she was affected. This was a huge flaw, showing us in the set-up how her life was incomplete would have easily and quickly created empathy in the audience.

• Structure/Plot

The story started from Sophie’s POV- she invited her potential fathers- but then switched to her mother’s, Donna. While it was good to give all the characters screen time and depth, a unified perspective and line of action would have kept things in order.

• Logic

Tied in to the above, Sophie’s plan was quite haphazard. Why on earth did she invite the men to stay in/near the hotel when she wanted to keep them a secret from her mother? The simpler thing would have been to set them up at a remote location on the island. As is, the movie stumbled badly early on- when Merryl Streep and all the women broke into a song and dance routine (the one ending where she pushes her sister into the water), how did Sophie not see it? Her absence needed to be explained.

The deeper issue with Sophie’s plan is that she didn’t do anything (aside from initially looking at the men in an inquisitive way) to determine who was her father. This led to a passive pace to the story when it started off as active. The obvious thing would have been a blood test and the movie didn’t even mention it. After that, she could’ve looked for physical and emotional similarities between her and one of the men. But no.

• The end

Sophie learned to feel that her identity is not tied to her biological father and accepted each of the three as 1/3 her father. What nonsense and a cop-out! Even though she was not raised by a father, the reality is that the vast majority of people raised without one of the parents are missing something.

Sophie and her groom called off the wedding so they can explore the world. As if newlyweds cannot? I know, the story tried to say that she was getting married mainly to latch onto the male figure she never had, but that was vague and illogical based on most of the above.

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