My All Time Favorite Movies: ALADDIN

I have been toying with the idea of doing a series of posts on my all time favorite movies for a little while now. Working at a movie theater again has started all of these conversations about movies and I always love to hear what people have on their lists of favorite movies. I decided I would take my 20 favorite movies of all time and write a blog entry about each of them. There are no set qualifications for a movie to be on this list. These are simply my 20 favorite movies of all time. They will not be numbered. Do not assume that I am going in order from 20-1. I will probably do that starting at 10, but honestly 11-20 are not numbered. They kind of exist right outside of the top 10. A few things you will realize as the list goes on are how recent so many of them are, and how Americanized the list is. I make no apologies for this. I know most people who are deep into film as I am often have many movies from the pre-1970s on their lists, but you will only find 2 or 3 of those here. I do not dislike "classic" movies in any way, but they have never stuck with me as much. I respect the craft, but I am rarely left feeling like they are my favorite movies. I cannot really explain it further than that. I am not xenophobic, but when it comes to cinema, I just prefer the American Aesthetic. I have roughly 10 foreign films that I love, but they do not make it into this list. Again, it is just my personal taste. Each post will be labeled as "favorite ever" so you can easily find them as I go on. As always, I love to hear feedback, if not on my choices, on your choices for some of your favorite movies of all time. Okay, onto this week's post. Oh and there will probably be spoilers about each title on the list.

ALADDIN


It would be silly of my to try and concoct a best of all time list without including an animated film. There are so many excellent ones throughout history and they are often left behind for no real good reason. Animated movies are not a genre. They are a different way to tell a story in any genre. When I was thinking of this list, two animated movies made the final 40 and in going back and forth between Aladdin and Wall-E, I ultimately decided on the classic Disney Musical.

Aladdin is nothing but a street rat in the eyes of the world at large, but one day he helps a mysterious woman in the middle of town and she sees more than just a street rat. The problem is that she is actually the princess and a princess must marry a prince. Those are the rules. Jasmine, the princess in question, is making it very difficult for her father, the Sultan, to find a husband for her because she is tough, and independent and wants to marry for love and not because it is what she is supposed to do. This girl does not care about how much money you have. Aladdin is scooped up by the soldiers of the kingdom, but it is all a clever ruse by Jafar, the evil sorcerer who has the Sultan's ear. Jafar sends Aladdin into a magic cave to fetch a magic lamp, but Aladdin is no idiot and he winds up with the lamp and he ends up releasing a genie who grants Aladdin 3 wishes. Aladdin only wants to be a prince so he can marry Princess Jasmine.

Aladdin is a colorful, vibrant musical with perfect voice work from Robin Williams and a wonderful cast of characters. The characters are so great three of them do not even speak, but still have buckets and buckets or personality. You have an angry monkey, a playful magic carpet and a loyal tiger who do not speak, but still manage to be fully realized characters. Add them to the perfect Genie, a sarcastic talking parrot, a truly wonderful villain and two wonderful leads and you have everything you need for a magically perfect musical. Aladdin moves quickly; it has thrilling, daring action sequences and a whooper of a climatic action sequence. However, it is more than just that. It has wonderful, memorable tunes, a sharp funny script and the animation is still wonderful today. I love how fluid everything is once the movie gets going.

"Friend like me" is one of those instantly classic umtempo musical theater dance numbers and the colors and creatures that pop out during that number are so much fun that it is impossible not to get wrapped up in them. There are a few of those fun musical numbers, but the movie also has one of Disney's best love songs "A Whole New World." It is my absolute favorite Disney love song, but more than that, it tells a great story in the movie and allows for the animators to tell a wonderful little story as this romantic song is being sung. The movie has dazzling vocals throughout, but the subtlety of "A Whole New World" will win me over every damn time. You also get the great opening number "One Jump" which offers a fun introduction to the Aladdin and Abu characters and of course, "Prince Ali" the number that I would love to see staged live because it is just full of great character moments for the Genie, but also boasts an impressive number of people/animals. It is hard for me to understand how anyone could not love the music of this film. All of the songs are witty in their lyrics and catchy in their melodies and they all fit perfectly into the movie.

Last but not least there is the comedy. Robin Williams riffing throughout the movie is Robin Williams at his best. He has had richer parts, and done great work in many other movies, but for my money, this is film utilizes Robin Williams in the way Robin Williams was meant to be utilized. His zingers are top notch even 20 years later. His voices are great and he just makes the Genie such an insanely likable character. However, he is not the sole laugh giver. Gilbert Gottfried is perfectly cast as the snarky parrot, Iago. His lines are incredibly memorable. In fact, one of my favorite things about Aladdin is how memorable it all is. I used to have the whole thing completely memorized and even now, that I do not watch it as frequently, I can still remember giant chunks of hilarious, or witty or even frightening dialogue. I am not going to say Jafar is the creepiest of Disney villains, because I can think of 2 or 3 that outdo him in that department, but he is more lecherous. He just oozes nastiness and watching him gain control, is such a dark force and I loved it.

Aladdin is fun for everyone. It is hilarious, has great music and a timeless story about love being just about loving the person and not what the person is supposed to be. It has a strong female princess, a wonderfully charismatic "prince" and a great bunch of supporting roles including Robin Williams whose performance as Genie is one of the all time best voice over performances in cinematic history, in my opinion. Everyone has their rankings of Disney animated movies and I understand everyone is different, but if Aladdin is not in your top 5, we probably have a problem with each other. I am never not in the mood to watch Aladdin,and that is key to being one of my favorite movies of all time.