Aladdin Review: 4 Ups & 5 Downs
Will Smith saves Aladdin from disaster.
Guy Ritchie's Aladdin hits cinemas worldwide this week, and if the film's rather dubious set of trailers weren't discouraging enough, Disney opted to hold all reviews until the very day it was released in the UK.
To the surprise of few, this live-action adaptation of Disney's classic 1992 animation is quite the mess, with most early reviews sitting in the mixed-to-positive range so far.
It's fair to say that Ritchie's film isn't close to the catastrophic disaster that fans expected from its earlier trailers, but it's also not a particularly persuasive argument for Disney remaking all of their animated classics in live-action form.
Some solid central performances combine with an undeniable nostalgia factor to paper over some of this Aladdin's conceptual flaws, but you'll need a strong love for the source material to make it to the end with your patience in tact.
With both Dumbo and Aladdin scoring mixed notices from critics and fans alike, hopefully Jon Favreau's The Lion King might break the rule of threes later this summer...