Welcome to another double feature!
This time we are looking at adaptations and how well the 1982 Annie and the 2014 Annie compares. I have never seen the Broadway musical so I can’t compare to that experience.
Annie (1982)
Director: John Huston
Cast: Aileen Quinn, Albert Finney, Carol Burnett, Ann Reinking, Tim Curry, Bernadette Peters
A young orphan girl’s adventures in finding a family that will take her. – IMDB
Annie is a movie that hear of a lot but never got around to seeing. Its quite weird since I love musicals a lot and watch and rewatch them throughout the year. Annie is a really fun movie especially with the subject it deals with like an orphan waiting for her parents to get her at the orphanage run by a mean woman. However, Annie is never a sad movie buy rather a very charming one although sometimes the long runtime might be where it suffers a little. The songs are fun and catchy which is pretty important since this is a musical.
Aileen Quinn as Annie is a great choice. She truly comes alive on screen and makes us believe in Annie who is a positively bright ray of sunshine to everyone around her. She appreciates what she has and fights to protect those in need and knows how to find a way to stay hopeful no matter what. Her fascination with the world around her under Warbucks care is really cool to watch. However, the orphanage kids are all very fun to watch. My favorite two songs are the scenes with them for Never Fully Dressed Without a Smile and Its a Hard Knock Life.
The 1982 Annie is almost destined for success as it does have quite the brilliant cast. Albert Finney plays as Warbucks, a billionaire who believes in making money and capitalism until he meets Annie who opens his eyes to what he is missing. Daddy Warbucks is great and it goes all the way to creating memorable characters in his bodyguards, Punjab and The Asp. While I haven’t seen Ann Reinking in anything else, she also has such a wonderful role with Grace Farrell, who plays the private secretary/assistant and really forms a bond with Annie.
There was the surprise of seeing Tim Curry as Rooster. I absolutely love Tim Curry because he has an art of naturally capturing all the roles he does so incredibly well. The same applies for Rooster who really doesn’t have much depth other than being the greedy brother. Of course, we can’t forget the mean and yet very entertaining Miss Hannigan played by Carol Burnett, whose voice reminded me that I hadn’t seen Horton Hears a Who in forever and should soon.
Overall, I love Annie. I’m not a fan of the length and some of the songs I didn’t really care for but overall, it was a lot of fun.
Annie (2014)
Director: Will Gluck
Cast: Quvenzhané Wallis, Jamie Foxx, Cameron Diaz, Rose Byrne, Bobby Cannavale
A foster kid, who lives with her mean foster mom, sees her life change when business tycoon and New York mayoral candidate Will Stacks makes a thinly-veiled campaign move and takes her in. – IMDB
The 2014 modernized remake of Annie was a shorter affair than the original. While it still held some nice songs and changed the orphan to foster kid and even readapted the songs to work with that. They took out some songs and added some new ones. However, the songs are still decent and delivered for the most part alright.
Other than still liking the kids and wishing their role still was more, Quvenzhane Wallis truly does stand out as Annie. I haven’t seen Beasts in the Southern Wild yet so this is the first movie I have seen her in. Her modern parallel to Annie and Sandy being a beautiful Hachi dog was really great and possibly the best part in the movie. At the same time, while Rose Byrne and Jamie Foxx are both great actors. I can’t say that I particularly loved or hated them. They were okay however, also at moments felt awkward.
While Cameron Diaz has had some comedic roles in her career and even as someone who doesn’t always like the roles she plays, her role as Miss Hannigan was just way over the top and just too much that many times, it felt annoying. The same goes to the shallow character that is the equivalent of Rooster in the 1983 version but now is the PR guy for Warbucks to help him become the New York mayor which is played by Bobby Cannavale. I remember watching this guy before and him doing some other movies where I did like him but I honestly can’t remember anymore what they are.
Something about this remake felt like it was lacking some charm that the original had. Even if we put the comparison apart, there were some great moments in this movie and some nice choreography however, it did have a lot of moments that didn’t work well either.
Tranquil Dreams 