Just Chick Flicks Reviews The Princess & The Frog

Meet Tiana, Disney’s New Princess

The  classic fairy tale, The Frog Prince gets a modern-day retelling in Disney’s  The Princess and the Frog.  Set in Jazz Age New Orleans, The Princess & The Frog is kind of a fractured  fairy tale. But in this tale the princess is not waiting for the prince to come and save her. Tiana  has her own dreams and is willing to work hard to achieve them for herself. Tiana’s works two jobs as a waitress in order to make enough money to open her own restaurant. Broadway star Anika Noni Rose (Dreamgirls) is the voice of Tiana, Disney’s first African-American princess.

The Handsome Prince Naveen

The fun-loving and carefree Prince Naveen  (Bruno Campos) is tricked into being turned into a frog by the  Shadow Man, Dr. Facilier.  Naveen hopes he will be human again after kissing a princess. Instead,  when Tiana kisses him, she is turned into a frog. They head down river together with the help of a trumpet-playing alligator named Louis and a Cajun firefly with dental problems  named Ray to find Mama Odie, ‘the old blind lady who lives in a boat in a tree’ to break the spell.  Of course,  along the way they fall in love. But in the movies as in life its the journey that make it interesting.

A New Kind of Disney Princess

With wonderful original music by Randy Newman and featuring the voices of Terrence Howard, Oprah Winfrey and  John Goodman, The Princess & The Frog is also Disney’s first hand drawn animated movie to come along in many years. The Princess and the Frog soundtrack is full of Dixieland Jazz and Zydeco music that really makes you feel like you are in New Orleans.

I was really  anxious to see this movie. A lot had been made of the fact that Tiana was Disney’s “first African-American Princess”. But when you look at it, most of the princesses in Disney movies are from European fairy tales. Besides, we don’t have royalty in American.  And I doubt that any of the little girls watching this movie will notice or care.

Little Girls (and Big Girls) Love Princesses

I went on  Sunday afternoon and  was surprised to see a group of about 30 little girls in the three rows behind me. Oh my… a Princess and the Frog birthday party!  Their parents were passing out super-sized  Slushees,  M & M cookies, candy and popcorn. The trailers had not even started when the seat kicking started. I could tell this was only going to get worse. There they were,  3o potential princesses  filled to the brim with sugar and the anticipation of a beautiful new princess, a handsome prince and a happily ever after. Their little legs were just twitching with excitement.  So I moved up a few rows.

It was a good vantage point to observe how these young ladies enjoyed the movie. They were ages 6-12 and not that it matters, but they were white. It didn’t seem to matter to them that Tiana was a different color. She was pretty, she sang and wore pretty dresses. When she turned into a frog, she had big frog eyes and long eyelashes. To them a princess is a princess.