Annie (2014, PG)

I was intrigued by this movie as soon as I heard the first rumors about it, and the trailer left me charmed and excited.  Unfortunately, the end result is an incredibly middling film on the lower end of the movie musical spectrum.  It has its good points, and I’m not sorry I saw it, but it’s not nearly what I’d hoped it would be.

In this updated version of the Depression-era story, Annie is one of five plucky foster kids unlucky enough to be saddled with Miss Hannigan, a boozy failed pop star who only fosters for the extra cash.  After a chance encounter with mobile mogul/mayoral candidate Will Stacks, our curly-headed hero is taken in by the billionaire, and what begins as a PR stunt naturally becomes something more genuine.  There are a number of new plot elements, many of which don’t quite work, but I appreciate the film’s effort to do something different with the story.

The best thing about the movie is Quvenzhané Wallis as Annie.  She’s so fun and likeable in the role – charming, savvy, and, of course, adorable.  I enjoy seeing her inventive problem-solving techniques, and she’s just generally so winning; if I were an emotionally-distant billionaire, I’d want to adopt her, too.  I also like her ragtag collection of foster sisters (“It’s a Hard-Knock Life” is easily the best number in the film,) Bobby Cannavale does a fine job as Stacks’s unscrupulous PR guy, and I was pleasantly surprised to see Tracie Thoms (Mahandra from Wonderfalls) pop up in a small role.

The best adjective I have for the singing is “lackluster.”  For the most part, the voices range from mediocre to awkward, and most of the songs aren’t filmed with much life.  I like the creative devices used for some of the numbers, especially “Little Girls,” and I like the way songs have been rearranged or rewritten to better suit the modern-day setting, but “It’s a Hard-Knock Life” is the only one that feels like a proper musical performance, energetic with a lot of personality.  Though Wallis isn’t a remarkable singer, she sounds perfectly passable – in her case, the trouble is the spark.  When she’s acting, she’s like a miniature charisma-bomb, but I don’t see that same engaging spunkiness when she starts singing.  I don’t know if it’s the direction, lip-syncing or sound-mixing issues, or maybe just nervousness about her singing, but she doesn’t feel as much like Annie during the numbers.  And she’s far from the only one; Bobby Cannavale has a similarly well-defined screen presence, but he seems listless during his one song.

For me, my favorite Annie is actually the TV movie from the late ‘90s.  It’s astonishingly imperfect (and honestly, so is the stage show,) but I enjoy it, and watching this movie made me nostalgic for the likes of Victor Garber, Alan Cumming, and Audra McDonald.

Warnings

Some drinking, a few veiled references to sexual content, and a bit of gross-out humor.