High School Musical 3!

I'd better start off right up front admitting that I get just as excited as my kids about High School Musical. (OK-- maybe even more so). Yup-- I've got all three soundtracks on my iPod, and I've seen 1 and 2 countless times.

I grew up LOVING musicals. The 1960s were replete with epic musicals: Mary Poppins, My Fair Lady, The Sound of Music, and my favorite of all time: Camelot (stage version more so than the movie....) I knew them and loved them all-- and still do.

High School Musical brings the musical genre back to a new generation, and for that, I truly adore it. So naturally my 9-year-old daughter and I were there on Friday for the opening night of High School Musical 3! What did we think? We loved it! Still, I'm not sure it was my favorite of the three...

It was certainly larger than life! The biggest difference, in my opinion, was that there were all kinds of fantasy/daydream sequences. That's very typical of musicals-- but more so of musicals of the 1950s (think Debbie Reynolds). Here's Ryan and Sharpay's fantasy sequence number, I Want It All:

End of song:


Oh-- they were just imagining it all:


That's kind of cute, but it's not the kind of musical the first two were. (With the exception of parts of the song Fabulous from HSM2).

There was even a nod (you could call it a very blatant copy, but I prefer to think of it as a nod) to Fred Astaire, when Troy danced up the wall, across the ceiling, and down the other wall during the song "Scream"! (That also reminded me of my new iPhone app, iChalky ($0.99 on iTunes):

iChalky dude, Troy, Fred Astaire

So, all-in-all the movie was great fun. My daughter and I thought it had a somewhat weak ending, though-- especially compared to the ending numbers of the first two! We're All in This Together and All for One were both FUN, upbeat songs, and the look was great. They left you in a great mood, thinking "That was a GREAT movie!"

This grande finale song was actually called "High School Musical"-- which is not a good start right there. The senior class danced around in their incredibly floppy gowns during graduation, singing "High-Schoool-Mus-i-cal. Who said you have to let it go?" over and over and over. Lame. Disapppointing. Bad ending.

Where I think they might possibly have made a mistake on this one is that I am certainly not going to see it in a theater again. It was great, but I won't go again. Part of the intoxicating thing about the first two was that you saw them on Friday, then again on Saturday and again on Sunday! Since our babies were toddlers, we've known that the more you see a show, the more you love it! (Blue's Clues, same episode five times a week, anyone?)

Well, we now have to wait... and wait and wait and wait for the DVD. Good idea? I'm not sure. It means we'll forget. I already can't conjure up all the scenes and songs in my mind. By the time the DVD comes out will I still want it? That's the gamble Disney took.

OK, the movie broke box office records for a musical, but will kids be as crazed for the DVD? I can't predict. I already can't remember how much I liked it.




What do you think?