Into The Woods (2014) * 1/2

Directed by:  Rob Marshall

Starring:  Meryl Streep, Emily Blunt, James Corden, Johnny Depp, Anna Kendrick, Lucy Punch, Chris Pine, Christine Baranski, Tracy Ullman, Daniel Huttlestone

What a waste to assemble all of this talent and strand them in a dismal musical.    Based on the award-winning Broadway play, you not only will not be humming any of the songs in Into The Woods, but you won't remember if there are any songs.    Into The Woods is one of those productions in which even the dialogue is mostly sung, so it's hard to differentiate what is actually a song and what is dialogue.    No matter.    The film is a collection of sung words up against a morose set which are the deep, dark woods everyone sings about.    The actors try mightily to have fun and make it fun for us, but they have to overcome too much.

Set in that time when fairy tales took place (the 1500's, 1600's?), Into The Woods dovetails the stories of Jack and the Beanstalk, Cinderella, Rapunzel, Little Red Riding Hood, and a baker who can not conceive a child with his wife.    If that is a fairy tale, I don't know of it.    The baker (Corden) is promised that he will be able to conceive with his infertile wife (Blunt) if he finds four items and delivers them to the witch (Streep) who cursed his house over an old property dispute.    Cinderella (Kendrick) is abused by her nasty stepmother and stepsisters, but is able to go to the ball and run out on the prince (Pine) on consecutive nights the ball is held.     The prince is enchanted by this woman who runs out on him and launches a search for her.    Rapunzel, she of the long blonde hair people can climb on, is kept captive in a tower by her adoptive mother, the witch.    Another prince falls for Rapunzel.    Then we have the Jack and the Beanstalk angle, which fits into the events.     Oh, and don't forget the Big Bad Wolf (Depp), who is in the film for little more than a cameo.   

If you're bored yet by my recap of the film's events, well, I guess I'm guilty of being bored writing it.    You may be even more bored watching them unfold before your eyes.     Some musicals have songs that catch your ear and make you feel.    Grease, Les Miserables, West Side Story, and Rock of Ages are examples of such musicals.    They also have interesting stories, so we care about what everything is singing and dancing about.     Into The Woods is thin soup, even with various subplots and stories mixed in.     Virtually every song references "the woods", which is said to be dark, mysterious, and otherworldly.    It looks like a dreary swing club for ticks to me.

I admit I perked up at about the 75 minute mark, when it looked like Happily Ever After was upon us and everything would be tidied up.    Alas, the film kept on going like an unwanted Energizer bunny.    There was 45 minutes more of singing and drudgery still to go.    With a skilled musical director like Rob Marshall (Chicago) and this cast, Into The Woods should have been a home run.    I just don't think the underlying material is good.