| T O P I C R E V I E W |
| randall |
Posted - 11/25/2007 : 18:46:35
The buzz was that Disney Pictures had discovered a sense of humor in its willingness to make fun of its own classic animated m.o. -- maybe the influence of John Lassetter? -- but that's overstating the case; any such self-mockery is gentle and minor. The flick belongs to Amy Adams as a Disney animated princess transported to real life in modern New York City. Her bravura turn is starmaking; she knows that fantasy, like farce, only works when you take it seriously, and she's completely, adorably deadpan, in contrast with the knowing twinkle you can see in Disney-prince James Marsden's eyes. The songs are clever and pitch-perfect, led by a spectacular Central Park number that could actually get a hand in some theaters. And Rick Baker, that makeup genius, creates a live-action version of the SNOW WHITE crone! It's all tons of fun, so far beyond cute that cuteness itself causes laughs. Not perfect, but well worth your money. |
| 11 L A T E S T R E P L I E S (Newest First) |
| Demisemicenturian |
Posted - 12/27/2007 : 11:44:12
quote:
Originally posted by Randall
The last post contained a spoiler. Sorry.
Yes, it was a spoiler already given by BaftaBabe, which is why I did not highlight it separately. However, I realised afterwards that a spoiler warning had not then been added to the whole thread as it should have been, so thank you for reminding me to add one to my post.
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| randall |
Posted - 12/27/2007 : 02:05:26
The last post contained a spoiler. Sorry. |
| Demisemicenturian |
Posted - 12/24/2007 : 23:43:01
A spoiler from BaftaBabe's post above is repeated here.
I wholeheartedly agree with Rockgolf and Ali. No song struck me as being a filler and I found all of the central performances great.
It's not perfect. The lawyer's girlfriend isn't utilised well and it is too obvious even for this film that the couples will swap over. It also would have been better if the New York boyfriend were not just as gorgeous as the animated one. However, these are small points.
I had thought the hype might lead to disappointment, but it didn't. |
| Ali |
Posted - 12/13/2007 : 07:32:21
It's a charming film, made all the more so by the delightfully effervescent Amy Adams. Just great.
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| MisterBadIdea |
Posted - 12/12/2007 : 15:41:20
I saw this movie again, and it played better this time around -- maybe because I saw it on an actual, y'know, date. Still, my objections stand -- it's not a movie that has really put much thought into its premise. Compare it to something like "Who Framed Roger Rabbit," or even more to the point, "Pleasantville," and "Enchanted" looks pretty shoddy. |
| ChocolateLady |
Posted - 12/02/2007 : 06:39:17
quote:
Originally posted by BaftaBabe
I'll tell you what shut them up to pin-drop quietness, though -- and that was the trailer for The Golden Compass. Take that, Disney!
Well, The Golden Compass will be released this week here and while I usually don't go see films early after the release, I think I might try to go see this one. |
| BaftaBaby |
Posted - 12/01/2007 : 23:17:33
OH YES THERE ARE SPOILY SPOILERS
Enchanted took nearly 50 million bucks on its US opening Thanksgiving weekend holiday release and it's currently number 1 in the US box office. Of course this bears no relation to how good the film is, but it does prove there's a definite market for fantasy/real life crossover.
So, how good is it? Well, it does have some good stuff, I can't deny - though it never truly succeeds, even in its own terms. Obviously since it's out of the Disney stable the production values are great, and there's some refreshing self-mockery, not a quality Disney been famous for in past decades.
Most of the performances carry the script through its definite longeurs. If, like me, you thought James Marsden was one of the best things about the recent remake of Hairspray you won't be surprised that he all but steals the film as the chisel-jawed golden-tonselled charmer with perfect comic timing that is Prince Edward. He raises everyone's game.
The concept is certainly what they call high, though it doesn't actually sustain. Enchanted solves that problem by stopping every once in a while for a musical number, which sometimes but not always emerges from the action. Some of the songs just come across as fillers.
In terms of the balance of fantasy and reality they've chosen to distribute the two elements in quite a schematic way. The film opens like one of those 1940s or 50s Disney feature-length cartoon fairytales. There's Giselle, a lovely lass who lives in a tree house surrounded by talking and singing animals with whom she schemes about finding her true love and they'll know and there'll be a true love kiss and all that stuff - some of it cute - and with echoes of Cinderella, Sleeping Beauty, etc etc.
Over on the other side of Fariytale-town a wicked Queen has spent her adult life keeping her child Prince Edward as far away from girls as possible, since she figures when he gets married she'll lose her crown and power. So the kid has grown up singing in the forest and fighting a succession of big bad trolls. You with me so far? So anyway, as destiny would have it, Prince Edward and the forest lady meet by chance and yep, they KNOW the other one is THE one and a wedding is planned toute suite.
So now the wicked Queen shows us she's quite a shapeshifter and weaves a plot to stop the wedding. Disguised as an old crone she accosts Giselle just as she's headed for the Palace, and drags her over to a wishing well, then pushes her in. She emerges as a real life lady smack dab in the middle of Times Square, dressed in her frilly hoop-skirted wedding gear. Did I mention her best friend is a talking chipmunk? Still with me?
So after wandering around NYC for a while, where no one takes too much notice in a city full of weirdos, by chance she falls from a fire escape into the arms of a rich young lawyer, his 6-year old daughter in tow and what you need to know about him is he's a pragmatic guy, his wife left him, and he's currently engaged to a woman we're not sure we're supposed to like or not.
Long and short - Giselle and the lawyer hang out enough for him to get past her soppy-yet-wise romanticism and learn to find those traits are just what's missing in his life, and that the evil Queen can't stop Prince Edward from following Giselle to NYC to save her and bring her home so eventually she has to materialise as well.
There's some really truly silly silliness wherein Prince Edward and the lawyer's girlfriend get it on together, the Queen metamorphoses into a big bad dragon and climbs up the Empire State Building - did I hear you say King Kong? - with little lawyer in her talons quivering like Fay Wray except she intends to kill him dead as dead can be - even though you'd think it would suit her plans to have the lawyer and Giselle get it together - but, lo, out of the rain here comes said Giselle in her knock-em-dead evening dress but wielding a sword and, yes, folks, she's climbing that building and will maim that dragon who will let the lawyer go and fall to her death as dead as dead can be and Giselle will save her lawyer and they will kiss the true love kiss.
And in a jolly music-infested coda we will learn that Giselle and lawyer and his kid live the most fun-filled creative life that a multi-million dollar lawyer's salary can buy in the most expensive town on earth, and that Prince Edward lives happily ever after with the lawyer's ex, now really happy goshdarnit to be an animated woman in fairytale town, and the chipmunk -- well golly we never really know whether he's happier as an animated wise-cracker or a real-life Alvin clone who can only squeak and send messages by doing Charades.
Did I mention there were a lot of filler musical numbers? And really, there really are a few very funny moments. Did I mention there were only a few?
The cinema was full to the brim with wriggling restless children who seemed to enjoy the jokes a lot and seemed to go to the loo a lot when things got slow. I'll tell you what shut them up to pin-drop quietness, though -- and that was the trailer for The Golden Compass. Take that, Disney!
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| RockGolf |
Posted - 11/28/2007 : 16:49:36
Every so often I get dragged to a family movie, which is usually excruciatingly boring. This time it was Enchanted, and the title is exactly how it left me.
I found the Central Park song hilarious, the lyrics in the song used while Gisele cleans the house were cleverly subversive. Using rats, cockroaches and pigeons to clean the apartment - brilliant.
James Marsden made me forget how mediocre he was in XMen. Susan Sarandon was terrific. Amy Adams may have earned a second Oscar nod. Timothy Spall was virtually Hunchback's Quasimodo brought to life. But why do you hire the tony-award winning lead from "Wicked" (Idina Menzel) and then put her in a non-singing role.
Great fun and at least 8 out of 10. |
| ChocolateLady |
Posted - 11/28/2007 : 07:45:25
Interesting about the Prince Charming problem. While Ever After was pretty much a bust (except for Houston, who can do no wrong in my eyes), one of the few things that they did right - at least for part of the movie - was giving the Prince a touch more than just a handsome face. Mind you, not enough more, but it was a start. Sorry this one took a step backwards on that. |
| MisterBadIdea |
Posted - 11/28/2007 : 07:25:00
There's a couple of really great scenes in Enchanted that drive home the magic of fairy tale romance and the horrible, crushing pain of complicated reality. Those scenes are so good, I feel like I'm kicking a puppy when I say that the film is mostly awful. A waste of a good premise and an utter disappointment.
Let's focus on the good scenes, I guess. Director Kevin Lima is mostly known for animation and the animated scenes are all great, particularly the note-perfect pastiche of the opening scene. The scene where Gisele realizes she's falling in love with someone other than Prince Charming hits like a punch to the gut -- a woman who not only bought into the fairytale dream but embodies it, realizing it's not true, that's some powerful shit right there. The dance sequence at the ball -- wonderful.
I think we can dismiss everything else, it's all very bad. Except for the aforementioned scene, I don't exactly see what's so great about Amy Adams's performance, which is essentially the pretty girl version of Will Ferrell's Elf. Lima doesn't seem to understand that what works in ink and paint looks stupid and juvenile with flesh and blood. The Central Park sequence in particular is awful, as is the ending -- rather than integrating the two disparate genres into one whole movie, Enchanted essentially becomes two malnourished halves of movies.
But the worst part is how they negate the very premise of the movie. They'd like you to think that this is a movie about a fantasy girl who falls into reality, but it's not. The fantasy girl doesn't fall into reality at all, but into another fairytale world called Romantic Comedy Land, the melding of fake and real that gives you the worst of both worlds. A movie that brought Gisele into an actual realistic world would be amazing, but instead it's a world of cutesy one-liners, cheap endings and a bright sunshiney clean New York.
I don't think James Marsden does a bad job, but he's stuck playing a parody of something that never quite existed. Ostensibly, his Prince Edward is a play on Prince Charming from Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. But while the plot and characters of the cartoon world are based on Snow White, the style is pure Little Mermaid/Beauty and the Beast. The princes of those movies weren't jovial and adventurous, they were brooding and sensitive. Neither, as I recall, were the Prince Charmings of the old Golden Era animated flicks. I'm not sure the writers ever got a handle of who this character was, and for that matter, the same goes for Gisele, who goes past innocent to downright dumb. Ariel the mermaid wasn't the most complicated of characters, but she at least knew of and experienced anger, an emotion that seems to baffle Gisele. I really can't recommend this movie. |
| ChocolateLady |
Posted - 11/26/2007 : 06:12:27
While I haven't seen any promos to this, I've seen the posters and they look very cheesy (it isn't often that we get films to open here that almost coincide with the US openings, but since Hanukkah is coming up, I guess they thought it would be wise to push this one out early). If this isn't the case, and it really is okay, perhaps I'll find some time to go see it soon. Thanks. |
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