Enchanted Review
by Jonathan Moya (jjmoya1955 AT yahoo DOT com)November 28th, 2007
Enchanted (2007)
A Movie Review by Jonathan Moya
Rating: 3.5 out of 5 or B+
The Review:
Amy Adams as Giselle in Enchanted gives the whole Disney Princess world a light dusting. A braid of floral dandruff in her auburn hair, singing her happy working song (composed by Alan Menken and Stephen Schwartz of Pocahontas and The Hunchback of Notre Dame fame), Giselle sweeps and cleans her animated 2-D world with the aid of her furry bunny, tweety bird, shy curly tail doe friends and one seriously agitated chipmunk named Pip. After being pushed down a well by the wicked Queen Narissa (Susan Sarandon in a luscious black and purple velvet bustier gown lined with golden fingers clutching her hooters) Giselle tumbles far far away into a world of not so happy ever after folks. She pops up from that rabbit hole in time known as a New York City manhole cover, a billowy vision in a wedding dress -- the rude 3-D world of Times Square zooming all around her. Adopted for a few nights by Robert Phillips (the macdreamy Patrick Dempsey being very macgruffy) a forlorn divorce attorney and his princess obsessed daughter Morgan (Rachel Covey a ray of little Miss Sunshine), Giselle continues her singing, spic n' span ways, this time enlisting the local Manhattan fauna of rats, flies, cockroaches and pigeons (and thus continuing the Ratatouille tradition of trying to animate grotesque things in cutesy ways).
Giselle is caught in a world where the rules of love in the Andalasian constitution (that it be true, run straight except for the expected detour for the prince to fight a witch turned hag or dragon, and that it be happy happy happy forever and ever after) don't work, don't apply and don't make very much sense. She is confused about this place where love can stop and die, or even worse, turn back on a slant, fall down somewhere else, and form a triangle. Her Prince Edward (James Marsden playing it straight with almost no chaser) following closely behind is being delayed because he keeps on putting his sword through the top of transit buses and being run over by a tour of bicyclist after only finishing the first few notes of their love song- even though her true love, in the guise of Robert, stares her in the face her every real morning, noon and night. Her emotions are flying as neatly as the little pirouettes of hands over her head that is her happy dance.
Enchanted isn't a grand scale retooling of the Disney Princess animated tradition- just a sideways revision. It's a romantic comedy for the millions of one parent kids and those families on their second try of happy forever aftering. Its $50 million opening weekend gross says it is a princess story whose time has come.
But without Amy Adams enchanting portrayal it would be just another bad sappy princess tale decaying among the ruins of not so great family fare. Adams is all full body princess- all genuine wide eye majesty from her Belle ringlets to her Cinderella slippers. No winks. No nods. No tongue in cheek. Her posture is princess perfect. Her every step is almost a Skippy little waltz. Even her anger and sadness is silk.
Robert's unwillingness to see the sunny side of life leaves Giselle perplexed, bothered and bewildered. He turns down even her gentlest requests.
"Is that the only word you know? No," she says to him. "No no no no no no no," he replies. "I'm... I'm... I'm so angry! Hahahahhahahaha." She laughs from her heart.
Eventually her singing and dancing, her persistent cheerful goodness wins him over. Patrick Dempsey goes from charmless man to charming lover with aplomb, even though his good looks and engaging smile do most of the acting and talking.
The transition from Prince Edward to Robert, from one true love to one real love, that wicked reflection that bounces off the magic mirror of life and bends Enchanted waves from fairy tale to romantic comedy isn't quite the golden ray of sunshine it should have been- even though it does involve a lost slipper and a Prince looking for that perfect fit.
Enchanted only poison apple is with the wicked queen role. When the evil queen in Snow White asks the mirror "who is the fairest one of all?" it is the wrong question. If she had said "who is the most beautiful, babe-a-licous one of them all", the mirror would have said "you your royalness." The queen's side of a fairy story is a tale of pride gone blind. Half of male goth culture started out with the feeling of wicked joy that a real good looking queen in a dark tight velvet floor length gown produces down in their netherworlds.
The cartoon version of Narissa is dark wonderbra perfection. The real version of her applies her makeup with all the deftness of a drunken drag queen, could use a little more support up there, and wears her evil a little too loose around the hips. She isn't hot, just damp. There is no sizzle to her nastiness.
The King Kong like ending which involves a wincing role reversal just proves that this queen should never have been let out of the closet.
Amy Adam is enchanting, Enchanted the movie a little less so. It gets a B+.
The Credits:
Directed by Kevin Lima; written by Bill Kelly; director of photography, Don Burgess; hand-drawn animation supervisor, James Baxter; edited by Stephen A. Rotter and Gregory Perler; music by Alan Menken, with songs by Mr. Menken and Stephen Schwartz; production designer, Stuart Wurtzel; produced by Barry Josephson and Barry Sonnenfeld; released by Walt Disney Pictures. Running time: 1 hour 47 minutes.
WITH: Amy Adams (Giselle), Patrick Dempsey (Robert Phillip), James Marsden (Prince Edward), Timothy Spall (Nathaniel), Idina Menzel (Nancy Tremaine), Rachel Covey (Morgan Phillip), Susan Sarandon (Narissa) and Kevin Lima and Jeff Bennett (Pip).
Enchanted" is rated PG (Parental guidance suggested). Pigeons and rats and water bugs, oh my.
Copyright 2007 by Jonathan Moya
http://www.jonathanmoya.com/
Originally posted in the rec.arts.movies.reviews newsgroup. Copyright belongs to original author unless otherwise stated. We take no responsibilities nor do we endorse the contents of this review.
