You know the family Thanksgiving crowds are gonna go see this.
“Enchanted” was infuriating. It started off actually really smart and biting (you can tell the Disney team was getting off on mocking their history.) But it pulls it’s punches every step of the way, and what could have been a really scathing satire turns into one long ad for the magic of Disney. My wife – a women’s studies professor – actually shouted something at the screening and was shushed. It has this terrible “pro-feminism” stance, which just amounts to letting Amy Adams take off her high heels and wield a sword. A major theme in the film is “there’s no happily ever after.” Patrick Dempsey spends the whole movie telling Adams that she should date her prince charming (a solid James Marsden, believe it or not) instead of just marrying him after only knowing him for a day, and the movie hints that Adams is going to discover that she doesn’t need a man to live happily ever after.
But then she fucking falls in love with Patrick Dempsey…and they live happily ever after! It was mindboggling.
What a wasted opportunity. Could have had really genius jokes about the lack of people of color in Disney’s history, or how insanely skinny the princesses are, etc. And every time it looks like the movie is going to go there and say/do something interesting, it shoots itself in the foot.
And while Amy Adams might give the most ANNOYING performance in recent cinema history, there’s a spectacular CGI chipmunk who deserves an Oscar. Seriously. [ed. thanks to our contributor JC]