SYNOPSIS:
A
fairy tale comes to life in this thoroughly originial, new Disney
Classic. Drawing inspiration from its classic heritage, Disney
creates an inspired story unlike any you've experienced before.
Filled with excitement, fun and icnredible music from the legendary
Alan Menken, Enchanted is the ultimate fish-out-of-water adventure.
For princess-to-be Giselle, life is a fairy tale - until she's
banished from the animated land of Andalasia and thrust into
the very unmagical, live-action world of modern-day Manhattan.
When a cynical, no-nonsense divorce lawyer comes to her aid,
little does he realize this joyful, wide-eyed innocent is about
to enchant him. Enchanted - the musical comedy that will have
your entire family under its spell.
MOVIE REVIEW:
First it was my reviewer John who was full of praise
after he caught “Enchanted”. Subsequently, I overheard
my chirpy colleagues who were getting all excited after they
caught it when the movie opens.
In
my mind, I was wondering how good “Enchanted”
can be. Fairy tale? Prince and Princess? Yawn…
But
you know what, “Enchanted” surprised me. Finally,
the House of Mouse knows how to laugh at themselves. Those
clichéd, lovey-dovey fairy tales which the boys hate
but the girls adorned since young finally gets a bashing by
the same group of people who endorse them. There aren’t
any better choices in the industry other than Disney who knew
how to handle a job like this.
“Enchanted”
opens with the first ten minutes presented in hand-drawn animation.
It’s ‘refreshing’ to see wonderful, hand-made
drawings again after so long. Those human touches were indeed
priceless given the influx of CG animations. With the story
moving to the big apple, you got to credit the production
team for the movie’s smooth transition to reality. The
performances of the cast were spot-on. Amy Adams who plays
Giselle scored additional points for her almost flawless singing.
James Marsden gives a thorough breakthrough performance as
Prince Edward and Susan Sarandon is perfect as the wicked
Queen Narissa. There are countless references to the grand
old Disney animation classics such as “Snow White”,
“Sleeping Beauty”, “Cinderella” and
many more so keep a lookout for them.
Not
forgetting the catchy songs and lyrics by Academy Award composers
Alan Menken and Stephen Schwartz and also a huge musical sequence
which was filmed at New York Central Park, a reminisce of
the loud, colourful parades at Disneyland.
Even
if you are a strict, no-nonsense movie-goer, “Enchanted”
will light up your day. What’s there not to like? There’s
hand-drawn animation, cute animals, excellent performances,
catchy song routines, fairy tales bashing… (the last
one is optional though). “Enchanted” might actually
turn you into a Disney convert after the disc stop spinning.
SPECIAL FEATURES :
For such a wondrous, inventive movie, I was looking
forward to Kevin Lima’s commentary track but there isn’t
any. The DVD does come with other extras though. First up,
“Fantasy Comes to Life” consisting
of 3 short featurettes. “Happy Working Song”
as the title implies is about bringing the song sequence to
live combining both visual effects with well-trained rats
and pigeons. A 6 minutes feature, “That's How
You Know” shows us how the huge musical sequence
were choreographed at New York Central Park. For the finale,
visual effects plus live elements were again employed and
this is featured in “A Blast at the Ball”.
A
2 minutes Bloopers reel and six Deleted
Scenes (with an alternate opening and a rather funny
gag) are also here in this DVD.
"Pip's
Predicament: A Pop-Up Adventure" is obviously
targeted at the younger crowd following the adventure of Pip
the chipmunk in pop-up book form.
Lastly, there’s a whole of bunch of trailers including
“Prince Caspian”, “The Little Mermaid: Ariel's
Beginning", "National Treasure 2: Book of Secrets"
and "Tinker Bell" but strangely, “Enchanted”
is missing. A promo reel for Blu-ray is also included.
AUDIO/VISUAL:
Presented in anamorphic widescreen, “Enchanted”
is a marvel to ogle even on the small screen. Both the animation
and the subsequent live-action shots were rich and awesome.
The
musical numbers and dialogue are of utmost clarity and the
surround starts to kick in high mode towards the finale. It’s
both a visual and audio treat for the audiophiles.
MOVIE RATING:
DVD
RATING :
Review
by Linus Tee
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