Disenchanted review: Disney’s Enchanted sequel loses the magic

2007’s Enchanted It was Walt Disney Pictures’ cultural reset. After years of live-action movie misses, the studio finally just leaned into the fairy tales and sweeping romantic musicals that defined the Disney Renaissance — but this time, with some tongue-in-cheek jokes about the ridiculousness of people bursting into song and dance in the middle of the street and princesses marrying men they met three seconds ago. EnchantedIt was an absolute delight. Even though Giselle the protagonist was not officially added to Disney Princess’s lineup, (Amy Adams would have to be paid in perpetuity by Disney for an animated representation of her), it was still a joy. Enchanted Certain elements influenced the style of Disney princesses.

The sequel has big shoes to fill, especially given the difficulty of focusing on the central couple’s life after their happily ever after. Enchanted’s epic high point, in which Giselle ropes all of Central Park into an infectiously catchy song-and-dance sequence, seems like something that can never quite be matched.

Und Be DisenchantedNever fully. The new sequel on Disney Plus has some fun moments, but it can’t capture the first movie’s originality and magic. The movie is too long because of the excessive amount of content that Adam Shankman and Brigitte Hales pack in. But mostly, the filmmakers never firmly decide whose story this is, and they shift the movie’s emotional arc to a relationship that never quite earns a happily ever after.

[Ed. note: This review contains some setup spoilers for Disenchanted.]

Image: Disney

Giselle, the fairy tale princess from the movie Giselle, is still unhappy with New York City years later. Her family moves to Monroeville, after she gives birth to her baby. Her husband Robert (Patrick Dempsey), is supportive. However, Morgan Baldacchino (Gabriella Baldacchino), her stepdaughter is unhappy about her decision.

Giselle wants her life and family to be as happy as a fairy tale, but finds that moving to a new home isn’t enough to fix her problems. The town’s most dedicated (and obnoxious) citizen, Malvina (Maya Rudolph), feels threatened by Giselle, and Giselle ends up accidentally embarrassing Morgan in front of her new classmates. Giselle makes a wish that their lives were like a fairytale after they have a heated argument with Morgan. Poof! She wakes up the next day to hear birds sing, to see appliances speaking, and to find everyone dressed in medieval fantasy attire. Monroeville is now the fantastical “Monrolasia.” And no one except Giselle seems to remember their past lives.

Everything seems wonderful, until Giselle realizes her fairy-tale wish is slowly turning her into an evil stepmother — the villain in Morgan’s story. Each time the clock strikes a new hour, Giselle’s alter ego starts to take control, in a pixie-dusted twist on Strange Case with Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde. If she can’t reverse her wish by midnight, she’ll be stuck as the villain, making Morgan’s life miserable, and any attempt to repair their family bond will be completely lost. Meanwhile, Malvina, who has naturally become the evil queen in this fantasy version of the town, is out to steal Giselle’s magic wand for herself, so she can continue to be the most powerful person in town.

Photo: Jonathan Hession/Disney

Additionally, if the wish becomes permanent, then all the magic will be sucked out of Giselle’s homeland of Andalasia, meaning Giselle and her Andalasian friends will cease to exist. That’s a lot to pack into one movie, which means that Robert is reduced to wandering around town waving his sword and looking for fantasy creatures to fight. This movie is more about Giselle coming out of her marriage to Morgan.

But for a movie that’s so intrinsically tied to the mother-daughter relationship, Be Disenchanted doesn’t do a good job of showcasing it. Morgan, for one, is never allowed to show her true character. She’s just a surly teen who dislikes her stepmother for an unspecified reason, even though they were once close. Although it might be one thing for the movie to focus on Giselle’s efforts at reestablishing that relationship, Giselle turns into Morgan about half way through.

After that, the film splits. Morgan seeks to solve the problem in Andalasia while Giselle takes over as Malvina, who is the villain. This plot is more interesting: Giselle, Malvina, and Malvina become gaudy villains singing big bad songs and openly plotting. It’s been a while since Disney has committed to putting a proper old-school singing villain on screen, and both Adams and Rudolph absolutely commit to their roles. Adams is particularly adept at switching between her kind, sweet princess personality and her evil stepmother personality.

The villain song is an enjoyable jazzy tune, but all other numbers fade to homogeneity. None is as particularly grating as Idina Menzel’s big solo, which takes place when Morgan is in the animated world. For one, it’s incredibly generic and corny, and frankly, a waste of Menzel’s powerful voice. The worst crime of all is how terrible the animation looks. The animation scenes of the first film were identical to the Disney theatrical releases. But this time around, they’re janky and look more like the Carrie Underwood scenes in the music video that came out with the first movie. It’s not just a quick scene either; this is where one of the biggest most emotional points of Morgan’s arc happens, and the choppy animation undermines what could be a moving moment about the power of memories.

Photo by Jonathan Hession/Disney

In “Monrolasia,” though, everything from the costumes to the set design is charmingly over-the-top. You can have some fun moments when you filter regular suburbania through fairy tales. The gossipy barista turns out to be the magic mirror. Naturally the town festival is transformed into a ball. Morgan’s room becomes a tiny hovel at the top of a tower, because as the stepdaughter, she’s the mistreated, big-hearted heroine of the story. When the filmmakers play around with these fantasy conventions — particularly the superficial elements that make a villain a villain and a hero a hero — the movie is delightful.

Unfortunately, there are no other options. Be Disenchanted pivots to Giselle and Morgan’s relationship, it doesn’t go deep enough to really pull the ending together. And that’s a great pity, considering what a bad rap stepmothers get in fairy tales. Since the first film was focused on deconstructing storybook-romance conventions, such as love at the first sight and so moving the focus to the evil stepmother trope or the mother-daughter relationships would make a big difference. This arc, however, is not explored in the emotional depth that it requires. The focus instead is on superficial suburban quarrels.

Be Disenchanted There are some great moments in the film, but everything feels a bit superficial and uneven. If the story was just about Giselle trying to find her place in this new community and butting heads with Malvina, the more superficial aspects would make sense — after all, those are the shallow reasons Malvina feels threatened by Giselle in the first place. But the intended-to-be-moving family arc misfires, simply because we never actually see much of that relationship. The end comes out the same. Be DisenchantedThis is only an echo of Enchanted — the songs sparkle less, the emotional climax doesn’t hit as hard. The magic sputters, bringing back some of the original movie’s fun, but definitely not enough of its heart.

Be DisenchantedDisney Plus is now available