"Enchanted" (2007) - Movie Review

I wrote in my review of “August Rush” that it is a cheesy hallmark card. And I say it once again for “Enchanted”; the difference being I gladly accepted and enjoyed it in the process. It is no wonder when Robert (Patrick Dempsey) tells Giselle (Amy Adams) that she talks like some one jumping out of a Hallmark card. Well she is from the fairy tale fantasy world which we believe to reside only in books and films. The film happily takes us in its merry celebration due to the belief the actors/actresses put in. That makes this one sweet film for wide audiences.

Giselle living in her happy cartoon/fairy tale world meets her prince charming, Prince Edward (James Marsden) and loyal to their surroundings, get ready to marry after one day or may be one kiss which they define “True Love Kiss”. It cannot get cheesier than this. But wait, the plot gets interesting with known predictability of this “true love” would pour water in the idea of the evil queen and step mother of Prince Edward, Queen Narissa (Susan Sarandon). Hence she curses upon Giselle and pushes her to a well which directly connects into middle of scary New York City. There she manages to stumble upon Robert, a lawyer and a single father trying hard to look in through the actual love. He gifts his kid daughter Morgan (Rachel Covey) a book about famous people. He does not want to raise her giving fairy tale hopes since his life has been unpleasant pot holes.

Giselle played with much sincerity by Amy Adams who we know gave the bubbling energetic Ashley in “Junebug’ recreates some one of the same energy but with a twist of fantasy character. I am sure she would have got pain in her mouth due to the time and wideness she smiles about, almost all the time in the movie. But it is not annoying rather inviting and refreshing. Apart from her, whoever comes from the world of fantasy believes in their character so much that some times they would have felt awkward playing one in the reality in front of a camera to uplift further fakeness of it. But we want to believe as we did as kids on these wonderful characters who have a charm even in the wicked characters, the animals who abides happily to their kind orders of princess.

I have thought about the concept of Indian Cinema’s songs taken properly into the Hollywood would bring in a genre of its own. Director Kevin Lima manages to squeeze in couple of songs which moods in the perfectly situational circumstances and very well lovable as any rhymes we have memorized out of likeability than a duty. Accompanying visuals oozes its energy and emotions to tag along the song as necessary.

The main tactics is the use of the fairy tales as a bow of self parody and homage at the same time. I noticed number of it and realized through Wiki that there are so many more than I picked out. Those references does not come as an unnecessary addition but plot points, humour and fun as any fantasy film would like to have. Apart from Amy Adams, James Marsden and Patrick Dempsey has the art of getting to the level of their character to a seasoned and perfected tone. It is not catchy enough to notice them but interesting at very crucial points to the character of Giselle. Without them the story would have been a mere “Alice in New York City” with nothing but boring adventures.

It is curious and entertaining to watch a character from the happy faced ambience learns to identify its true love and the dull faced earthly character finding it’s through this encounter of a young woman who radiates tireless consistent energy. It was slightly disturbing to see cockroaches dancing and cleaning (yeah, cleaning!!) a house in a uniformed sequence. Many got more than slightly disturbed of the hanging ceilings of insane colonies of rats in “Ratatouille”. If they think so, see this and they will faint. It was not particularly a cherishing moment but tell you what, it is highly unlikely for that vision to witness without worrying about our kitchen being conquered by those fiery little creatures.

“Enchanted” targets all the audience and it has something to offer for every one. If some one seriously is going to resist smiling or denies not having fun with a straight face quoting being that the movie is not for mature audience in their condescending tone, then they are not “mature” enough to truly appreciate the beauty and charm the film has to offer. I loved the Hall Mark cheesy card as a film and I sincerely acknowledge it. (Alright. Now is the time for a representative of Hall Mark to send me a cheque for my publicity of them)