Why was Enchanted so good?!

"Happy working song"

Enchanted was a one of its kind movie. Want to know why?

NUMBER ONE: A parody of itself

Very few parody movies are a parody of things that the company who made the movie does. Enchanted totally changed the parody scenario with the fact that it was a parody of Disney by Disney. All of Disney’s own traditions, such as the songs, the people that start to dance out of nowhere, the goody goody princess, the prince that on reality cannot do anything, the apple, the animals, everything that Disney made famous on its own movies are strictly used here for comedy purposes. It’s like someone once realised what was wrong with his life and decided to write a book about it- only the fact that on Enchanted’s case, its not what has gone wrong- but what has gone… good.

Where have I seen this before?

NUMBER TWO: “What if this was real”?

Sometimes when you play a game, or read a book, or see a movie that is set in a imaginary place, in a ficticional setting, you often think “What if this was real?” or even “What if these characters really existed?” Enchanted hit that really hard. When I first saw Little Mermaid, I thought: “Man, what if there really were mermaids”? Would the things portrayed in the movie really happen? I think not, and thats where Enchanted wins. Giselle is basically a mish mash up of every single Disney Princess. She has the naive feeling of Ariel, the wish to know the unknown from Belle, the adventure spirit from Jasmine and much much more. This leads me to the number three reason.

Uhm... Do I kiss her or eat this apple?

NUMBER THREE: Wake up, Sleeping Beauty

Even if Disney fairytales were real, do you think that things would work out like they did in the movies? Think for a moment, do you think Ariel would get Eric’s love? Or do you think Tiana would come back to being human? To every single belief (taken from each Disney Princess) that Giselle has, Robert is there to contradict everything? True love’s kiss? Working song? Singing and dancing out of nothing? No phrase can describe what Giselle goes through on Enchanted than the phrase “Wake up, Sleeping Beauty”.

I'm on a bubble, doo doo...

NUMBER FOUR: Music!

What was my surprise when I discovered that the score was made by Alan Menken and the songs were made by Alan Menkend and Stephen Schwartz? Who better to work on a Disney parody of Disney than some of Disney’s best composers and songwriters? Every single song on the music is catchy, satyrical and celebratory. From True Love’s Kiss to Ever, Ever After, the musics carry the movie along so well. I mean, come on, who didn’t notice that True Love’s Kiss was a parody of EVERY single love song in Disney movies? And Happy Working Song a parody of Whistle While You Work? And How Do You Know a parody of Under the Sea? And to my surprise, the non-satyrical songs made by Jon McLaughlin and Carrie Underwood were as good as the main songs? Talking about songs…

Dancing with the dinosaur- I mean, the beast.

NUMBER FIVE: Stuck in the 90′s

Everything that made those Disney movies from the 90′s so famous is back here. While Princess and the Frog is the full fledged return to 2D hand drawn animation, Enchanted was the pre-return with its animation sequences. Its funny, right? Who Framed Roger Rabbit had 2D animation and sparked the interest on it again, leading to the creation of the Disney 90′s movies. So I can say that if it wasn’t for Enchanted, there would be no Princess and the Frog. And while it’s simply downright STUPID to compare Princess and the Frog to a Disney 90′s movie, if you do that with Enchanted, eh, you’re probably right.

Nooo, this is totally not an overused trope!

NUMBER SIX: Amy Adams, a Disney Princess for real

Amy Adams was the star of Enchanted and boy did she do the role. Better yet, Adams was so good that she can be one of the best Disney Princesses ever. I am not kidding you. She just looks like Disney decided to create an animation to real life machine and throw Ariel, Belle, Snow White, Cinderella and Aurora in there. The result was Giselle, and if Giselle wasn’t portrayed by Amy Adams, I don’t think the movie would have gotten as much praises as it got. Amy Adams is definitely the first real person to deserve joining the ranks of the Disney Princesses.

Aha! Heartshot!

NUMBER SEVEN (AND THE LAST ONE): Cameos cameos cameos!

Enchanted created two new types of cameo: the music cameo and the written cameo! Not only do you have physical cameos such as Jodi Benson, the voice of Ariel, as Robert’s secretary, and Paige O’ Hara, the voice of Belle, as an soap novel actress, but you also have musical cameos, with snippets of songs such as Part of Your World, Colors of the Wind, Beauty and the Beast, Once Upon a Dream and more thrown in the fantastic Alan Menken score of the movie. And you have the written cameos, such as the firm that Robert works on being named Churchill, Harline and Smith. Those are the names of the three men that created the Snow White’s score and music!

Enchanted may probably be one of the best- if not THE best- movie of the bad section of the Eisner era.

The Disney Movies Sequence.

After deep thought and analysis of the Disney Movies from Little Mermaid (1989) to Princess and the Frog (2010), I’ve seen a sequence, or rather a pattern that repeats itself, sometimes obviously, and sometimes not. Lets begin.

The Sequence for Disney Movies

It all begins with the Hero. The Hero is usually the main character, and he has something that the other people don’t have. Or perhaps he doesn’t haves something that the other people have. On The Little Mermaid, Ariel is our hero. And on Hercules, well, its Hercules. Duh.

The Hero craves for something, his objective at life. The objective is, at the start of the movie, un-reachable, untill something happens that turns the objective possible. Generally, that includes a task. The objective of Alladin is to get Jasmine to love him, and his task is to recover the lamp and make her love him. On Princess and the Frog, Tiana, Naveen and Louis objective is to turn human, and their task is to reach Mama Odie.

Generally, the Hero has companions. It is the elderly figure and his friends. His friends or/and the elderly figure will lead the hero in the right direction to complete the task. In Hunchback of the Notre Dame, its the Gargolytes (is that right?) and on the Lion King, its Musafa and Zazu making an elderly figure and Timon and Pumbaa making the friends. On Beauty and the Beast, its the Beast’s servants, Lumiere, Mrs Potts and Clocksworth.

The Hero then notices that to complete his task he needs something, a necessary power or status or thing that will make that objective way more easier or even complete. On The Little Mermaid, Ariel must kiss Eric, a true love’s kiss, before the sunset of the third day, and they she will be human permanently- the power is the true love’s kiss. On Alladin, its the Genie and the lamp. They are the necessary power and the friend. On Hercules, it is Phil, the necessary power to achieve his task and his objective.

But on the way of the task there is the villain, who’s objective is to make the hero fail on the task and not achieve his objective. Generally, the villain has a relation with the elderly figure or/and the hero. In the Lion King, Scar is Musafa’s brother and Simba’s uncle. In Hunchback of Notre Dame, the villain is Quasimodo’s… uhm… caretaker? On Beauty and the Beast, its Gaston, who loves Belle and wants to marry her.

The Villain is always accompanied by two/three villain companions. They generally are the Stupid Villain Companion, the Smart Villain Companion and the Funny Villain Companion. In the Lion King, the Hyenas- Shenzi, Banzai and Ed- are, respectively, the Smart, Funny and Stupid Villain Companions. On Hercules, Pain and Panic are the Funny and the Smart Villain Companions.

After the Hero reaches its objective, the movie ends with an happy ending, which generally leads to the death of the villain and the villain companions or the villain companions escape. The film ends with the hero, friends/necessary power-status, generally with the elderly figure, and its love interest, with a reprise of the initial song. Talking about songs…

The Song Formula

The film generally starts with an Intro song. Or an History song. For example, in Hercules, the first part of the Gospel Truth tells what happens before we find Hercules on its journey to become a hero. And on The Lion King, we have the song Circle of Life, introducing us to the system that conducts life in the Pride Lands.

An objective song is generally sang by the hero. And it is an song about his objective, and how he will reach it. Or it could be the Hero song, talking about something the Hero likes. In Pocahontas, its the song “Just Around the Riverbend”, and on The Little Mermaid its “Part of Your World”. This is generally the song that represents the movie.

The following song is the Interlude song that is sang by an secondary character. On Beauty and the Beast, its “Human Again”, where the servants sing about how they want so much to become human again. On Mulan, it’s “I’ll Make a Man Out Of You”, although that can also be considered a Pre-Task Song. The Interlude song can also be a funny/comedic song like “Under the Sea”, or “Hakuna Matata”. Time passes on both the Interlude/Pre-Task song.

The Necessary Power song is actually not necessary. For Alladin, its “Friend Like Me.” And for Hercules, its “One Last Hope”. Generally in a movie where the Necessary Power song is not in, there is a Secondary Character song, like in the Lion King, where Zazu sings “The Morning Report.”

The next one is the Villain Song, in which generally the villain reveals its plot and how he will use the hero to do so. On The Lion King, its “Be Prepared”, one of the rarest occasions in which the villain companions also participate. On Pocahontas, its “Mine Mine Mine’, which is also a rare occasion, since the main male character also sings in this song, but about another thing. On Princess and the Frog, its friend of the other side.

The song before the ending song is the love song. This is generally one of the best moments on the movie. On The Little Mermaid its “Kiss the Girl”. On Beauty and the Beast, its the title song, “Beauty and the Beast”. And on Hercules its “I Won’t Say (I’m In Love)”. On Alladin, its a “Whole New World”. And a whole lot more.

The final song is either a reprise of the love song, or the hero song, or the objective song, or the intro song. In The Little Mermaid, it is a chorus reprise of the objective song. And on Beauty and the Beast, a chorus reprise of the love song. Finally, on The Lion King, its a chorus reprise of the intro song.

Although all Disney movies from Little Mermaid to Princess and the Frog follow (or almost follow) the same pattern, they are a jewel on itself.

I hope you enjoyed this post. And remember…

Wait. I forgot.

You guys just don’t give up.

So I re-watched Princess and the Frog again.

And I still love it.

And people have stopped comparing it to old Disney movies, that is fantastic.

But now they are comparing it to Pixar movies.

WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU GUYS?

On a lighter note, our next post is going to be an interview with Bonie Appetite.

It’s not a 90′s movie.

I’m tired of seeing people saying that Princess and the Frog sucked because:

• It didn’t have any cool musical scenes like Hakuna Matata
• It didn’t have compelling story like Beauty and the Beast
• Didn’t had a really independent villain like in Lion King
• Didn’t had a clear message like Little Mermaid

Notice the similiraties? They’re all movies from the 90′s. God do I have to draw… PRINCESS AND THE FROG IS NOT A 90′s MOVIE. Its so stupid that people compare it to the older Disney movies, just to use it as a reason for why it sucked. It didn’t even suck! Fantastic movie, songs, characters, stories and more.

But why all the rage, Strat, you ask? Well, here’s the deal: people think that Disney is going to come out of the Eisner era, where they were supposed to create good CGI movies and even produce sequels to Pixar movies – did ya know that there was going to be a Toy Story 3 produced by Disney, not Pixar, and Finding Nemo 2 and Monsters Inc 2 – drawing like they did before?

Another thing is that times have changed: we are in the 2010, not 1992.Things have changed a lot, the world was struck by the 11th of September, and lots of other things. Did they really think that things were going to be the same? Well, surprise, the story is different! No more “everything will come true if you wish”, now it’s “you can wish but you have to work to make it come true”.

So please folks. Stop comparing.

Now.

Oh and by the way, go to mousebits.com to vote for the D-Oscars. More info coming soon.

Originality is dead.

Originality is dead.

Don’t look at me like that. You know I’m right.

When writing about Disney, you can’t take the fanboy side. Cause then its not an article. Its a fanboy article. Written by a fanboy. So it technically takes a point and defends it, no matter if it is wrong or right. So I can’t take the fanboy side on this article here boyos. Let’s get this show on the road.

Let’s look at the movie market. What kind of movies make more money? Original movies or sequels? The answer can be both or sequels. Original movies like UP get millions not only of cash, but of awards. Sequels like Toy Story 3 are awaited since the first movies made their childhood. But why are people making more remakes or new versions of older movies or even sequels instead of new, original IP’s?

This applies to other markets too. Books. Video Games. Theme Parks. All of them are no more created from nowhere. They take things from other movies, animations, or even usual stories (remember the Top 10 Attractions with a Story? Remember the over 15 attractions with the prop or character is missing and guests must find it with or without a character’s help).

So what happened to originality? Did it flew away? Disappeared? Lots of things disappeared from the Disney Theme Parks thanks to this loss of originality. 20,000 Leagues Under The Sea was replaced by Winnie the Pooh. Why is that? Maybe because people love animated characters more than underwater fish?

Well, that didn’t make sense. Right, Nemo?

But we can’t really throw all the blame on the Imagineer’s back, can we?

We can, though, throw the blame for originality being destroyed in the guests back.

Lets suppose you are a new guest. Never read a Disney Blog. First visit. In which attraction would you go? An attraction that features underwater creatures or an attraction that feature familiar underwater creatures? Of course, you would pick the latter.

So who’s fault is that the originality was destroyed? Well, everyone! If guests were more interessed in new things and decided to give it a try before deciding that it isn’t the right thing for them, we could have a lot of original attractions back. But if the Imagineers decided to dig a little deeper and do something different, something un-usual, they would get a LOT more guests.

That’s my opnion.