Movies

April 20, 2018

LGBT Representation and Happy Endings

Young adult fiction focusing on LGBT characters was a really depressing genre for a very long time.

A majority of books in this genre focused on tragic, but unfortunately realistic stories of LGBT teenagers. They accepted who they were, maybe found a significant other, were kicked out of their home by their parents, and they moved on with their life. In the mid-2000s, “Boy Meets Boy” by David Levithan felt nearly revelatory simply because it had a happy ending. The boy got the boy and there was very little bigotry involved.

Levithan’s oeuvre continues to be one of the more optimistic entries in LGBT young adult fiction, although there are increasingly more novels being written about teens who identify as LGBT who get a happy ending. In a manner similar to “Boy Meets Boy,” there’s something oddly refreshing about “Simon vs. the Homo Sapiens Agenda” by Becky Albertalli, which was published in 2015. Even though the premise comes across as a little intense–Simon, a closeted gay teenager, finds himself falling in love with a pseudonymous pen pal known as “Blue,” but his emails to Blue are discovered by another student, who blackmails him–it feels like an effervescent book with an incredibly happy ending. Reading it to me felt like being wrapped up in a comfortable blanket and watching my go-to comfort food movies or clips of American Treasure Robert Preston performing. (None of the books I read repeatedly are particularly cheery, although I do get an immense delight over Dante’s descriptions of how popes are tortured in hell.)

Albertalli’s novel is the basis for the movie “Love, Simon,” which was released last month. The big news with the film is it’s the first film released by a major studio (20th Century Fox) to focus on a gay teenage romance. While there has been some criticism and reflection on the fact there’s a heavy emphasis on how Simon is an average guy–a monologue that brought to mind a short speech Nathan Lane gives in “The Birdcage” while wearing a suit as an attempt to seem more masculine–as well as how Simon is seemingly contrasted to Ethan, another gay student, the movie does present itself as very approachable, which is arguably good as it had a wide-release and is being distributed internationally.

This approach also presents a gay man who does not fit into the feminine stereotypes assigned to most queer male characters in major projects. To my mind, the only other lead queer male characters in major screen projects who hew closer to masculine gender norms are Will on “Will and Grace” (more on that later), Jack and Ennis in “Brokeback Mountain” and Armond in “The Birdcage,” and even his character wore foundation, owned a drag club, and did an incredibly kinetic bit of dance choreography. As deeply frustrating as it is to have yet another major studio project focusing on a gay man who is portrayed as fitting in more with male gender norms, it is worth noting it does go against the overwhelming portrayal of gay men being incredibly feminine, which oddly feels like a form of progress, even if it simultaneously comes off as regressive to have a character trumpeting his averageness.

More startling is the fact the film does have a happy ending. If you look just at the more significant LGBT-focused films released recently–“Carol,” “Moonlight,” and “Call Me By Your Name”–two of them end with ambiguous endings and one ends with a devastating scene. Even if the end of “Love, Simon” is interpreted as ambiguous, it still feels more uplifting than the final moments of “Carol” and “Moonlight” because, in the world of the teen movie, we assume the couple at the center finds happiness and stays together forever. It’s aspirational, while in adulthood we start to realize how much harder life is.

One of the main reasons why I loved it was because it feels like there are still very few happy storylines given to LGBT characters on screen. Even though there’s an increasing amount of LGBT characters in television and movies, they are often secondary characters. There are still plotlines about characters struggling with their identity, which isn’t a bad thing since Simon not being out is one of the things that drives the plot of “Love, Simon” and questioning your sexual orientation or gender identity can be done deftly, as in the case of “Brooklyn Nine-Nine,” “Crazy Ex-Girlfriend”, and “Transparent,” all of which have multiple LGBT characters.

This isn’t nearly as TV shows still killing off gay characters, particularly lesbians, a trope the website Autostraddle memorialized in enamel pin form. With the recent love of rebooting and reviving TV shows, there have also been more outdated portrayals of gay men. “Will and Grace” brought back with it the butch-femme dynamic of friends Will Truman and Jack McFarland. “The Tick” had an unfortunate subplot where the gay sentient Artificial Intelligence on a weaponized boat has a crush on another character and sexually assaults him, which is played for laughs. (I have not seen any episodes of the “Roseanne” revival and cannot comment on the gender non-conforming character.) While one of these is much more troubling than the other, the way Will and Jack are portrayed on the show, even if it seems outdated, is wildly viewed to have helped make most of America more accepting of gay people. It was there on network television and in a way that felt palatable to most people.

“Will and Grace” wasn’t the cultural pieces that told me it was okay to be gay–those would be “Victor/Victoria” and “Six Feet Under”–it likely helped teenagers struggling with their sexuality to realize they too could have a future and be successful in life, even though the masculine Will is the one portrayed as having the steady career. In the time between the original finale for “Will and Grace” and its return, LGBT representation in the media seems to have grown and characters can now even be found on shows on Disney Channel and Cartoon Network. We have also seen the rise of social media, which ultimately does connect people with similar interests, and an expansion of how people can consume stories with streaming platforms and podcasts.

On the podcast “The Adventure Zone,” brothers Justin, Travis, and Griffin McElroy, along with their father, Clint, get together to record themselves playing roll-playing games, which results in a gripping piece of storytelling. The four hosts routinely have characters, both playable and NPCs, in their role-playing campaigns who are canonically not straight white men like themselves. In the first season of “The Adventure Zone,” the Balance Arc, one of the three main characters, Taako, was an aloof gay wizard who dressed in a feminine manner but used he/him pronouns. Throughout the series, there are multiple lesbian characters who are often more competent than the main trio. More impressive than the inclusion of these characters is the dedication of the McElroys to listen to the constructive feedback from the podcast’s fans regarding the representation of marginalized people on the show. It is one thing to have diverse characters in storytelling, it is another thing to do it well, something a lot of writers still struggle to do.

As the arc continued, listeners met Taako’s sister, Lup, who is a transgender woman. Lup is an unapologetic badass who will hurl a fireball without blinking an eye, a contrast to her brother. While there tends to be a narrative around trans people having them adhere strictly to the gender norms matching their identity, the podcast presents a character who is simply allowed to be herself, without any criticism. It provides people listening another positive representation of transgender women, further reflecting the world we actually live in, despite it being set in a fantasy world.

What is even more heartening is Lup is seemingly a fan-favorite and a frequent subject of fanart and cosplay. This means it is quite possible to create a well-rounded LGBT character who fits outside of the standard characterization and have them embraced by fans. There is, of course, a huge difference between a podcast, albeit a very popular one–Travis, Justin, and Griffin McElroy also host the immensely popular podcast “My Brother, My Brother, and Me”–and a TV show on a major network or a movie released by a major studio. If “The Adventure Zone” was less successful than it is, there is significantly less loss posed to the McElroys and Maximum Fun, the podcast’s distributor, than a movie studio or TV network that spends millions of dollars on a project. But it means it can be done and should be done. (It is worth noting Sara Ramirez is currently playing a masculine-of-center bisexual character on CBS’ “Madame Secretary”)

Seeing as how “Love, Simon” performed very well at the box office, it would be nice to see major studios releasing movies focused on LGBT characters, even making those portrayals more diverse. This can come in a variety of forms, be it race, disability, or gender expression. But at the same time, there should be a hopefulness to the stories presented, something being done increasingly well in media. Let LGBT characters have a happy ending because it allows real people to see everything will be okay.

August 13, 2017

“Descendants 2” (2017)

descendants_two_ver3 Everything is awful in this world, so it seemed like a good idea to indulge in what is my pop culture guilty pleasure.

“Descendants,” which premiered on Disney Channel in 2015, ended up being something I liked far more than I expected. It had flaws, although most of those flaws are solved by reading Melissa de la Cruz’s “Descendants” novels. When the second movie was announced, I was mildly excited and intrigued, which is a feeling that has only grown since reading De la Cruz’s novels. Besides, it can’t be the worst thing I’ve seen this year.

The movie picks up a few months after the first one as Mal (Dove Cameron) is trying to get used to her role as the girlfriend of King Ben (Mitchell Hope). While she starts to crack from the stress, Evie (Sofia Carson) is busy designing dresses, Jay (Booboo Stewart) remains his athletic self, and Carlos (Cameron Boyce) is struggling to ask Jane (Brenna D’Amico) out to the cotillion. Ben eventually discovers Mal has been relying on magic to cope with the pressures of being his girlfriend (and queen to be), and the two have a falling out. Mal returns to the Isle of the Lost and confronts her old foe Uma (China Anne McClain), the seapunk pirate daughter of Ursula. Uma, bitter about not being selected to go to Auradon, teams up with Harry Hook (Thomas Doherty), to try to bring Mal down while Ben, Evie, Jay, and Carlos try to save Mal.

There is a glaring problem with most movie musical spectaculars on Disney Channel and it’s the over-produced songs. This goes back to at least “Camp Rock,” where there’s a song where Joe Jonas is sitting on a tree and there are a lot of background vocals, but he’s the only person in the frame and Demi Lovato is just standing there, listening. The running joke in my family is the leaves and twigs have incredible singing voices because there the audio has this incredible melody, but the only person singing is Joe Jonas.

This problem rears its ugly head during what, otherwise, is the best number of “Descendants 2,” “What’s My Name.” If you listen to “What’s My Name” on the soundtrack, it’s a great hip-hop number the cynical would argue is designed to make people excited for the film. But in the movie, all of the engineering of the number ends up detracting because the audio levels are so horribly uneven, causing some of Uma’s lyrics to become muddled and all of Harry’s verse to be lost.

Many songs for Disney Channel movies seem designed to be big radio hits, no doubt on Radio Disney. I’m sure there are no Disney executives losing sleep about how the production of the songs on Disney Channel movies will affect them, but it is incredibly distracting and I wish, as odd as this sounds, there was an element of realism to the songs.

Aside for three glaring problems, “Descendants 2” manages to be superior in almost every way to its predecessor. It possibly benefits from having the world of the film established already, but there’s a feeling by cutting out the Disney characters people love and focusing on their children, the movie manages to be enjoyable. The movie is even a full minute shorter than its predecessor and feels tighter in terms of story, failing to drag at any moment. Even the musical number that feels superfluous, which comes right at the end of the movie, is a delight to watch.

More importantly, you can tell almost every actor has grown in the time between the first and second films. No actor has improved more than Carson, whose jazzy version of “Rotten to the Core” remains one of my favorite things about this series. In the first movie, Evie was an enjoyable character, but Carson largely felt overshadowed by Cameron, whom I thought was bound to be a star if she kept improving after the first film. In every scene she’s in, Carson seems thoroughly engaged with what is happening around Evie and steals nearly every scene she’s in just by her presence. One only hopes she gets non-Disney Channel acting work because she proves in this movie she has the chops (and before anyone says, “Disney Channel stars can’t act,” I suggest you turn your attention to Cole Sprouse, who is giving a fantastic performance as Jughead Jones on The CW’s “Riverdale.”)

The villains in this movie also seem to be better cast. As much as I love Kristin Chenoweth, I don’t think she’s a great Maleficent. With that movie, it felt more like she was cast for her singing chops than if she was right for the role. Here, the addition of McClain and Doherty makes the film instantly better. Even if there weren’t a number of improvements, their performances are so delightful you could still enjoy the movie. McClain, who has a history as an actress and musician before this film, is, like Carson, so throughly engaged in every scene she appears in, you can’t stop watching her. While villains, as I have often pointed out on this blog, do not need to be written with nuance, McClain’s body language and line delivery brings the character the depth it might not have gotten with other actors. Doherty gives a performance so deliriously over-the-top, the script acknowledges it, and it makes the film better as a result. No one wants to see a muted version of the son of Captain Hook. The character of his father is already a mustache-twirling villain in the animated film–as well as Dustin Hoffman’s performance in the underrated “Hook”–so it makes sense the character here would be the same.

The songs in this film, largely written by people not involved with the first movie, are catchier and seem to propel the plot along better. There even fail to be any hip-hop covers of songs from the Disney renaissance done horribly wrong. The choreography, done by Disney favorite and director Kenny Ortega with Tony Testa, is more impressive and, in many numbers, feels more natural. As always, the costumes are incredible, particularly with three very important dresses during the cotillion. You even get the sense the set decorators had more fun with this movie with clever signs on the Isle of the Lost–although “Chum” listed as a size in Ursula’s Fish and Chips made me think of Chip Zdarsky’s comics.

The film stumbles with the performance given by Cameron, who unfortunately had the most to shoulder in terms of plot. Her lip syncing is not particularly good and she’s largely surrounded by actors who are giving better performances than her. There was one moment when I paused the movie when Evie and Mal are seated next to each other and I came back to notice how Cameron was just there, while Carson is actively reacting to what the other characters are saying. What helps Cameron is she was already really good in the first film–I was predicting her to be a star after the movie–so the movie doesn’t suffer too much by having a pretty decent actress in the lead role. I just hope before the third film–especially since Uma gives a “You’re not gonna believe this” moment–she grows more as an actress, even though she has been working hard on her music career.

The other problem is Hope is just very bland as an actor. I had initially thought it was the result of how the villains were more compelling in the first film, but Ben is a very well-drawn character in the novels. Hope, who has a larger role in this film, barely registers in this movie in terms of a presence, except when he’s singing in “Chillin’ Like a Villain.” Every line delivery is so flat and uninteresting, it destroys every single important moment he has. What’s worse is the audience really needs to care about about him and Mal, and I care a lot more about Evie and Doug and Carlos and Jane than I do about them because of how utterly uninteresting Cameron and Hope are as leads.

While this franchise is not the place to look for originality, it bothers me to no end Uma wants the Fairy Godmother’s wand so she can go to Auradon, angry over not being invited by Ben. I’d like to think they could have gone after some other noted magical object in Auradon instead of going after the one from the first film. It causes the movie to have the problem of nearly following the same plot as the first one.

If you’re not a stickler about your Disney movies and want something, anything, to provide some mindless diversion from the current world, <i>Descendants 2</i> while not high art, is enjoyable. Thankfully this movie doesn’t flounder around, considering Disney Channel only released this movie this year. One hopes the series continues to improve if they make another film and Sofia Carson gets some work outside of Disney Channel.

June 27, 2017

“Despicable Me 2” (2013)

despicable_me_two_ver7_xlgI kept thinking during “The Book of Henry” about how the film seemed to not understand how people work. More importantly, it felt like it didn’t know how children behave, particularly at different ages. The movie used the broad brush of having all of the children either precocious or cute in an age inappropriate way.

Then we have “Despicable Me 2,” which is a cartoon that, despite one flaw, manages to understand how people, particularly children, behave on a day-to-day basis better than “The Book of Henry” or quite a few other scripted TV shows and movies.

“Despicable Me 2” is an interesting film to write about because it feels like it’s the result of a pleasant surprise, similar to “Toy Story 2.” It’s likely Illumination Animation would have gone on to continue to release more films, especially when you look at how they already had “Hop” scheduled for release the next year. But “Despicable Me” managed to be a massive hit, probably bigger than anyone could have expected. Yes, that does mean some people have pre-judged the series, but it has spawned what, based on the second movie, are pretty enjoyable films to help escape the current world.

Gru (Steve Carrell) has retired from villainy to become a full-time father. After a research station is stolen by a giant magnet, he is recruited by the Anti-Villain League to find who stole an experimental serum. While undercover in a bakeshop with AVL agent Lucy Wilde (Kristen Wiig), Gru begins to suspect Eduardo (Benjamin Bratt), the owner of a Mexican restaurant, is the presumed dead villain El Macho and behind the theft. Meanwhile, the Minions begin going missing from Gru’s home and lair.

The “Despicable Me” movies fall back on some of the tired, annoying problems common in animated films, such as fart jokes, butt jokes, and pop culture gags that sometimes seem out of place. In the universe of “Despicable Me,” there isn’t nearly as much of a problem as in other films. In this film, there seems to be more than in the previous film–one character is named “Ramsbottom,” but I laughed–but it prevents the film from being too bogged down. No, I’m not sure I needed the Minions to make me wonder why none of the members of The Village People ever donned drag and went as the Chiquita lady, but the movie still works.

This is largely because “Despicable Me” often feels like what would happen if you made a Bond film without James Bond that was told from the perspective of the villains. Steal the moon? Steal the Great Pyramid? Steal the Times Square jumbotron? These are all things that have not only happened, but are completely plausible in the universe of the film. The area where the second movie trips up is with the villain. The motivations for the villains in the universe of these films is often, “Why not?” or a means of getting their names out there. But here we’re given a villain whose motivations often feel incredibly murky. Why this? Why now? Yes, we get a nice “Hoboken” gag out of it, but it feels underdeveloped.

The two other problems with the film stem from it losing its bite from the first film. It might be a problem with it becoming such a beloved film–it will be interesting to rewatch the “Shrek” films–but it also has the issue of Gru retiring from villainy. At heart, he’s still a bad guy, but he’s a bad guy with a heart of gold. He still never leaves home without his freeze ray and his knowledge of villains ends up saving the day in this movie. But without his plotting, the film feels like it lacks something.

The other key problem is the Minions, which is no doubt the result of them becoming such popular characters. While they do have a role in the plot of this film, they seem to spend more time on screen than in the first movie, which just feels unnecessary. They at least get their own movie, which will be interesting to watch, and it should be interesting to see how the third movie handles them as characters.

But at the end of the day, “Despicable Me 2” manages to be a fun, escapist comedy. This feels incredibly strange since it is an animated film with a certain fine balance of realism and playful absurdity. Even minor things like a joke at one point about how Agnes is reciting something for an assembly manages to be hilarious because of how true to life it is. It manages to be a family movie that isn’t stupid, which feels like it’s becoming increasingly difficult to make. It still is clever, with plenty of relatable moments and delightful sight gags. Even as an adult, after having my brain fried, albeit on my own terms, this was the right thing to watch and feel better.

There is a place for animated movies that aren’t the high art of Pixar films and are just enjoyable family entertainments. That might be what Illumination’s place in cinema is and there’s nothing wrong with that, especially since the studio seems to be good at doing that based on the “Despicable Me” movies and “Sing.”

June 26, 2017

I Can’t Believe I Just Watched This!: “The Book of Henry”

book_of_henry_ver2_xlgIt’s rare that movies in this series result in me actually saying, “I can’t believe I just watched that.” “Divergent” certainly made me say that, as did the end credits of “Catch Hell.” But as I was walking to my car after seeing “The Book of Henry,” I actually said, “I can’t believe I just watched that.”

The plot of “The Book of Henry” is an utterly bonkers idea that I can’t believe a bunch of a-list people signed on to do this movie both in front of and behind the camera. I also am a little surprised this has a distribution company as major as Focus Features would distribute this, but then I remember “Collateral Beauty” exists. As I texted a friend after this movie, this a movie where almost every narrative decision is a hard left turn. And because of that, I’m going to let you know I am going to spoil this movie because I can’t talk about the insanity of this plot without spoiling it.

Henry (Jaeden Lieberher) is a 12-year-old wünderkind who is an investment genius, an inventor, a co-parent, and apparently went to medical school. In fact, in a movie that largely does not know how children behave–except in a moment with a great joke in the cafeteria late in the film–the only way we can excuse Henry’s stand-up philosophy in his fifth grade class is the fact that we are shown he’s such a genius, he can beat out the girl in “Gifted.” Henry largely takes care of his waitress mother, Susan (Naomi Watts), and his brother, Peter (Jacob Tremblay). He even has a crush on the girl next door, Christina (Maddie Ziegler).

The movie has a distinct feel in the first 15 minutes of being a heartwarming film for the whole family, which would explain the fact I was the only person who went to the theater alone. Michael Giacchino even has a nice peppy score for the opening scenes as we see the idyllic small upstate New York town the characters live in.

But then we get to the first hard left turn, where the movie momentarily turns into an after school special on child abuse. Henry suspects Christina is being abused by her stepfather, Glenn (Dean Norris), but he seems to be the only person who cares. After the school principal (an underutilized Tonya Pinkins) explains to Henry she can’t do much because Glenn is the police commissioner, he decides to take it upon himself to figure out how to kill the police commissioner.

At that first twist, I wasn’t too surprised because that’s what I knew from the reviews on the internet. In fact, the general word about this movie was that it’s the movie about the boy genius who decides to kill the head of the police. And yet, that’s not the craziest thing about this movie. While Henry is in the process of his plot, he has a seizure and is diagnosed with a brain tumor by a doctor (Lee Pace), who is left speechless as Henry rambles off everything he can assume about the tumor. The movie then has the cojones to kill off its title character halfway through the movie. While this is such a stunning move, the big question is how the movie can sustain itself for the rest of the run time. In the midst of their grieving, Peter finds his brother’s notebook. From there, his mother is coached through her oldest son’s notes into killing Glenn.

That’s right. This is a movie in which a 12-year-old boy genius dies from a brain tumor and then, from beyond the grave, coaches his mother into killing the police commissioner, who is abusing his stepdaughter.

The movie really doesn’t become interesting until it gets to the point where we realize what the movie is becoming. In fact, you spend a majority of the movie up until Henry’s death wondering if we’re supposed to root for him. He is presented as such a smug asshole, you don’t know why every fawns over him. Then he starts plotting in intricate detail how to kill his neighbor and you actually hope he gets caught, that someone pauses and wonders what is going on with this beloved boy genius. And quite frankly, it’s a little slow up until the point where the script actually makes the decision to kill him off–with the tone, I was actually expecting for a miraculous recovery–and turn the movie into, “Hey, I’m going to have my grieving mother kill an abuser.”

The movie, which is written by crime novelist Gregg Hurwitz, feels more like it was written by a robot than someone who actually lives among people. If we explain Henry away as being a sociopath–or even being raised to be cold, like the Holmes family in the Charlotte Holmes novels–his behavior actually makes sense. Susan is portrayed as a doting mother who also wants to be cool, a woman who can barely get herself dressed most days, and a woman who feels lost while she’s raising this genius. I actually thought from the beginning of the movie this was going to be a poor man’s “20th Century Women,” which is actually an insult to “20th Century Women.” Peter is one-note and the rest of the characters feel so poorly fleshed out. Sheila (Sarah Silverman) is Susan’s co-worker that might be an alcoholic, but the movie is done with that character development as soon as it introduces it. Pace’s doctor keeps showing up for reasons that don’t really make sense and it is just explained away that he’s checking up on the family. Even Christina, who should arguably be one of the characters you care the most about, is reduced to an empty vessel that keeps insisting she’s fine. Like many of the films in this series, it creates characters just to fill up the screen, which is a major problem in a movie that should have a lot of emotional heft.

The script also has handles child abuse in a very clumsy manner. At one point, Henry comes bursting into the principal’s office and begins listing off the signs of child abuse. Child abuse in this film is treated as little more than a list of warning signs, including a moment where Peter offers Christina a cupcake when she’s not eating in the cafeteria and she says, “No.” While the movie does end up with the big murder plot entangling Susan, the child abuse is really just a moment for Henry to save the day. Much like how rape is often treated in storytelling, the child abuse in this movie is of more narrative importance for Henry than the actual victim. The closest we come to seeing any of the real emotional trauma she’s experiencing is when she’s dancing at the talent show, but I’ve also seen enough art and dance performances to know that most good performers emotionally connect to what they’re doing.

The worst part about this movie is it’s a very well-cast in what is ultimately a very competently made movie. Everyone involved here is just saddled with such a rotten script it ends up becoming a bad movie. There’s certainly something that could be salvaged from this movie. There could be a movie solely about a boy genius who tries to win the heart of the girl he has a crush on. You could have a movie about a single mother who, with the help of her two overly precocious children, helps her co-worker overcome alcoholism. You could have a movie about a mother grieving the loss of her oldest son who is pushed towards dating the neurologist who treated her late child, which would actually help answer the question of “Why does Lee Pace keep showing up?” You could even start the movie at Henry’s seizure and death and go with his mother discovering his notes and learning about his plot and her trying to deal with all of those details. Any of those would be better than this baffling mess of a script that led to us possibly having the biggest “What on earth did I just see?” of 2017.

June 26, 2017

The Films of Dreamworks: “Antz” (1998)

antz_ver3_xlgDreamworks must be one of the most successful companies to be the result of a feud.

Jeffrey Katzenberg had been at Walt Disney Animation, there during its 1980s lull and the start of the “Disney Renaissance.” After a fight with Michael Eisner, he left Disney and started Dreamworks SKG with Steven Spielberg and David Geffen.  The first film announced to be released by the animation division would be “The Prince of Egypt,” an animated musical telling the story of Moses. While some people view it as a massive “Fuck you” to Disney, it came at a time where every movie studio was desperately trying to emulate Disney and either succeeding (“Anastasia,” “The Prince of Egypt”) or failing massively (“Quest for Camelot,” “The King and I”).

In the midst of the Disney Renaissance was the release of “Toy Story,” which proved to be a big hit for the brand new Pixar. While Pixar proceeded to work on a sequel on “Toy Story,” they also announced a project called “Bugs,” which would focus on a neurotic ant who ends up being a hero, while also falling in love with the princess of the colony. The same year of the release of what was retitled “A Bugs Life,” Dreamworks released what ended up being its first film, “Antz,” a movie about a neurotic ant who ends up being a hero, while also falling in love with the princess of the colony. I will firmly argue “The Prince of Egypt” is not a giant middle finger to Disney, but if this film isn’t, I don’t know what is.

“Antz” does follow the barebones narrative description of “A Bugs Life,” but it also could be described as an animated Woody Allen film. It is a movie with a distinctly mature sense of humor that deals a lot with our place in the world. It’s also a movie in which Woody Allen plays an overbearing creep who kidnaps the female lead, whom he’s obsessed with.

Allen voices Z, a neurotic worker ant who struggles with his day-to-day life in the colony. While he gets along well with fellow worker Azteca (Jennifer Lopez) and Weaver (Sylvester Stallone), a soldier ant, he still finds himself depressed. After Princess Bala (Sharon Stone) decides to visit the bar the colony congregates at, Z becomes infatuated and poses as a warrior ant. After surviving a battle with termites, he is welcomed home as a war hero, but decides to kidnap Princess Bala, who is currently engaged to the fascist leader of the army, General Mandible (Gene Hackman).

When writing about “Despicable Me,” I addressed the idea of what is adult humor in animated films. Animation can result in movies strictly for adults, such as “South Park: Bigger, Longer, and Uncut,” or it can result in family movies that have incredibly mature jokes that are clever and sophisticated, such as in quite a few Disney films, “Despicable Me,” and “The Peanuts Movie*”.

Then there is the type of bawdy, gross out humor you find in Dreamworks movies, which I’ll refer to as “Dreamworks Humor.” Dreamworks Humor is often associated with all computer-animated Dreamworks films post-“Shrek” and tend to deal in double entendres that kids won’t understand, gross out humor kids will find funny, and sometimes implied or outright sexual discussions. Dreamworks Humor is found throughout “Antz,” which between that and how dark the film is, I am tempted to suggest it’s not actually a family film and is instead an animated film that managed to get a PG rating. I stopped keeping track of all of the jokes and lines in this film that surprised me, but I did count a comment about drinking from the anus of an aphid, a joke about inbreeding, a scene with bugs eating poop–which, to be fair, is realistic–and a line where Z says Bala had a chance to be in his “erotic fantasies.”

None of these lines make you go, “Oh my God, I can’t believe they went there,” like some lines in “Shrek.” It feels more like you’re watching a comedian who thinks they’re edgy saying a bunch of things in an attempt to shock you and make you laugh like Sarah Silverman, Amy Schumer, or Ali Wong, but they instead just make you have a really uncomfortable night at a club. This is Dreamworks Humor taken to an extreme, which might be the result of it being the studio’s first film and it ultimately being a film to answer the question of, “What if Woody Allen were an ant?”

The film also has the distinct feeling of being rushed. The animation looks awful, although you have to credit Dreamworks on getting the anatomy of bugs right. It doesn’t have the eye-searing shoddiness you find in “Delgo” or “Foodfight,” but there is a very rough feel to every single detail in this film. What particularly hurts it is the fact it was released the same year as both “A Bug’s Life” and “The Prince of Egypt,” which show us you can have very unique and beautiful animated details of grass, water, and leaves and that Dreamworks did have the technology to have richly detailed CGI in animation, even though “The Prince of Egypt” is a traditionally animated film. The timing of this just feels unfortunate, but when would have been a good time to release a movie that is little more than the equivalent of sending a bag of dicks to Michael Eisner and telling him to eat it? A movie doesn’t have to match the level of artistry found with Pixar movies, but even “Despicable Me,” which was made on a smaller budget, had a unique and even whimsical look to it. The film also has an annoying feeling of several frames looking like they were all put through a tilt shift lens, which feels weird since this is animated, but most of the film has a very clear area that is focused in the middle, and the rest looks very blurry. Maybe this was because I was watching it on Netflix on my laptop, but it added to the film feeling like it had a rushed production.

What’s worse is Dreamworks’ first outing is incredibly boring, even if it briefly addresses totalitarianism and fascism. Not every animated film needs to be filled with bright colors, but the script is needlessly tedious. It wasn’t until 19 minutes into the movie I laughed, and that was at a good sight gag. There can even be very serious animated films–minus three massive flaws, I would argue “The Hunchback of Notre Dame” is darker and more adult than this–but this is just dull and feels like a first-draft of a movie.

There are some situations where beating a competitor can pay off, but this shows it doesn’t help when there’s a subpar product. Thankfully, there were two better films released that year, one of which was made by the same studio that made “Antz.”

*It’s very Schultz-ian, but I will never stop laughing at every joke about “War and Peace” in “The Peanuts Movie,” even if I now find myself singing songs from “Natasha, Pierre, and the Great Comet of 1812.”
June 25, 2017

“Despicable Me” (2010)

despicable_me_ver6_xlg Despite having a very clear affection for most animated movies, I failed to see “Despicable Me” until recently. I actually don’t remember it being released in 2010, possibly because I was busy working on moving back to Chicago and trying to emotionally recover from “Toy Story 3.”

Of course, “Despicable Me” is a franchise that seems inescapable, largely due to the Minions. If anything, the near ubiquity of the Minions led me to avoid watching the series until recently. They seemed to be annoying cute little sidekicks, the kind I don’t enjoy in children’s movies. This changed when I saw a trailer for “Despicable Me 3” before a film in the winter–possibly “Moana,” which I still have a lot of affection for. If you were wondering what is a good way to hook me into film series I’ve almost intentionally avoided for six-and-a-half years, promise me there will be an 80s-Themed villain in your movie. After the trailer ended, I turned to my mom and said, “We might need to catch up on these movies.” My willingness to at least give this series a shot increased after watching “Sing,” another Illumination film, which had a cute, fun premise, with a surprising amount of depth.

I finally sat down and watched “Despicable Me” after months of thinking I would one day watch the movies. I didn’t go in with low expectations or hopes of it being the greatest animated film of the year. I just decided to sit back and see how it was, which worked very well when I saw “Sing.”

The movie follows Gru (Steve Carrell), a villain who decides to try to steal the moon after Vector (Jason Segal) steals the Great Pyramid. Due to cost constraints, Gru and his collaborator, Dr. Nefario (Russell Brand), decide the best way to carry out this scheme is to shrink the moon and then steal it. Following being foiled by Vector, Gru adopts three orphan girls, Margo (Miranda Cosgrove), Edith (Dana Gaier), Agnes (Elsie Fisher), to aid in carrying out his plot, but finds himself growing attached to the girls.

The risk you often run when watching most animated family films is finding humor that is too mature, often becoming bawdy, like any of the “Shrek” films. “Despicable Me” operates at a very smart, clever level of a lot of its humor, right down to a sight gag involving Lehman Brothers. Even how showing how Gru is a moderately successful villain by having him mention to the Minions how he stole the miniature versions of famous landmarks from Las Vegas hotels is skillfully done through Carrell’s timing in his voice acting. It’s refreshing to watch a movie that understands good humor doesn’t mean stooping to jokes about cars having diarrhea.

It’s also nice, being someone who recently bemoaned the lack of good villains in children’s movies–although Gaston felt more deranged in the live-action “Beauty and the Beast,” so good on Disney–to see a movie about villains where the characters are outright bad. Gru takes joy in a child’s misery in our first introduction to him, uses a freeze ray a little too freely, and adopts three orphans as a means to the end of his scheme to steal the moon. Vector shows us at multiple moments he doesn’t care for the safety of children, which kept reminding me of a point made about villains in “The Incredibles.” It is possible to write a movie with a villain who is evil and make him not very good. Perhaps because of the concept of writing a film focused on bad guys, this movie succeeds at having villains who both succeed at driving conflict and being good antagonists on both ends of the spectrum. It might be difficult to believe Gru would really switch so fast to liking the trio he adopts, but to jump on this film for plot contrivances seems a bit harsh since the top-grossing animated film of this decade (and currently, all time) has a plot that makes no sense. It is possible to believe Gru, who has issues with his own rough childhood, would turn and feel immense love for the girls.

The Minions also manage to not bog down the movie with their silliness. As I’ve addressed elsewhere on here, it’s very difficult to have a sidekick who doesn’t feel out of place. The Minions largely work because when they’re on screen, they’re there to serve a purpose, which is be minions. They happen to be cute, tiny yellow guys who speak a nonsense language, but they actually have a reason to appear on screen. Perhaps due to their popularity they start to overwhelm the subsequent movies–although they did get their own prequel, which I will look at–but at least here, there’s nothing inherently wrong with them.

There’s nothing high-art or heart-wrenching about “Despicable Me,” but for a film that has likely been written off by many as mindless due to the popularity of one group of characters–one friend questioned my sanity when I told her I liked this movie because of the Minions–it manages to be smart, clever, enjoyable film that looks like it could appeal to everyone in a family.

January 18, 2017

Where Have All the Bad Guys Gone?

Spoilers ahead for “Moana,” “Sing,” “Zootopia,” “Wreck-It Ralph,” “Big Hero 6,” and “Frozen,” although I assume everyone has seen “Frozen” by now.

“Moana,” the latest animated Disney film, has many of the conventions of beloved Disney movies. It features a princess, toe-tappingly good songs, a comedic sidekick and a weird animal. What “Moana” misses is a villain, although there is an argument to be made that Te Ka, a lava demon, is the villain of the film.

“Moana,” unlike many other post-“Tangled” Disney films, manages to work without the presence of a villain. With nearly every other Disney film struggles with lacking villains or red herrings, “Moana” manages to succeed because it’s structured as an adventure film, with some buddy-comedy aspects.

The disappearance of villains in animated films seems to be a bit of a new trend, one that doesn’t always seem to work. This seems to have been something stolen from Pixar since a lot of animation studios seem intent on stealing from what is arguably the most acclaimed animation studio out there. What seems to be the most beloved Pixar films–“Finding Nemo,” “Cars,” “Wall-E,” “Brave,” “Inside Out,” “Ratatouille”–tend to have no villain. Granted, plenty of other great Pixar movies, ones that I personally prefer, have villains in them, notably “Toy Story 3,” “Monsters, Inc.,” and “Up.” (For the record, “Ratatouille” is my favorite Pixar film, but Skinner is more of an antagonist and Anton Ego is Addison DeWitt-lite.)

Pixar, however, tends to make movies children and adults can enjoy, ones that even seem to be a little more cerebral. Most children’s entertainment seems to try to pander to kids and dumb things down for them, ignoring how children sometimes have a heightened sense of the world for how it is. Pixar’s approach to movies is similar to Laika, who has produced “Coraline,” “ParaNorman,” “The Boxtrolls,” and “Kubo and the Two Strings.” While Laika films don’t have villains in the traditional sense of classic Disney films, the films produced by that studio tend to delve into truly dark territory beyond the picture’s aesthetic.

Even several Dreamworks films feature villains, especially when we consider the “Shrek” films are essentially just parodies of films from Disney’s “renaissance” period. When Dreamworks, the biggest purveyor of the unnecessary animated dance party to close out a movie, still has villains in its movies the question arises as to what happened to villains.

In the Disney films myself and many others grew up with, there is the immediate introduction of a villain, usually noted by their dark clothing. (Think about it: Cruella De Vil, Gaston, and Captain Hook are really the only Disney villains who wear clothing where the dominant color isn’t black or purple.) Disney villains are often distinguished by their desire to stop at nothing to get what they want, be it King Triton’s trident, gold in Virginia, or Esmerelda and state-sponsored discrimination against a specific race of people.

What’s more striking is the motivation of those characters for committing often heinous acts is usually made very clear from the beginning. In the instance of Professor Rattigan in “The Great Mouse Detective,” he is motivated to kidnap Flaversham and his daughter because he knows both of those pieces can help him with his plan to overthrow Mouse Britania. His end game is to rule all of “mousedom” and outsmart Basil, which fuels everything he does in the movie.

 

the-great-mouse-detective-classic-disney-19899694-1280-720

The world’s greatest criminal mind.

 

This isn’t really the case with a lot of modern Disney movies. In “Frozen,” we are initially shown the Duke of Weselton, who has a strong desire to capture the mysteriously cut-off kingdom’s trade resources. Based on everything that goes on in the film, right down to him calling Elsa a monster when her powers are revealed, you would assume he’s the villain.

This is one of modern Disney’s favorite strategies in story telling: the red hering. The villain of Frozen ends up being Prince Hans, Anna’s love interest. While I am all in favor of twists in storytelling, the reveal of Prince Hans being the villain just doesn’t work. He has very little motivation for what he does in the movie other than what is revealed in the film’s third act. Furthermore, his reasons for courting Anna for marriage make no sense. If he just wanted to get close to her and gain her respect, it’s safe to assume he could have just tried to befriend her. It’s well-established in the film everyone in the surrounding kingdoms knows about how reclusive Anna and Elsa have been since their parents’ death, so it’s safe to assume if Hans wanted to just befriend her, she probably would have given him her unyielding loyalty.

A similar thing happens in the plot of “Big Hero 6,” although in that film the issue is more so that the presumed villain was framed by the actual antagonist, which is much more forgivable.

The other common failure of storytelling in modern Disney films is when the villain is a mystery. Generally, as seen in “Zootopia” and “Wreck-It Ralph,” something is wrong with the universe of the film and there is an antagonist who is causing the problem, which the protagonist has to solve. (Arguably, this is also what happens in “Moana.”) In “Wreck-It Ralph,” there are glitches in the games, which seemed to have been caused by Ralph jumping from game-to-game. As it turns out, these were actually caused by the actual antagonist of the film, who also sabotaged the game, resulting in the glitches seen in Vanellope. This one works because in the plot of the film the end results all make sense.

This works less well in “Zootopia,” a film everyone enjoyed more than me. In the world of the film, predators and prey live in harmony, but this is threatened when some prey go feral. After an initial false ending and increased prejudice in Zootopia, it is later revealed the timid sheep who works as the assistant mayor is behind the prey going feral. This ends up feeling very rushed and coming out of left-field for the same reasons why the Hans reveal doesn’t really work in “Frozen.” The motivations feel very haphazard, as if someone realized the final version of script was due to Disney and they didn’t have a villain. While the overall ending of “Zootopia” works, the reveal of the antagonist feels like such a twist, it catches one by surprise for all the wrong reasons.

But having an animated film with no villain can work. Studio Ghibli has made many films with no villains and they continue to endure, never ceasing to be a delight on every viewing. Illumination’s “Sing” is another film that, while not high art, manages to be a fun, light-hearted movie without a villain, although I would like to think capitalism is the villain in “Sing.” The movie is ultimately about a bunch of animals in a singing competition and it fulfills its mission. It’s fun and the plot actually makes sense, even if it seems largely like an excuse to have a bunch of stars singing popular songs from the past forty years.

While an animated film can succeed without a villain, the tendency to not have a villain as seen in classic Disney films can result in films not working because of poor scriptwriting. There is no reason why films should try to avoid a menacing villain as children can handle characters who behave in an almost unbelievable way. After all, we have enough people in the government and other positions of power whose behavior isn’t too far removed from the villains we saw in cartoons as children. Shouldn’t art imitate life, even if it’s to provide an escape?

April 24, 2016

I Can’t Believe I Just Watched This!: “The Huntsman: Winter’s War”

The+Huntsman+Winter's+War Once upon a time, in the year 2012, a film called “Snow White and the Huntsman” was released in a year where the world received two Snow White films–the other was “Mirror, Mirror.” The film earned almost $400 million worldwide and in an ivory tower, executives at Universal Pictures decided to greenlight a sequel. After a bit of complications, production on the film began and almost four years after the release of “Snow White and the Huntsman,” “The Huntsman: Winter’s War” was released.

Despite how well “Snow White and the Huntsman” did at the box office, the release of “The Huntsman: Winter’s War” feels like a bit of a surprise. I remember watching the first film on HBO while bored and finding myself bored every time Charlize Theron wasn’t on the screen, chewing scenery. I also remember having a hard time believing Queen Ravenna (Theron) would feel threatened by Snow White (Kristen Stewart) and wishing the movie wasn’t trying so hard to be a Serious, Gritty Reboot.

Thankfully, “The Huntsman: Winter’s War”–oof, this might be the clunkiest title for a film not based on a young adult series–has gotten rid of Snow White and a serious demeanor. The film, however, feels more like it should be a direct-to-video release instead of a major motion picture because of the clunky narration (Liam Neeson), poor narrative logic, a message pounded over the audience’s head and a pop song that was just inserted at the end of the movie. Which, no offense to Halsey, but when your first movie has a gloriously epic Florence and the Machine song, you need to have a song that can compete.

The odd thing about “The Huntsman: Winter’s War” is it’s incredibly dark and I don’t know how it got a PG-13 rating since there is blood shown in this movie as well as some sideboob. What is also interesting is the film manages to be both a prequel and a sequel to a movie and either way, I don’t think we asked for either.

At the start of “The Huntsman: Insert Caption Here,” we meet Ravenna, who kills a king by putting her finger on a chess piece. That’s right, Ravenna kills a man while playing chess and this happens in the first five minutes. She becomes queen with her sister, Freya (Emily Blunt), at her side. Freya is pregnant and after she gives birth to her daughter, she goes to be with her lover. Unfortunately, it appears her daughter was murdered by her lover and this unleashes an ice-based power in her. Freya heads to the north, where everyone there talks like they were raised by Groundskeeper Willie and she becomes queen, raising an army from children her army kidnaps and in the process she outlaws love. Unfortunately, two of her soldiers, Eric (Chris Hemsworth) and Sara (Jessica Chastain) fall in love and Freya punishes both of them.

Seven years later, Snow White has vanquished Ravenna and her kingdom is trying to get rid of Ravenna’s mirror. This sends Eric and Nion (Nick Frost) and Gryff (Rob Brydon) on a quest to find the mirror and destroy it, even though it seems to have the power to drive non-magic wielding people insane.

Now that I type up the plot, it seems to make less sense, particularly compared to the first film.

At some point, you had to wonder what the Universal executives were thinking when they signed off on this film. I’m sure they were more than okay with Freya essentially being Elsa from “Frozen,” but a sadist and with even more emotional baggage. But this film has some of the clunkiest narrative I’ve ever seen and I voluntarily watched a Disney Channel original movie.

The “good guys” and the “bad guys” are clearly labeled in this film based on their positions on love. The good guys believe love conquers all, while the bad guys believe love makes you weak and ruins you. It oddly feels like the movie should have been released during Valentine’s Day weekend instead of in April because it’s a movie that’s not quite a summer blockbuster. The movie even has a plot around how dwarfs hate each other and implies the very uncomfortable situation as to how dwarfs tend to reproduce. But don’t worry, even Nion and Gryff can find love.

Then there’s the accents the actors use in this film, which might not have bothered me if I hadn’t started watching “Outlander.” Hemsworth is still sporting his Scottish accent from the first film, but Chastain’s accent seems to change from scene from scene, as if she was trying to figure it out as they went through the filming process. But it seems odd because only Freya’s soldiers seem to sport Scottish accents because everyone else has a British accent, unless director Cedric Nicholas-Troyan decided Scottish accents made for a good distinction of Northerners.

Improbably, this movie is thoroughly enjoyable if you know what you’re getting yourself involved with. At the screening I attended, I noticed a lot of walkouts, particularly people with younger children. Yes, this movie is incredibly dark, but it also has Hemsworth walking around with a big goofy grin on his face the entire movie, even winking at a girl who is the latest child to be turned into one of Freya’s soldiers. Theron is there, chewing scenery in every scene she appears in, especially at the end of the movie where she’s manipulating what looks like tar that also spews out of her mouth. Blunt, although giving the most restrained performance of the film, is also capable of spewing out bizarre dialogue and giving a well-rounded performance that feels like it’s aware of everything else going on around it.

Even more baffling with this film is it having the subtitle of “Winter’s War” and trailers that seem to promise as much batshit insanity as possible from Blunt and Theron, most of it is spent on the road with Hemsworth and company as they try to find the mirror. It has more of a feel of a historical comedy for a good half of the film than an action fantasy film with a war. (And there’s not much of a war. Sorry.)

The movie feels like it got the memo as to what the audience liked about the film the first time around and upped it for this prequel/sequel, which oddly works if you know going in what you’re getting. This is a movie where in the last 20 minutes Ravenna wears three different outfits for no better reason than, “Let’s see how many stunning, over-the-top costumes we can put on this character.” “The Huntsman: We Left Out Snow White” is a film that really has no reason to exist, but it’s here with a seeming motto of “Go Big or Go Home.”

“The Huntsman: Winter’s War” might be the campiest wide-release, major studio movie that will come out in 2016 and it feels like we should applaud it for simply existing and sticking to its artistic convictions, as bizarre as the movie is at times. If only it had gone will a less clunky message and had a better end credits song.

January 23, 2016

I Can’t Believe I Just Watched This!: “Descendants”

Descendants-Poster I don’t own a TV and it’s not something I go around bragging about as if I’m the coolest person you know. I could probably fit a TV somewhere in my apartment if I got rid of a bookcase (unlikely) or my desk, but until then, there’s simply not any space. As a result, I don’t have cable and all TV I consume is watched on my laptop.

This means I missed the most recent Disney Channel Original Movie phenomenon, “Descendants,” until I was in the checkout line at the grocery store. No, not one of the food co-ops I buy groceries from, an honest-to-God supermarket. (I have a craving for Bigelow Lemon Lift tea rooted in memories of sitting in the dining halls of MSU with food and a book.) Among the magazines was a tie-in magazine for “Descendants” with an image of the four main characters on the front. Confused and intrigued, I picked it up and flipped through before my purchase was ready. I looked it up when I got home and discovered it was a Disney Channel Original Movie and my interest has been piqued ever since, only growing since I saw a copy of the DVD at Target and noticed Maleficent on the back and learned from the blurb there’s a lot of retconning that goes on in this movie.

The movie is set shortly after the marriage of Belle (Keegan Connor Tracy) and Beast (Dan Payne) in the United States of Auradon, a land created from the unification of all the kingdoms in Disney films. Beast is elected king of Auradon and he banishes all of the villains and their henchmen to the Isle of the Lost. Flash forward 16 years and Beast and Belle’s son, Ben (Mitchell Hope), is preparing for his coronation as king because apparently this is an elected monarchy where the descendant of the king becomes the next king, sans an election. Ben decides his first act as king will to invite four children from the Isle of the Lost to attend school in Auradon and he selects Mal (Dove Cameron), Evie (Sofia Carson), Carlos (Cameron Boyce) and Jay (Booboo Stewart), who are the children of Maleficent (Kristin Chenoweth), the Evil Queen (Kathy Najimy? Kathy Najimy.), Cruella de Vil (Wendy Raquel Robinson), and Jafar (Maz Jobrani? Maz Jobrani.), respectfully.

The children are tasked by Maleficent with getting the wand of the Fairy Godmother (Melanie Paxson), which will allow the villains to break free and get their revenge. While at Auradon, the four, erm, descendants work on trying to make the plan work while connecting with the children of the good guys and struggling with if they’re really evil as a result of who their parents are.

Oh, and it’s a musical.

The biggest issue with the movie is the logic right at the start. Beast is elected king of Auradon, not president. And on top of that, his son automatically becomes king? There’s no chance Prince Charming could be king? Or Li Shang? If we’re going to be honest, Shang and Mulan would be the perfect leaders. They have military experience and proven leadership. But then there’s the Isle of the Lost itself, where we have reason to believe the villains have found other villains to procreate with, even though the only villains we meet are the four mentioned earlier. Where’s Governor Ratcliffe, human Ursula, Gaston and Lady Tremaine? Did Frollo get banished to the Isle of the Lost or did he get to help out with state-sponsored discrimination against a group of people? Also, how are the Evil Queen and Maleficent alive? Why is Jafar running a junk shop and why is he the only person who has a new thing since being banished to the island? The movie just tells us these things are the case at the beginning of the film, assuming we’ll just accept the reality presented, but no, I’m sorry, I was raised on Disney movies and I know how these villains go.

The other big issue with the film, although it could be argued it makes the movie stronger, is how every child of a “good guy” is significantly less interesting than the main quartet, right down to the costumes, designed by Kara Saun. But on the other hand, the film presents us with four characters you can root for, particularly Mal as she struggles between pleasing her mother and doing what she really wants. Sometimes the movie tells us things in the most rushed way, like in order to prove to us Evie is smart she has her magic mirror stolen and she manages to still get a good grade. But the four of them are believable as being good people, with great moments like a recurring gag about Jay and Carlos loving chocolate.

The film also does something unthinkable even in 2015 and actually casts actors who are good for the roles, regardless of their race. This means having Robinson, who is black, play a character usually depicted as white and having a son who appears white. Similarly, Sleeping Beauty’s mother is also played by an black actress and her granddaughter also appears to be white. You can suspend all disbelief here because the actors are perfect in those roles, particularly Robinson, and the characters they play are all that matters, not the race of the actors, which is how it should be. Even if some of the characters come off as bland because of how they’re written–looking at you Ben–the casting for this film is pitch perfect, particularly the four leads and their parents.

I have unfortunately glossed over the fact the film is a musical, which is actually the only other demerit. The opening number, “Rotten to the Core,” is a catchy EDM-influenced number–Carson recorded a fantastic version of the song I recommend checking out–but at no point during the song did I truly believe the actors were singing the song. The rest of the original numbers are bland, but the worst I can say is they feel like a time suck and without the songs I feel like the movie would not be nearly two hours long. If you do watch the movie, I recommend skipping the bizarre pseudo-hip-hop cover of “Be Our Guest” the students of Auradon perform because it is flat out awful and feels like an arbitrary number dropped in the film to remind us all of how the movie follows the children of our favorite Disney characters.

The film does have the trappings we now cynically expect from a Disney Channel Original Movie, but thanks to some fantastic casting and protagonists I can actually care about it manages to be a fun movie to watch, even if you just put it on in the background. It’s a shame they really didn’t think through the logic of how Auradon works.