A high energy family-friendly delight of a film!!
Not your typical Cinderella story...
What do you get when you mix a bit of fairy tale-Cinderella world with some Shrek, throw in some Princess Bride, a little bit of Disney's Robin Hood (see Hester the snake), along with a little singing, and some random modern-day references thrown in for good measure? You get Ella Enchanted, Miramax's newest gem of a film, narrated by Eric Idle and starring the lovely Anne Hathaway and the dreamy Hugh Dancy.
Ella of Frell (Anne Hathaway) has a gift. Er, I mean, a curse. A gift, a curse, it all depends on how you look at it: no matter what you tell Ella to do, she must obey. A rather capricious fairy named Lucinda (Vivica A. Fox) gave baby Ella the "gift of obedience": anything spoken to Ella as a command, she must automatically do. Fast forward a few years: Ella is now a young lady, and no one except her aunt Mandy (Minnie Driver) knows about this gift/curse. Not even her best friend and fellow civil rights activist Arieda (played by...
Why Destroy Such a Wonderful Book?
You'd think after the success of the "Lord of the Rings" and "Harry Potter" movies, producers and writers would be getting a message loud and clear: that the more loyal a movie is to its original source material, the happier fans will be. As it is, I'm detecting a trend in the reviews written for the big screen version of "Ella Enchanted" - those that have never read the book find it sweet and charming, but those that are fans of Gail Carson Levine's wonderful novel are wondering what went wrong.
Levine's novel is a reworking of the Cinderella story, who comes up with a legitimate reason as to why Cinderella would allow herself to be bullied around so much by her stepfamily. Levine's ingenius idea is that Ella has been placed under a gift/curse by her fairy godmother Lucinda, which forces her to to whatever she's told.
Well, this is about the only plot device that the screen-writers chose to keep, and even then it's twisted into something that's virtually unrecognisable. In the...
Enchanting performance by Anne!
In spite of the harsh criticism received for this movie for it's contradiction with the book I personally think it was a neat production judging in terms of cinematic creation. I never heard it being referred to as an adaptation, so why worry about if it ain't broke?
The most eye catching thing right throughout the movie was obviously Anne. Her acting has astonishingly improved since Princess Diaries, Nicholas Nickleby and the rest. Also you get to hear her amazing voice where she performance a beautiful solo and dancing of course ;).. talking about dancing, in the finale just try focusing on Jimi Mistry. you won't stop laughing!
I never pictured Hugh Dancy as prince charming, but you really get a laugh here. The entire film has a very fine blend of colors, you would notice it's very easy to watch and the picture quality is looks great. Even though not in depth, you will be taken into the worlds of both Giants and Elves, a pretty good contrast, and as always the...
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