Comment by dmitriid
5 years ago
That's my problem with Encanto: technically it's very impressive. All the rest: standard Disney movie with forgettable songs, forgettable characters, forgettable story that rushes from plot point to plot point with no time to breathe.
And given all the magic in it it's so highly unimaginative with it.
Isabella's lament was the best part of the movie (filled with emotion, meaning and imagination), but it's literally just a "meaningless stepping stone to discover Bruno" within the movie.
I kind of disagree. I found the elder sister being physically strong and an impressive leader and yet still a woman and also have vulnerability to be pretty new. Her arc didn’t involve her marrying a man or finding absolution in becoming less independent as is common when a strong independent woman has a character arc. The lack of any big bad and instead implications of danger because of complex family expectations and dynamics are also new. When I was young there was always some big evil person (scar in lion king, Ursula in little mermaid). Even more recent but older movies like Tangled had bad/evil people with no nuance. Now a days childrens movies are much more nuanced in good and evil and I really liked the diversity of characters in Encanto and the diversity of how these characters get validation.
> I found the elder sister being physically strong and an impressive leader and yet still a woman and also have vulnerability to be pretty new. Her arc didn’t involve
Well, I thought Encanto had good music and animation at the same time that the writing and plotting was a train wreck, and this is one of the best examples why.
Luisa sings a song about how she's stressed by all the responsibilities she has. Except that she doesn't have any responsibilities - they are not depicted before or after her song. She's not a leader and no one follows her. She doesn't run anything in the family or in the village. All she ever does is lift things and put them down at the direction of someone else. Her song makes no sense and her character has no arc.
The movie takes this same approach to the much more plot-central relationship between Mirabel and Isabela - we're told that they hate each other, and then they have to make up, so there's a song that accomplishes that by hand-waving. This level of writing makes the song worse so that the movie can also be worse.
I agree, I enjoyed the movie for what it was but I found the story pretty lacking compared to some of the other recent Disney (and Pixar) animated features. It kind of felt like the powers were chosen for the sake of pretty animation and/or good songs, with much less thought to how they work in the core story.
The sister that can hear everything is especially bad for the internal consistency of the story. Perhaps with a different personality it could have been pulled off, but it made no sense that she couldn't contain her excitement over the Bruno vision gossip, then later on casually mentions she always knew Bruno was living in the walls of the house.
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Slight nit: Luisa was the middle child. Isabella was the oldest.
Sorry, I missed that bit! Thanks for that catch. I unfortunately can’t go an edit it now but I appreciate it.
Catching up with a couple of friends recently, it came up that our daughters, all of similar ages, are crazy about watching Encanto and even more keen on the songs. It's perfectly reasonable to have normal movie-criticism opinions about the film, but for the target audience, it's a smash. Another 'Frozen'.
Exactly, the songs are an absolute hit with my daughter and her friends.
Just take a look at the UK top 10, three Encanto songs with "We don't talk about Bruno" at number one for last three weeks:
https://www.officialcharts.com/charts/uk-top-40-singles-char...
Literal definition of a hit.
Somewhere I read that Disney had to make submissions to the Academy Awards before finishing screenings of Encanto and weren't sure which song to submit (if they submit multiple songs it risks splitting the vote), so they submitted "Dos Oruguitas" and haven't had it nominated. Clearly picked the wrong song, should have gone with "We don't talk about Bruno", would have had a very good chance of getting an Oscar.
Part of the problem might have been that "Dos Oruguitas" is a smash in Spanish but doesn't as have much emotional impact if you don't understand the lyrics. I saw the movie in a local theater in Latin America and several people cried with that scene.
As a fun fact, every single voice actor is famous in Colombia because of their singing, for example Maribel is the leader of a popular girl band. The Spanish dub is incredible, one of the few movies I would recommend seeing in Spanish instead of English if you are bilingual.
Dos Orugutos was nominated for best song: https://www.billboard.com/music/awards/2022-oscar-nomination...
> forgettable songs
Opinions of Encanto aside, I think it's fair to say "We don't talk about Bruno" is a legitimate earworm (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Earworm)
And reached no. 1 in the UK music chart.
> forgettable songs, forgettable characters, forgettable story
Strong disagree on all three. IMO this group of songs are some of the most memorable Disney animation tunes since Frozen, and maybe even since the mid-90s— don't ask me, look at how they're exploding all over Tiktok right now. For characters, I felt the movie does a pretty decent job of giving depth and personality to most members of a really large ensemble cast, particularly those closest to Mirabel. And even those with a lighter presence (Dolores, Camilo) still get their little moments that endeared them to me.
And as to the story, it's unique within the Disney canon in a number of ways; chief among them is that it doesn't have a conventional villain. Yes there is a character who is the "main" problem, but the real antagonist is the family dynamics and the grandmother's trauma. These are issues that are super relatable for a lot of people/families, much moreso than the over-the-topness of a clearly antagonistic and unredeemable character like Mother Gothel (Tangled) or Prince Hans (Frozen). The comparison is even more stark if you go back further to classic villains like Scar, Gaston, or Ursula.
> Isabella's lament was the best part of the movie[...], but it's literally just a "meaningless stepping stone to discover Bruno" within the movie.
Isabella's song ("What Else Can I Do") is pretty much the opposite of a lament and takes place after Mirabel has found Bruno. I don't know what "lament" you could be talking about, maybe "Waiting On a Miracle" which is Mirabel's classic Disney "I Want" song, in the same vein as "Part of Your World" or "Let It Go".
My kids have basically listened to the soundtrack on repeat for two months now and I assure you the songs are anything but "forgettable".
After finally watching the movie, well, the best description on the "problem" is that it's childish.
But we are talking about a children movie.
They're called "family" movies and not "children's" movies for a reason. Kids are usually watching these with their parents, and when they're done well, every age group gets something out of them.
Frozen, Up, and many others accomplish it well. I personally found Encanto completely boring.
Agreed. I'm repeatedly shocked as I hear adults report they loved this movie.
Of course my daughter is watching it over and over, and the songs are playing constantly. The music is fine, I'm a Lin-Manuel Miranda fan but I don't think this is his best work.
But the movie?!? There's no growth in any character, even the catharsis with the grandmother is "look how much I suffered, have sympathy that I ended up a tyrant". It's just eye/ear candy, fine for kids.
I genuinely don't get it, there are tons of relatively recent Pixar and Disney movies that I think are just better in all respects.
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I am not sure why you are getting downvoted. It is subjective. Hard disagree, though.
Yes, the eye candy on the average cereal box marketed at children looks impressive too, for some definition of "impressive". A movie needs more than just good graphics.
Disney animated features are not cinema; they're visual entertainment. All you need for good visual entertainment is to be good at entertaining visually. On that score there is no argument that they're very good at what they do.