Hey Wilycub! Good to see you back on here, how have you been?
I love this movie too. It took me a few minutes to “get it” the first time I saw it, but once I did, yes, it had me hooked. You can see why I picked this after we’d done The Princess Bride! Both apparently were in the works for a long time before finally getting made. Both are affectionate spoofs. Come to think of it, you’re right about the lack of dirty jokes. The closest we get is when Nancy turns up and understandably goes ballistic. Robert then explains to Giselle that
“She’s got it into her head that we may have . . .”
“Kissed?”
“Something like that.”
Actually, on the subject of kissing, that reminds me, something I didn’t notice in this movie until I watched it the other day. I knew that Giselle and Edward never kissed, that much was sort of a big point, considering how much faith Giselle has in the power of True Love’s Kiss. But what I only noticed for the first time last week was that Robert and Nancy are never shown to kiss either.
Agreed 100% on Amy Adams - she was born to play Giselle. The task of playing a Disney princess in the real world is very tricky when you think about it. One slip-up and the suspension of disbelief is gone, but she didn’t even look like slipping up even once. She is completely convincing in every frame of every scene. She believes whole-heartedly in the part. I don’t believe anyone else could have pulled it off, and the fact that she didn’t win an Oscar for this movie can only be described as criminal.
Also, here’s a weird thing. I don’t know if it’s just me, but when she and Patrick Dempsey are talking about chipmunks talking, he says they can’t, and she says, “not here they don’t” - the inflection in her voice there makes her sound EXACTLY like Catherine Hicks in Star Trek IV The Voyage Home. Just for a moment.
Most of the cast I know from other things:
Timothy Spall has a list of credits as long as your arm, in a considerably variety of roles.
The wonderfully OTT James Marsden I knew as Cyclops in the first three X-Men films (a criminally under-used character, come on, those laser eyes are such a cool power!).
Patrick Dempsey I had only seen as Professor Arronax in a truly horrendous adaption of 20,000 Leagues Under The Sea back in the late 90s (it bore precious little resemblance to the book, and the only good thing about it was Michael Caine as Captain Nemo)
Idina Menzel must have been just making a name for herself at this point, we all know her most famous part now.
Susan Sarandon, well, I don’t think I’ve seen her in anything else, but I do know she was in Thelma & Louise, not that I’ve seen it.
Rachel Covey is considerably more accomplished than the average child star - the cliche of “don’t work with children” does not apply to her. She turned in an excellent performance - and I’ve just discovered won an award for it.
And one of the nicest cameos - well, actually she has several scenes, Jodie “The Little Mermaid” Benson as the secretary.
The one thing that bugs me in this film - and it’s only a minor thing, is at the end when they are asked to take their partners for the king and queen’s waltz. The song that is sung to accompany the dancers is not in waltz time. That was a technical screw-up on the part of Alan Menken the songwriter. It would have been simple to fix! That said, it’s still a nice song in itself, as are all the songs in this movie, Disney through and through, the earlier ones evocative of old Disney standards, then gradually in the real world getting more earthy, for want of a better description.
So yes, as you’d probably guessed, I love this movie. Disney at its finest, and that’s pretty fine.
