997. Enchanted (2007)

Starring: Amy Adams, Patrick Dempsey, James Marsden

Director: Kevin Lima

Running Time: 107 mins

Enchanted is an American film about a princess from a fairytale land who, on the eve of her wedding with the prince, is banished to the real world by the evil queen who wants to maintain her crown by stopping the marriage, and she experiences a lot of trouble in adapting to her strange new surroundings.

This is a very happy and funny fairytale parody. The comedic twist on Disney’s generic plot is consistently entertaining, whilst the all-star cast does a fantastic job here, and although the story is sometimes relatively inconsistent, on the whole, this is a cheery film that’s genuinely enjoyable for all.

The main idea here is that you’ve got a princess from Disney’s magical fairytale land being thrown into the cynical real world, and, although it seems like a potentially annoying concept, there are some properly hilarious consequences.

The most important reason why this film is so enjoyable is definitely down to Amy Adams’ excellent central performance as Giselle, the princess. She does a fantastic job of putting on the typically cheesy and smiley image of a Disney Princess, but also shines in showing the character development of a relatively two-dimensional person into an interesting and well-rounded character by giving a both emotional and entertaining performance.

The supporting actors are all very good too. Patrick Dempsey is a very likeable Earth protagonist, whilst James Marsden is hilarious as the dashing and charming Prince put completely out of place in the real world. Coupled with other good turns from the likes of Timothy Spall and Susan Sarandon, and the actors here are all great fun to watch, adding to the enjoyability of the film immensely.

The other thing that makes this such a surprisingly hilarious watch is the excellent writing. The comedy maintains a perfect balance between child-friendly slapstick and generic Disney writing to properly funny stuff for adults. Of course, there’s nothing inappropriate for kids, but there are some excellently funny subtleties throughout that will be a good laugh for parents.

What’s more is that the whole idea of the princess stuck in the real world actually remains consistently funny throughout, thanks to the great performances and good comedy, and although Disney occasionally deviates from its uncharacteristic but impressive self-parodying to please the kids, which is a little bit of a shame, this is on the whole a very funny and interesting film that is a great watch for all, and that’s why it gets a 7.3 from me.