Strange Magic review

2015’s 1st film.

http://putlocker.is/watch-strange-magic-online-free-putlocker.html

My opinion right after watching film

My opinion right after the film is that it is wretched. I have never heard so many songs in a film, and so many horrible cover songs at the same time. Most of the characters are poor, it is a poor tribute to A Midsummer Nights’ Dream, and the effort is seriously lacking.

Production

Production started in 2012 for the film. Lucas wanted to make a daughter specifically for his daughters, and used this film to do it, since girls likes romance films, and that there are not any films specifically targeted for girls anymore. They wanted the film to be like Beauty and the Beast, but the Beast does not change, and also wanted to take some inspiration from A Midsummer Night’s Dream.

Story

The film starts with a map of the Fairy Kingdom and the Dark Real, and then we are taken to the Fairy Kingdom to be introduced to our protagonist Marianne (Evan Rachel Wood). It is her wedding day, and she is supposed to marry the very vain man Roland (Sam Polladio). She ends up accidentally flying to the Dark realm, where there are primroses to make love potions. The assistants tell their master Bog King (Alan Cummings), which worries him, since he does not want people to be in love. We are about 6 minutes into the film at this point, and there is already approximately 3 songs.

She wants to give him a flower before the wedding, which could be bad luck, but she does not care. They sing another cheap cover song, and it is clear he is only marrying her to get an army. So she sees him cheating on her, and Marianne calls off the wedding. When she is home, she sings a song about never falling in love again, and turns into a “badass”. Sigh.

Her sister Dawn (Meredith Anne Bull) is with her elf best friend Sunny (Elijah Kelly), and rants to him about the spring dance, and who she should hook up with, being totally oblivious to the fact that he is in love with her. ANOTHER cover (do you see the issue here?) is being sung, and they are attacked by a lizard, but Marianne saves them. She tells her sister not to be so lovestruck all the time.

It is the Spring ball, and her father the Fairy King (Alfred Molina) tries to rekindle her romance with Roland, and completely blows off that he cheated on his daughter. What type of father ignores something like that. We get a few more songs, where Roland tries to get back with her, and she humiliates him in front of everyone. I think 8 songs passed by now. I am not even kidding. They have a song about every 2 minutes.

After being kicked out of the ball, Roland is sad, and uses that to get Sunny (who is obviously in love with Dawn) to get him the potion, and they both can use it to get what they want. Sunny grabs the primrose he found earlier, but the Bog King is eventually told of Sunny`s presence. Sunny makes it to the Sugar Plum Fairy (Kristen Chenoweth). She is at first fearful because making a love potion for the Bog King (only to have it go wrong) is how she got trapped in the first place. She soon makes the potion for Sunny.

I forgot to mention that Bog King`s mother Grisleda (Maya Rudolph) wants her son to find love, and tells him to open up. Does that remind any of you of what Marianne`s father is trying to do? Remember this. Before the Sugar Plum is recaptured, she tells Sunny to not let the Imp get the potion. After she tells the Bog King that she made Sunny a potion, he goes to the Fairy ball to put a stop to all of this.

At the fairy ball, Sunny is singing, and trying to open the potion at the same time,  but it goes wrong when it hits Dawn, and she is bagged instantly by the Bog King to be kidnapped. We are midway through the movie, and the plot is really getting started. Maybe if we did not have a song every 3 minutes, then MAYBE this would not be a problem. Sometimes having crappy redundant cover songs does not help a story.

When Dawn is removed from the bag, she falls in love with Bog King because he is the first person she saw since the potion was put on her. Dawn`s constant singing of love songs grew annoying to everyone, and not he wants to find an antidote. Their father gives Roland his own army (which is what he wanted the entire film) to save his daughters, and when Sunny follows, he turns everything on him, though he told him to get the potion.

And now we have a poorly-done Esmeralda and Phoebus fight/infatuation scene, where they start to realize how similar the two are. She then ends up wanting to help him with the antidote to cure her sister from her crush. They would not be such a bad couple if they were not shoehorned in the last quarter of the film, and it was not so forced as to why they are going to fall in love, and to sing about it every 2 minutes. Both are guarded and cold about love so they will not be hurt. Maybe if he did not kidnap her sister, this would not look bad. I guess I can make the same argument about Beauty and the Beast, with him holding Maurice hostage.

They are soon told by Sugar Plum is that the antidote is something even more stronger than manufactured love (hint hint, it is real love, which is why the potion did not work with Bog King all of those years ago, because he used it on someone that is in love with someone else). Bog King and Marianne start to realize that they are interested in one another, but when Roland and company show up, it looks really bad on her part. He thinks Marianne played him and set him up for Roland to destroy him, which makes him go evil again.

Long story short, they fight, Roland becomes the big bad villain, and when he is outnumbered, he tells his army to trap them all. I cannot believe this. The army is willing to harm the daughters of the man they REALLY work for? Over some prick that is not even a part of their kingdom? Roland uses the potion on Marianne, but it does not work, since she is in love with Bog King. She pretends like all is forgiven, but punches Roland to his fall, and reunites with Bog King. I forgot to mention that all of a sudden, Dawn is in love with Sunny. WTF? When did this happen? How did this happen? She was not even paying any mind to him. If she had feelings for him beforehand, the potion should not have worked, but now that she thought Bog was gone, she has feelings for the elf? Whatever.

Mmph. What I can say is that they tried with this film. They tried to make a good love story, but what needed to happen was to have strong characters, good pacing, and a lack of interruptions/distractions, which this film does not have. The film could have been alright if it was not for the horrible cover songs that LITERALLY take place every 3 minutes outside of the climax, which could have been taken out to add development. Most of the characters are flat, and despite looking pretty, there is not much there to make it a strong film.

Characters

The characters are even weaker than the story. They have some personality, I will give them that, but the execution of their personalities and the one-dimensional side of them is just too much for me to personally handle.

She was a decent enough girl, but then she caught her fiancé cheating on her during her wedding day. This turns her into an ultimate badass, who hates love and all of that jazz. I would not have an issue with this, if it was not so poorly executed and forced in our faces. We get it, you are a tough girl. No need to reiterate it for us 500 times.

He is the only character who is decently executed. A love potion that failed years ago turned him into a mess, and he has some insecurities. Do not really have much issues with him, but maybe if his mother did not rub it in so much, I would not have gotten so annoyed.

She is the only one I liked in the entire film, but that probably has more to do with her voice actress. She was just very entertaining with her quippy remarks.

He is the charming hot guy that all of the guys aspire to be, and all the girls want to be with, but ends up being a jerk. He ends up as the villain because we need someone to be the foil to the message “love is deeper than looks”. He did not have the charm to make me invest in him, and he was failed humor as well.

He was infuriating, though I know it more so has to do with the dialogue. I like his dedication, but the constant humor that came with his character was not humorous at all.

She is the most underwhelming character in the entire film; and yes, even more so than the characters not covered in the section. She falls in love with anyone she sees, and then is kidnapped, falling in love with him because of the potion. She does not do much, and when she does speak, it is annoying. I think I covered her rushed feelings for Sunny up top.

Animation

Despite everything, the animation is pretty damn good. While it is very reminiscent to Epic, the style works for the fairy-type world they are creating. The fairy designs are decent, but something about making them overly thin with the squinted faces kind of irk me.

Music

HORRIBLE. The music is HORRIBLE. The amount of songs that I genuinely like that they ruined is truly grating to say the least, took me out of the movie, and blinded me with an unhealthy amount of anger. Why would they decide to do what they did with it? Even with the decent at best ones, it was lazy.

Reception at Release

When the film was released on January 23rd, 2015, it performed extremely poorly. It made about $12,429,583 domestically, and a pathetic $39,801 overseas, the international gross is $12,469,384.

Even if you ignored the financial flop of this film, the film is still a critical flop as well, receiving negative reviews. Many people complained about the fact that it looked nice, but has no surface, the songs and characters are horrible, and that it is the typical animated film today, which is all style and no substance.

Final Score

Story: 5/10

Characters: 4.5/10

Animation: 8.5/10

Music: 3.5/10

= 21.5/40 = 54%

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