In Review: Tangled

The Gist

Disney's modern take on Rapunzel involves a dreamy painting style of animation, Mandy Moore, and typical Disney-ness. That said, I feel I have grown too old for cartoons--with too much musical numbers.

The Good

• Voice acting and animation is top-notch
• A worthy addition to Disney's catalog of cartoons
• Good storyboard and moderate pace of narration, easy for kids like me to follow

The Bad

• may have too much slapstick, even for a cartoon
• musical numbers left and right, like watching old-school Disney movies in CGI

Synopsis

Once upon a time, there was a Golden Flower that can heal any ailment known to man. An old selfish witch named Gothel found it. Just by singing a song to the flower, Gothel is returned her youth. Addicted to the promise of eternal youth, she wanted its power for herself so she hid it away for her selfish purpose. Consequently, the Queen of a nearby kingdom fell ill during her pregnancy and no cure could be found for her but the mythical Golden Flower. The kingdom searched far and wide and found it one night when Gothel failed to hide it properly. The Queen was healed by the flower and she gave birth to a daughter with a beautiful golden hair. Gothel found the princess and realized that the flower's healing powers has been transferred to the Princess's hair as long as it's not cut. Gothel kidnapped the princess and hid her far away in a tower in the middle of the forest. From then on every year, on the princess's birthday, the kingdom would release thousands of paper lanterns into the air, in hopes that the princess would see it and one day return. Now turning 18, the princess, named Rapunzel, is trapped in a tower far away, her hair immeasurably long, wants to go out for a day to see the lanterns, or floating lights, but Gothel, her "mother" forbids her, saying that the outside world is cruel, full of people who wants to use her magic hair for their own good. And thus begins Rapunzel's dilemma and a quest to see the lanterns.

Dream Sequence

Apparently, Disney spent 260M USD for Tangled. That makes Tangled the most expensive animation film ever made and the second most expensive film ever made, only beaten by the Pirates Caribbean: The World's End. The hand-painted CGI feel on Tangled is probably one of the reasons why Tangled was so expensive. If you have seen Tangled, you will be impressed by how 2D old school the characters look, yet still very modern CGI. That was the idea of Tangled's directors and that was what they were intending to do, anyways. Blend traditional 2D and CGI animation and the results were impressive and nice to these eyes.

The Spirit is Disney, but the Flesh is Pix

ar. I meant Pixar. While, the animation used is technically grand that it scales past Pixar level, the narrative and the musical numbers made Tangled very old-school Disney. I heard some people loved it, but the last time I liked a Disney movie with musical numbers was on Enchanted. And its musical numbers were good and iconic as with most Disney films. With Tangled, I can't say the same. There were many musical numbers in that film, but I only remembered Mother Knows Best. I didn't sing along as I did with Enchanted's Happy Working Song, and So Close, or Aladdin's A Whole New World. There were no songs iPod-worthy.

I also deride the overuse of slapsticks, although the movie itself is comic in a very Disney way. I found it weird how often the frying pan was continuously a device of humor, and that there is a very intelligent horse that also acted like a Pointer dog. Kids undoubtedly will love those kinds of humor, but the folks accompanying for the ride, I can't say the same.

The voice acting was great, and Mandy Moore was casted right since she can sing. But did she do well? You bet. Voice acting, typical of Disney, was top-notch. Storyboard was also well done and the narrative was easy to follow, something that both kids and adults can follow easily. The dialogues, script, is a bit washed out, mainly because this is a kid's film. If it were Disney-Pixar, it won't have singing, will have less speaking, and more emotional touch. But this is Disney alone. Something for children, and if you expect it to be like Pixar, you will be disappointed as no matter how tightly knot these studios are, their products are still very distinguishable from each other.

No matter, Tangled has been very enjoyable, save for the musical parts that I wanted to skip. Maybe Disney will change that touch in the future. Maybe they will update their classics to CGI and do less singing and probably pick up influences from Pixar yet still be very Disney somehow. I don't know how. They managed to marry new age animation with traditional animation. If they can do that to the Flesh, I'm pretty sure they will manage with the Spirit. Maybe in the future. But for now, I give my verdict.

A passing mark of 3.5/5.