(For Day 28 of NaPoWriMo, the prompt was for a poem about “music at a ceremony or event of some kind,” like for instance a birthday.)

“Happy Birthday!” everyone sang.
The sound of unity in my ears rang.
Everyone loved me, at least for a song
That needed more verses to feel at all long,
And oh, how I wished, as the candles were blown,
That mom would stop yelling and put down her phone
And dad would stop cursing and pointing his finger,
That both would just stay as a smiling singer
And love me enough to not hate one another.
Not too much to ask for a father and mother.
I knew what would happen but blew all the same.
Then maybe the candles would carry the blame.
_____________________

MPA rating: PG

Sometimes a film so clearly wants to be like its predecessors that you have to at least admire the effort that went into its earnest attempt. Mary and the Witch’s Flower comes to mind in trying to live up to Studio Ghibli’s legacy, while Skydance Animation’s Spellbound aspires to be like the Disney princess musicals of yore. It certainly has a pedigree with producer John Lassiter, director Vicky Jenson of Shrek, and songs by the great Alan Menken. In it, Princess Ellian (Rachel Zegler) of the fantasy kingdom of Lumbria desperately tries to keep secret from the citizens that her royal parents (Javier Bardem, Nicole Kidman) have been transformed into animal-like monsters running amok in the palace. Seeking the help of two magical Oracles (Nathan Lane and Titus Burgess as an unspoken gay couple), Ellian takes her parents on a dangerous journey to transform them back to humans.

Spellbound has a lot of great ideas to its credit, particularly in the world-building, from a waterfall used as a massive gate to a desert that turns to quicksand under cloud shadows or a tunnel where sounds become projectiles. The songs are quite good too, though still don’t hold a candle to Menken’s best work, and the voice cast is on point, especially Zegler’s original spunky princess role and John Lithgow as her long-suffering adviser/sidekick. 

But it’s hard to escape the feeling that Spellbound is a pale imitation that needed more fleshing out to avoid its own plot holes, like how the monster king and queen escape the palace when their cages are left open yet had been free to wander the palace for months before that. And then there’s the message that makes itself known rather late in the runtime, clarifying the monster situation as a metaphor for divorce and saying many of the right things for a resolution while not diving deep enough to make it land emotionally. Spellbound is a valiant effort, often funny, cute, and imaginative, but its muddled tone and oversimplified lesson keep it from rising to the level of its forerunners.

Best line: (Queen Ellsmere, to her daughter) “The best thing about us is you. And it always has been.”

Rank: Honorable Mention

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