I saw Encanto...

 I can't even begin to describe how terrible this movie is. From a technical aspect it's standard Disney 3D animation. The music is OK,  but then again, I believe Lin Manuel Miranda is overrated. He's no Alan Menken or Elton John, but he's serviceable for this movie. The movie feels like a disjointed stage play and the musical numbers don't flow organically. They feel like a mandate by committee and break the flow of the already dragging movie. 

I did notice a bit of hopefully unintended ableism in the way the family treated Mirabel as "less than" normal. Not to mention the toxicity of the family and despite the toxic environment, Mirabel returns to them and everything is back to normal as if all the toxic bullshit never happened. Hell, Bruno was forced to live between the walls of the house because despite their toxicity, he couldn't leave them. 

"My Special friend" told me that there are some references to Cien años de Soledad by Gabriel Garcia Marquez. I told her that I vaguely remember the book, since I read it for a class 20-something years ago and pretty much hated every minute of it. She had read it more recently and that a few things in the movie are way too similar to be a coincidence, but not flat out copying enough the book and adapting it for kids. This can be a reasonable explanation to the "magical realism" and lack of explanation of the rules of this universe. Having the "villain" be a non-anthropomorphic force of nature is not a concept that younger children would understand.

The film is supposed to focus on the family, but pretty much everyone is a one dimensional character aside from Mirabel. Gee I wonder why that is...

Bonus fact: She's of Cuban origins, not Colombian... the "borrowing from 100 años de Soledad" theory is making more sense now.

The co-director, the co-writer as in Story by AND Screenplay by, conveniently looks a lot like Mirabel... coincidence? I think not... 

Like I mentioned on the caption Beneath Charice Castro Smith, the co-writer, co-director, co-memierda... sorry, got carried away by that last one, the fact that "the Colombian experience" for the world building is a second or third hand experience. For all the bullshit claims about representation this is a giant dickslap in the face... at least 7 people out of the 25 in the cast ARE ACTUAL COLOMBIANS. That's nearly a third... it almost makes for the 20 steps back... at least for Coco they got an American of Mexican descent. 

Some people woll say that this review is biased due to the incident the other day. It's understandable that one would think that way, but no. I was ready to give it a fair chance, but the whole celebration of the family's toxicity... again, Bruno had to live between the walls of his family's home because he had nowhere else to go. The steep mountains separated the town from the rest of the world... ah, I see the 100 Años de Soledad reference now... the town is a copy of Macondo... The flashback with the Abuela is a reference as well... but seriously, Bruno had to hear the song where his family speak shit about him and act as if he was the Anti-Christ or something. Not to mention how Mirabel was treated like crap for not having powers until they had to rebuild the house without powers and it was "imperfect" until Disney "happy ending" BS goves everyone their powers back and Mirabel is back to being the handicapped kid... and Bruno, he got his premonition powers, which caused him a lot of trouble. Isn't the whole getting the powers back opposite to what the movie was trying to say about the pressures being hoisted upon people that force them to "be perfect" despite having flaws themselves?

It's pretty to look at, if you like Lin Manuel Miranda, well this movie is for you. It definitely was not for me and I'm glad that I didn't have to pay $10 for a ticket to watch this...