Feel the Power…and Beware the Groove

On August 26, 2013August 26, 2013 By cherylmahoneyIn Fantasy, Juvenile, Reviews4 Comments

I recently re-watched an old favorite Disney cartoon that I thought would be fun to share: The Emperor’s New Groove, a wildly funny and absurd romp of a movie.

Emperor Kuzco devotes himself constantly to fulfilling his own every whim, with utter disregard for anyone around him. One of his whims includes a new summer home (“My birthday present to me!”). This is bad news for Pacha, whose ancestral village will have to be destroyed to make way for the Emperor’s new indulgence. Kuzco makes a serious tactical error, however, when he decides to fire Royal Advisor Yzma. She vows to kill him and, with the inept help of side-kick Kronk, accidentally turns him into a llama instead. Forced to rely on Pacha for help, Kuzco has to find, well…a new groove.

The plot is absurd enough, but what really makes this movie fun are the wonderful characters and the hilarious dialogue. Yzma is a seriously cracked villain, and so very funny in her wild speeches, hideous costumes and insane melodrama. Check out this scene here as she plots destruction; it’s pretty much all quotable. Trust me, I know this from experience. 🙂 I’m also convinced that Yzma is based on Norma Desmond from Sunset Boulevard. Unfortunately, no one I know has seen Sunset Boulevard, so I can’t get a second opinion on that!

Kronk is a wonderful sidekick with a big heart, really big shoulders, and not enough brainpower to be evil. He loves small furry animals and cooking, has a Shoulder-Angel and a Shoulder-Devil who confuse him, and he’s been known to formulate his own soundtrack.

Pacha is pretty much the nicest guy ever, with a really awesome family. His wife, Chicha, is one of my favorite Disney women. She’s smart, she’s capable, and she’s definitely the fiercer of the two in this partnership–while wearing a dress and taking care of her two kids–and did I mention she’s pregnant? How often do you see a pregnant animated character? Or, for that matter, a happily married Disney couple? I love that Chicha is not a princess, or an action hero, or a fairy. She’s just a really great, normal woman. We need more of them in movies.

Kuzco is our narrator through the movie, and he’s goes on a believable arc of self-growth. I particularly like the moment when narrator-Kuzco argues with in-the-action-Kuzco. It’s an important turning point. It’s not much of a spoiler to say that Kuzco grows from hilariously self-centered to a much more likable guy.

So we have fun characters, there are llama jokes, there’s also a very entertaining chattering squirrel…and there’s a nice message about consideration for others. Though mostly the movie is about the funny lines. This is definitely one of those movies where I’m going to wind up by saying–if you haven’t seen it, watch it!

Buy it here: The Emperor’s New Groove

Cinderella, As Told By the Kitchen Boy

On August 19, 2013August 19, 2013 By cherylmahoneyIn Fantasy, Juvenile, Reviews9 Comments

File:Happilyneverafter1 large.gif Do you remember that Last Unicorn review a while back? Well, when I watched the movie, the DVD also featured a trailer for Happily N’ever After—and for a rarity, a DVD trailer actually inspired me to watch something! HNA had actually been in my Netflix queue for quite a long while, but finally seeing the trailer convinced me to actually order the disk…and it was as fun as the trailer promised.

An animated movie from Lionsgate, it reminds me a bit of Once Upon a Time mashed up with Tangled. In a magic land where every fairy tale is playing out, Cinderella’s wicked stepmother gets control of the magic, and of the scales that control the happy or sad endings. Pretty soon everything is going awry for Ella, who hopes that the Prince can save the day for her. Unfortunately, what she doesn’t realize is that the Prince is unbelievably dense (and constantly consults a book to tell him the proper action to take). Fortunately, Ella also has a friend named Rick, dishwasher and all-around flunky at the palace—and quite reminiscent of Eugene in Tangled.

This is not a deep movie, but it’s a lot of fun, from the cute Rick to the incredibly funny prince. There are also representatives from several fairy tales, like the seven dwarfs. I always enjoy twists on fairy tales, especially when ordinary people get to be heroic. Rick is a great every-man hero, and the prince is hysterically funny in his earnest efforts (and failures) to do the heroic thing.

I also love that Rick is a long-time friend of Ella, who has been harboring a long-time crush–rather than having her love interest be a guy she danced with once. The romance on Ella’s side comes together rather neatly, but I’m willing to assume she always had feelings for Rick, and she just hadn’t quite put it together.

One piece of advice, if you get the DVD, watch the alternate ending–it ties things up a bit more, and I think I liked it better than the actual ending.

After enjoying Happily N’Ever After, I went on to the sequel. Unfortunately, as often happens with direct-to-video animated sequels, it doesn’t live up to the original–both in depth and in how downhill the animation goes. Almost entirely new characters, this one focuses on Snow White, an irresponsible teenager who has to learn about kindness and true beauty when her father’s horrible fiancee starts creating trouble. This has a nice message, which comes across as simplistic in the extreme. It probably would be fine for a younger audience, but it didn’t strike me as likely to transcend and be fun for adults too.

Part of the issue is that the movie takes on a different tone, trying to bring in more modernity to the fairy tale world. I was enjoying the idea of Snow White as a party-loving, make-up-using teenager for about two minutes…until she uses a magic cell phone to call her girlfriends, who answer with “Holla!” And then continue saying it every third sentence…

On the plus side, there’s one really nice moment with Snow’s love interest, Sir Peter, who seems to be a genuinely compassionate, intelligent, interesting character (except that he looks disconcertingly like Rick!) He actually rejects Snow White at a party when he realizes how shallow she is, and asks a different girl to dance. Cartoons talk about beauty-within all the time, while making sure their kind-hearted heroines are also beautiful and have gorgeous dresses. It was good to see a hero who really took a stand on the subject.

If you’re a fairy tale fan, the first Happily N’Ever After is a fun and clever movie. The second one, you can probably give a pass!

Witches and Hangings and Swampland, Oh My

On July 31, 2013August 1, 2013 By cherylmahoneyIn Fantasy, Reviews, Young Adult2 Comments

I’ve been hearing about Chime by Franny Billingsley for quite a while now. What finally drew me in to pick it up, though, was the opening line: “I’ve confessed to everything and I’d like to be hanged. Now, if you please.” So intriguing! What does it mean, what’s the story? Dark, but rousing my interest wonderfully.

Well…the mystery was better than the solution. This was a good book but, as sometimes sadly happens, it was never quite as good as I hoped it would be. Since a lot of people really loved this one, my reaction may be a product of my waiting too long to read it, and building the whole idea up just a bit too much!

Chime is narrated by Briony, who believes she’s a witch—Stepmother explained it to her. Briony has the Second Sight, the ability to see the wide variety of magical creatures living in the swamp outside her village. She believes that when she loses control of her temper, terrible things happen to the people around her—like the accident that left her twin sister Rose with the mind of a child, or the great wave that crippled Stepmother. Briony is careful to present a smiling mask to the world and to remember to hate herself and her wicked deeds—until she meets Eldric, who makes her wish witches could love.

Briony should have been an intriguing character, and in some ways she is. The trouble is, while I grew to like her, I also got frustrated with her very quickly. Certain twists became obvious (to me) almost immediately, and I wanted to shake Briony for not figuring them out. Considering certain trauma she had been through, her inability to see was probably realistic and I acknowledge that—but that didn’t make it less frustrating to read. There are additional twists and revelations as the book goes on, some of them more unexpected, although most I worked out sooner than Briony did.

That may be part of the fundamental problem of Briony’s character. She’s supposed to be very clever—but she doesn’t act that way. Briony and Eldric also felt consistently younger than they were supposed to be. To me, they often felt more like fourteen, instead of seventeen and twenty-two, respectively. I think Eldric was meant to be witty, and at times he was…but he came across as silly a bit too often. And I must say, having a man and a woman form a “Bad Boys Club” in the style of Tom Sawyer really doesn’t seem like the best of ideas for setting up an adult romance… There were some satisfying moments in the end, but it was rough in patches along the way.

I did find the magic more effective, once I got into it. It was initially difficult to figure out the setting—there’s a strong New England and Salem Witch Trials feel to the little town, and since it’s supposed to be an (old country) English village in the early 1900s, that threw me some. But—once I got grounded, I did like the world of spooky, magical creatures in the swamp—everything from a Brownie to ghost children to a Dead Hand—and the ways the villagers had learned to deal with them.

In some ways, Rose, Briony’s sister, became one of my favorite characters. She has more depth than was immediately apparent, and in her own obscure way, she really is clever.

The book picked up as the action did and the second half is at least an engaging ride that ultimately presents some good twists. And there is a reason Briony wants to be hanged—now, if you please. Not a wonderful book—not a bad book—a pretty good book that almost might have done better with not quite such an intriguing opening. Perhaps I would have enjoyed it more expecting less!

Author’s Site: http://www.frannybillingsley.com/

Other reviews (some who liked it much more than I did):
Things Mean a Lot
That’s What She Read
Good Books and Good Wine
The Allure of Books
Anyone else?

Buy it here: Chime

Glorious Gryphon Tales from Andre Norton

On July 29, 2013July 31, 2013 By cherylmahoneyIn Fantasy, ReviewsLeave a comment

I recently reviewed The Crystal Gryphon by Andre Norton, and since then I’ve read the other two books in the trilogy, Gryphon in Glory and Gryphon’s Eyrie (co-written with A. C. Crispin). They’re not long, so I thought I’d take them together today.

The trilogy is about Kerovan, who has always considered himself apart from other men due to his questionable magic heritage, showing itself in his amber eyes and his hooves. He was married as a child to Joisan, a strong young woman whose destiny as a noble lady was changed by a war devastating the country. Though they met and fell in love in the first book, there are still problems between them in the books that follow.

Gryphon in Glory begins with the two apart, largely because Kerovan believes Joisan is better off without him. Disagreeing (adamantly), she follows him into the Waste where, separately and apart, they encounter strange creatures and ancient magic. Gryphon’s Eyrie sees them still seeking a place to belong, as well as a true understanding with each other.

There’s so much I love about this trilogy. The world is amazing, with so many layers, so many strange creatures and different cultures. Their land is one with an elaborate, complex past that continues to influence the present. The second and especially the third book get farther away from the war that dominated the first book, leaving more room for other elements of the world to emerge.

I love the characters so much, Joisan especially. She continues to grow and mature and find new strength throughout the trilogy. I love watching her come into her own, finding increased abilities and confidence. She feels like the driving force in the relationship, in a way that works very well. The concept of a woman who refuses to let go of a man who keeps trying to end things sounds awful, but it actually works very well here, without ever compromising Joisan’s strength of will or self-respect.

I love Kerovan’s character as well; he’s so lacking in a sense of self-worth, and while I do want to shake him occasionally, mostly it makes me sympathetic to him. Kerovan goes through extensive character growth too, although for him it tends to be two steps forward, one step back. I might have liked to see his growth move more consistently forward, as at times it felt like we were continuing to tread through the same territory again and again. But in the end it does come to a satisfying conclusion, both in Kerovan’s growth and in the romance, as they find their way to being true partners.

And then of course the writing is beautiful too. It can be a little formal at times, but in a way that’s really lovely. The third book, with its added co-author (A. C. Crispin) made me nervous, but I didn’t observe a significant change to the style—which was a good thing!

With a warning that the character growth takes its time now and then, this trilogy comes highly recommended.

Author’s Site: http://www.andre-norton.org/

Buy them here: Gryphon in Glory and Gryphon’s Eyrie

The Ogre Downstairs by Diana Wynne Jones

On July 22, 2013July 9, 2013 By cherylmahoneyIn Fantasy, Juvenile, Reviews4 Comments

I’ve checked another one off my list of Diana Wynne Jones “to be read” – The Ogre Downstairs. It’s a romp of a fantasy in the old style, about kids trying to cope with magical adventures gone awry.

Caspar, Johnny and Gwinny are not at all happy with their two new stepbrothers, Douglas and Malcolm, and even less happy with their new stepfather, invariably referred to as the Ogre. The two sets of kids are forced to band together when two chemistry sets arrive, with rows of mysterious chemicals that cause unexpected results–from enabling flight to causing people to switch bodies to bringing inanimate objects (like toffee bars!) to life.

I feel like I’ve read many books (from Edward Eager to Edith Nesbit) about kids dealing with magical chaos, but it’s one of those tropes that doesn’t get old. These kids felt like archetypal fantasy children, good kids with some flaws. None emerged really strongly for me, but all five are distinct and effective within the story. They go through some nice growth as well, particularly in their understanding towards each other.

The magic is highly amusing and entertaining, with a grand variety of mishaps. The living, growing (and breeding) toffee bars are my favorite.

There’s a lot that’s good here, and the book is overall very fun. But I did have a big problem–and that was with the Ogre. (Spoilers here, you have been warned…) Throughout the book, the Ogre is loud, angry, ominous and forbidding, apparently with no liking or understanding at all for children. But then occasionally, for no clear reason, he’ll do something nice (like gifting them with the chemistry sets). This made me suspect that DWJ intended to reform him by the end–and she does. Although, it’s less about his change than about the kids changing their understanding of him. Even with the hints along the way…it just didn’t work for me.

The trouble is, the hints felt less like signs of a complex character, and made him feel more inconsistent than layered. The bigger trouble is that, though the kids ultimately decide he’s not really so bad–he is. He doesn’t just yell–he’s nasty, mean and genuinely hurtful. That would be bad enough, but at one point he gets angry enough to hit two of the boys. The scene is off-stage, so it’s not clear if “hitting” means a mild clout, a serious beating or something in between. All we do hear is “Johnny found out he had been right to postpone being hit by the Ogre. It was an exceedingly unpleasant experience.” And then Malcolm is ill for the next day. After that, you can’t convince me that the Ogre’s “bark was so much worse than his bite” (a direct quote).

For the record, I really, really like characters with gruff exteriors and hearts of gold. And I like happy endings, even improbably neat ones. But this…just did not work for me. I feel like the ultimate message was, “be understanding of the verbally and physically abusive stepfather and maybe he’s not really so bad.” That may be putting it harshly, but I feel it’s a valid interpretation!

It’s really too bad, because 80% of this book is a delightful fantasy. But then the conclusion of the last couple of chapters leaves me feeling rather troubled. I tell myself it’s from a different time, and standards on child-rearing were different, and it’s true that if this was an Edith Nesbit book from the early 1900s I’d give it a pass…but was 1974 really that long ago?

I don’t know if I recommend this one or not. It’s complicated. But I know some of you are Diana Wynne Jones fans, so I’m very curious on whether you’ve read this one–and what you think!

Author’s Site: http://www.dianawynnejones.com/

Other reviews:
Dead Houseplants
Caroline Williams’ Blog
Readers By Night
Swan Tower
Forgotten Classics
Anyone else?

Buy it here: The Ogre Downstairs