Sorry to disturb you, but I just had an unstoppable urge to throw that out there. I believe history will ultimately prove me correct.
I didn't see Strange Magic, but I recall reviews being "forgettable at best". Not that I had high expectations, but was Trolls really that bad?
Some reviewers compared "Strange Magic" to "Trolls", both of them being animated jukebox musicals, hence the comment. I've been avoiding the "formula" flicks for some time now, so maybe I'm just out of practice in dealing with them, but by about 20 minutes in I was wondering why they didn't just skip the animation and put the actual focus groups on the screen. The plot makes no logical sense except in a bare-bones seen-this-all-before sort of way, the characters are impossibly one-dimensional, none of the emotional beats have any lead-up whatsoever (BOOM! They're in love for no discernible reason), the message being hawked can be kindly described as "dopey", and the oldies-infested soundtrack is non-stop irritating. (I used to love psychedelic animated production numbers. This movie is dripping in them and I hated every last one.) This movie is product, a 90-minute toy commercial by people who didn't really seem to give a crap. "Strange Magic" was terrible and wrong headed and also featured random oldie production numbers out the wazoo (which, by the way, were better in every respect except quantity of color), but at least it had some heart and the characters were kind of interesting. I file it under "guilty pleasure and potential future cult classic" - sort of an animated "Xanadu". "Trolls" goes under "particularly craven Dreamworks movie".
I'm not surprised by that. I haven't seen both mobies, but when did Dreamworks release a good movie recently? I stopped watching DreamWorks movies many years ago after the terrible Shrek 4 movie. I don't like their humour. Isn't Strange Magic the Lucasfilm movie Disney released after the purchase? If I remember correctly it got terrible reviews and wasn't even in the cinemas over here.
Yep. Released and didn't tell anybody. HUGE-budget movie, very George-Lucas-y. And then they didn't even put it out on Blu Ray. "Xanadu" got terrible reviews too.
"Xanadu" got terrible reviews too. That's because 'Xanadu' is a terrible movie. I remember seeing it first run in Summer of 1980 and found the whole thing embarrassing.
"Strange Magic" is terrible too. But it's a VERY ENTERTAINING terrible. Like "Xanadu". And "Xanadu" got its own Broadway musical that ran for 500 performances. "Trolls" is worse, and is not very entertaining at all.
And "Xanadu" got its own Broadway musical that ran for 500 performances. Yeah, well so did 'Footloose' and 'The Wedding Singer' I'm just having fun with you mawnck!
I actually enjoyed "Strange Magic" for what is was worth. It's another Midsummer Night's Dream remake with music. I have no desire to see Trolls...they gave me the heebie jeebies when I was a kid.
I was always an ELO fan. Which is why I was tempted to see both Xanadu and Strange Magic... but after seeing clips I thought... "naw, I'd really rather remain a fan."
ELO doesn't appear onscreen in either movie, and thus emerges with their artistic integrity unscathed. Now The Tubes on the other hand ... By the way ... Xanadu's choreographer was a young chap, just starting out, named Kenny Ortega. Check out what he's been doing since then: Kenny Ortega - Wikipedia
Xanadu also had Gene Kelly doing what he does best. Sure it's 80's cheese. Most film musicals of the 80's were. Look at Annie and Grease.
