That moment when you need to show a host how wrong they are!

[WorldWacky]

I agree with @Lilsia . The songs were not memorable (I can't recall a single one, lyrics or tune) and I I found the plot overall strange. The family members were awful people and the grandmother was wholly terrible.

The most enjoyable character was the house.

Disclaimer: This is entirely my OPINION. Apparently we have to make sure we put that in our posts now?

I feel as if I could have written this post. I share this exact opinion! Worst grandma EVER! (In my opinion.)








(But also fact. She was mean.)

 

[disneyworldsk]

I feel as if I could have written this post. I share this exact opinion! Worst grandma EVER! (In my opinion.)








(But also fact. She was mean.)

right. there's really no excuse for a grandmother to be humiliating to a grandchild and emotionally abusive with verbal abuse and distancing and making her the outcast of the family. no good reason to excuse to carry that story thru the entire of the movie and make it seem acceptable in the end, with the victim seeking out the perpetrator granny and seeing the light and making rationalizations and hugging it out. and not only was she abusive to the grandchild but also casted her own son aside, neglecting his place in the family. and the bruno song supporting this outcast making it funny or acceptable that he was shunned by a nasty mother. maybe she should be outcasted and tossed aside for cruelty....

 

[lahobbs4]

I loved the music, but got bored in the movie. That's why we listen to the soundtrack daily and have only watched the movie twice! But we also have Hamilton and Moana music on repeat so we are clear LMM fans at our house. Dos Oruguitas is my favorite.

 

[WAstateDVCDaddy]

right. there's really no excuse for a grandmother to be humiliating to a grandchild and emotionally abusive with verbal abuse and distancing and making her the outcast of the family. no good reason to excuse to carry that story thru the entire of the movie and make it seem acceptable in the end, with the victim seeking out the perpetrator granny and seeing the light and making rationalizations and hugging it out. and not only was she abusive to the grandchild but also casted her own son aside, neglecting his place in the family. and the bruno song supporting this outcast making it funny or acceptable that he was shunned by a nasty mother. maybe she should be outcasted and tossed aside for cruelty....

I think people are reacting to this movie based on their own life experiences - which I think validates it is a really good movie.

from my viewpoint, The grandmother wasn’t very attentive to the feelings of her family, but I wouldn’t go so far as calling it “abusive”. She was harsh to Mirabelle, and definitely too focused on her commitment to her community, and her feelings of “keeping up appearances”. Definitely not uncommon in real life. I grew up with lots of real life people who behaved like that, and while I would never treat, or allow my DD to be treated like that, I don’t have as strong a reaction to it, probably because it never was an issue from my personal experiences. I am touched by the underdog/under appreciated within your own family theme, which makes me appreciate the movie more. To each his/her own, but I think the strong reactions speak to the strength of the movie.

One thing though - she didn’t cast aside her son. The movie makes it very clear that Bruno left of his own accord, because he was worried how everyone would react to his prophesy. He knew no one would see he was just the bearer of bad news, and not causing the problem, so he just disappeared.

 

[Kestryl]

I do have to say that I think the comment/question of “Can Lin Manuel Miranda write any other style of song?” Is pretty silly. Within Encanto, Miranda’s written very diverse songs. Honestly, if “Las Orgulitas” sounds anything like “Surface Pressure” or “We don’t talk about Bruno”, then the listener tuned out of the movie after the first two songs. Oh, and everyone realizes Miranda wrote half of the songs for Moana also, right? I think he can definitely write different styles of songs!

It’s like complaining all John Williams scores sound the same or all of Howard Ashman’s work was the same!

 

[WAstateDVCDaddy]

It’s like complaining all John Williams scores sound the same or all of Howard Ashman’s work was the same!

Even worse though. I think the differences in J. Williams’ work are fairly subtle - probably not to a fan of orchestral music, but probably to the average person.

LMM’s work is amazingly diverse. Sure, “Surface Pressure” probably sounds similar to “My Shot” (from Hamilton), but there’s no way I would say these all sound like the same writer:

• Surface Pressure
• Dos Oruguitas
• We Don’t Talk About Bruno
• How Far I’ll Go
• You’re Welcome
• 96,000
• Wait For It
• The Hamilton Polka… oh wait, that was Weird Al….

In my opinion, many of LMM’s songs do succumb to “Broadway-ization” however. The feeling that an up-tempo song has to have a significant build up and crescendo to capture the audience’s attention. Could be that he is writing songs for movies and stage productions, and he’s not alone. So many musicals make me feel like I’ve seen it before. The songs may be different, but the feeling is often the same.

 

[BecBennett]

I love Encanto and the music. I'm confused by the people in this post commenting that they're can't remember any of the songs. I feel like I've had either Family Madrigal, Surface Pressure and We Don't Talk About Bruno playing over in my mind constantly

 

[TheDailyMoo]

I love Lin Manuel since In the Heights and his music is just absolutely amazing but let's (subjectively) be real...his sound is distinctly him with not much variation on any of his themes. There's nothing wrong with that! But there's a reason I refer to both his solo shows as the same title, "In the Hamilton Heights".
Feel free to add to that...Moana Encantos In the Hamilton Heights ;-)
Go listen to the songs from Bring it On the musical and you can instantly tell which ones were his.
He's a super talent and an amazing song writer and lyricist but yeah he's definitely got his style that he doesn't stray too far away from.

 

[WorldWacky]

I think people are reacting to this movie based on their own life experiences - which I think validates it is a really good movie.

from my viewpoint, The grandmother wasn’t very attentive to the feelings of her family, but I wouldn’t go so far as calling it “abusive”. She was harsh to Mirabelle, and definitely too focused on her commitment to her community, and her feelings of “keeping up appearances”. Definitely not uncommon in real life. I grew up with lots of real life people who behaved like that, and while I would never treat, or allow my DD to be treated like that, I don’t have as strong a reaction to it, probably because it never was an issue from my personal experiences. I am touched by the underdog/under appreciated within your own family theme, which makes me appreciate the movie more. To each his/her own, but I think the strong reactions speak to the strength of the movie.

One thing though - she didn’t cast aside her son. The movie makes it very clear that Bruno left of his own accord, because he was worried how everyone would react to his prophesy. He knew no one would see he was just the bearer of bad news, and not causing the problem, so he just disappeared.

I personally haven’t had any life experiences where family members treated me the way Mirabelle was treated. When her grandmother found out she didn’t have a gift, she had no more use for her. The lesson I learned from the movie was that unless you have some spectacular talent (like being nasty to your siblings while making BEAUTIFUL flowers or eavesdropping-ahhh…rude,) you’d might as well hang it up or go live in the walls.
And I can’t remember any of the songs. Like someone mentioned earlier, “We don’t talk about Bruno, no, no,” is the only thing that I remembered.
I’m someone who drives my family crazy with singing ALL DAY LONG. Mostly musicals. But these songs were too wordy, hard to understand, and not very melodious to me. Between that and the storyline, I guess you can tell I wasn’t a fan. I’ll just stick to The Princess and the Frog.

 

[WAstateDVCDaddy]

When her grandmother found out she didn’t have a gift, she had no more use for her.

I definitely see it differently. When the grandmother found out Mirabelle wasn’t being given a gift, and didn’t know if the magic was ending, and realized they may no longer be able to support the town which depended on them…. She freaked out and worried about anything further damaging the magic gift which made the family special. So she pushed away the person who represented that failure, and was afraid of her becoming involved in anything.

But I was always a “glass half full” type of person.

 

[disneyworldsk]

I think people are reacting to this movie based on their own life experiences - which I think validates it is a really good movie.

from my viewpoint, The grandmother wasn’t very attentive to the feelings of her family, but I wouldn’t go so far as calling it “abusive”. She was harsh to Mirabelle, and definitely too focused on her commitment to her community, and her feelings of “keeping up appearances”. Definitely not uncommon in real life. I grew up with lots of real life people who behaved like that, and while I would never treat, or allow my DD to be treated like that, I don’t have as strong a reaction to it, probably because it never was an issue from my personal experiences. I am touched by the underdog/under appreciated within your own family theme, which makes me appreciate the movie more. To each his/her own, but I think the strong reactions speak to the strength of the movie.

One thing though - she didn’t cast aside her son. The movie makes it very clear that Bruno left of his own accord, because he was worried how everyone would react to his prophesy. He knew no one would see he was just the bearer of bad news, and not causing the problem, so he just disappeared.

i respect your perspective. thank you for showing all angles. love discussions on these boards!

 

[Lilsia]

I definitely see it differently. When the grandmother found out Mirabelle wasn’t being given a gift, and didn’t know if the magic was ending, and realized they may no longer be able to support the town which depended on them…. She freaked out and worried about anything further damaging the magic gift which made the family special. So she pushed away the person who represented that failure, and was afraid of her becoming involved in anything.

But I was always a “glass half full” type of person.

I am a glass half full person also, but the treatment Mirabel got from the family was horrible. There is no excuse for the grandma to treat her that way. It was not Mirabel's fault the magic didn't work for her. That sounds like excusing the behavior of an abuser.

 

[Kestryl]

Even worse though. I think the differences in J. Williams’ work are fairly subtle - probably not to a fan of orchestral music, but probably to the average person.

LMM’s work is amazingly diverse. Sure, “Surface Pressure” probably sounds similar to “My Shot” (from Hamilton), but there’s no way I would say these all sound like the same writer:

• Surface Pressure
• Dos Oruguitas
• We Don’t Talk About Bruno
• How Far I’ll Go
• You’re Welcome
• 96,000
• Wait For It
• The Hamilton Polka… oh wait, that was Weird Al….

In my opinion, many of LMM’s songs do succumb to “Broadway-ization” however. The feeling that an up-tempo song has to have a significant build up and crescendo to capture the audience’s attention. Could be that he is writing songs for movies and stage productions, and he’s not alone. So many musicals make me feel like I’ve seen it before. The songs may be different, but the feeling is often the same.

Makes sense though- he’s a Broadway guy. Like Alan Menkin and Howard Ashman! Ha.

On John Williams: there was an Olympic skate routine earlier this week, and I didn’t recognize the song at first but immediately went, that’s John Williams, it has to be. Turned out to be a selection from Schindler’s List, which I haven’t seen. After a while I guess you start getting a sense of their styles!

 

[WAstateDVCDaddy]

Makes sense though- he’s a Broadway guy. Like Alan Menkin and Howard Ashman! Ha.

On John Williams: there was an Olympic skate routine earlier this week, and I didn’t recognize the song at first but immediately went, that’s John Williams, it has to be. Turned out to be a selection from Schindler’s List, which I haven’t seen. After a while I guess you start getting a sense of their styles!

you haven’t seen Schindlers List?! It’s been many years since I watched it, but I remember it being a pretty amazing film. Definitely worth a viewing.

haven’t been able to watch any Olympics - still recovering from a floodedbasement.

 

[disneyseniors]

These reviews of the movie make me not want to see it. I wasn't too interested anyway, but I don't want to watch a movie about people being mean or abusive. It hits close to home for some of us.
My grandmother was not abusive, but she seemed to not want me around. I never got hugged, sat on her lap, kissed, or any interaction except what needed to be done while she watched me, like fixing lunch.
You can bet that I hug, kiss, and grab my grandkids for lap sitting ALOT, LOL. I am using her example of how Not to be a good gramma.

 

[cjlong88]

These reviews of the movie make me not want to see it. I wasn't too interested anyway, but I don't want to watch a movie about people being mean or abusive. It hits close to home for some of us.
My grandmother was not abusive, but she seemed to not want me around. I never got hugged, sat on her lap, kissed, or any interaction except what needed to be done while she watched me, like fixing lunch.
You can bet that I hug, kiss, and grab my grandkids for lap sitting ALOT, LOL. I am using her example of how Not to be a good gramma.

I would recommend watching it so you can make your own opinion. The grandmother did make Mirabel (and others) feel like they were never good enough. That’s a totally normal feeling parents and grand parents often impose onto kids have growing up (I teach and I cannot even count how common it is that I have this conversation with my students). I did with my father. He loves me dearly. Still felt like I was never good enough for him.

 

[Jennasis]

Also, Mirabel's sister with the flowers was a snot.

I also have to ask, couldn't the sister with the super-hearing HEAR BRUNO IN THE WALLS?? And yet she still ignored him. Atrocious.

 

[MomOfDisneyPrincess]

I wouldn't rank the movie very high in my list of favorites, but I don't tend to put on my movie critic hat on, rather just watch for enjoyment. DD15 watched it first and was sobbing and kept pausing to tell me how meaningful the movie was to her. She identified with Mirabel being the non-gifted one in the family and it really touched her heart. I was compelled to watch it for that reason alone. I totally understood her empathy for Mirabel, but I identified more with Luisa carrying all the weight of a bad marriage for so many years.

If the story speaks to me, it's a good movie and Encanto spoke to me. I didn't love the songs, but I do love whispering to my Alexa "let's talk about Bruno" or something to that effect just to see what she says!

 

[BecBennett]

I also have to ask, couldn't the sister with the super-hearing HEAR BRUNO IN THE WALLS?? And yet she still ignored him. Atrocious.

She mentions having been able to hear him every day at the end and Camilo's reaction to that I think is supposed to be an acknowledgement of the plot hole

 

[Jennasis]

She mentions having been able to hear him every day at the end and Camilo's reaction to that I think is supposed to be an acknowledgement of the plot hole

So she WAS just a terrible person.