Twisted Tale
Tangled
Directed by Nathan Greno and Byron Howard
Runtime: 100 min.
The Disney machine kicks into gear once again with Tangled, a 3-D update of the Brothers Grimm tale Rapunzel, but developed for a generation that no longer reads (and, as Disneys title-change implies, probably doesnt recognize the name Rapunzel in their Hannah Montana world).
The medieval girl Rapunzel (voiced by Mandy Moore) is still trapped in a tower where access is only available to her witchy guardian Mother Gothel (Donna Murphy) and her rascal suitor Flynn Ryder (Zachery Levi) by climbing her long locks of blonde hair. In contemporary cartoon fashionand
CGI excessRapunzels hair length is exaggerated to Shrek-like proportions. It sometimes wraps around Flynn like a lariat or noose. Its insanely wiggy with a life of its own, but theres not one credibly girlish moment where Rapunzels hair becomes a nuisance for its owner. And the couples adventures to escape get twisted into more of the same comical nonsense and musical numbers that extract both imagination and significance from fairy tales.
Tangled, like Pixar product, doesnt introduce audiences to wonderment; its simply part of the process where moviegoerschildren especiallyare indoctrinated into the habit of following advertising and consumerism. The nakedness of this films formula (with funny bandits, winking animals and Broadway-bound musical numbers) shamelessly makes jokes and routines the pay-offnot meaning, psychological suggestion or poetry. (Adults might remember the symbolic schooldays rhyme: Let down your hair so that I might climb the golden stair. Todays kids merely get 3-D.)
By mixing up and confusing the purpose of cinematic amusement and fairy tales, Tangled is aptly named for the mass misperception of popular entertainment as a mechanism of gimmicks rather than an expression of feelings. Tangled provides the latest evidence why this current era of animated, 3-D overproduction is not a golden age (no matter how many Pixar stooges claim otherwise). Adults will steer clear; responsible parents will read to their kids instead. Tangleds deficiency is a form of cinematic mange.