This was very silly, sure, but not too bad. It's set in a fairytale world, where the new king has made slaves of the giants and entertainers-by-law of the elves. When Ella is born, her mother and Mandy (her aunt? I don't know) try to hide her before fairy Lucinda (Vivica Fox) finds her, but they fail. The baby started crying when Lucinda picked her up and wouldn't stop, so Lucinda gave her the 'gift of obedience'. From now on Ella is forced to do whatever she's ordered to do, but must hide this curse from everybody. Her mother dies when she's still a child, and soon her father marries again, for money. The stepmother (Joanna Lumley apparently, I had not recognized her) has two hideous daughters, of course, vain Hattie (Lucy Punch) and dumb Olive. The eldest daughter is quite bossy and is constantly going 'do this, do that', and since Ella is forced to do it, she soon discovers her secret and takes advantage of it, to the point of having her steal and reject rudely her best friend. She's forced to tell her that she never wants to see her again, and she cries while she does so, and also she's offensive in some kind of racist way, still forced by her 'step-family'.
I was rather disappointed that the friend had no more role in it, I had hoped that their friendship would count more, that there might have been scenes with them, like the friend not giving up, believing something was wrong and that Ella would have never treated like that of her own free will.
But there was nothing of the sort. Friendships don't count in this type of movies.
Ella is a good girl, and can't go on living with her step-sisters knowing her secret, so she goes off on a journey to find Lucinda and have her remove the gift. Mandy is a fairy herself, but really clumsy, she can't do magic properly, to the point that she has turned her boyfriend into a talking book.
On her way, she is saved from some ogres who wanted to eat her by Char (Hugh Dancy), the prince who lives in a state of blind bliss, not knowing anything of what is going on in his world and believing every word his uncle Edgar (Cary Elwes) told him. Char believes that the ogres killed his father, for a start, but it was Edgar, to become king.
Ella and Char journey together (there's also an elf who wants to be a lawyer, but he has no relevance at all) and he finds out about the giants being treated as slaves, but he still believes his uncle to be good, and probably ignorant of it all. Silly.
When they finally get back to his castle, he confesses to his uncle that he wants to marry Ella, and Hattie tells Edgar about Ella's secret, hoping that he'll have Char marry her.
Edgar orders Ella to kill Char, so she goes as far away as she can. When she meets Lucinda, she begs her to take back her 'gift', but Lucinda dismiss her with a simple 'if you don't like my gift, get rid of it yourself', then she's all 'you should be at the ball' and orders her to go, so she's forced to go back to the castle.
She's in love with Char, apparently, and it all started because when he said 'stay' and she came back because forced, he then said 'I don't want you to do what you don't want to do', or something like that, maybe thinking she was obeying because he was her prince-soon-king, and when he proposes she cries her heart out while her hand raises a dagger. She succeeds, however, in breaking the curse by not killing him, because her heart is stronger than magic (as I said, friendships don't count in this movies, although I admit that a murder is much worse than a broken heart).
At this point, she is imprisoned because Char believes she wanted to kill him, and a group of people free her. I understand the elf and the giants, but why would the ogres want to help her? They were not friends, they were going to eat her!
She explains everything to Char, and at the end Edgar finally admits to everything right in front of all the guests, and quite stupidly he forgets he swapped the real crown with a cursed one and puts it on his own head and dies. Come on!
It ends with Ella marrying Char, of course.
I did not like the scene with the elves singing, not a bit, but the scene with the giants singing was not bad, it was a fun party.
I did not like the talking snake and the stupid death of Edgar.
I did not like, as I said above, that there were no more scenes with her best friend. I think she appears at the end, smiling after her when she leaves with Char after the wedding, but that is all. She should have had an active role in helping her. It also seems strange that Hattie found out about her secret in a few days while her best friend had no clue after years of knowing each other. Of course she didn't go around ordering her, but still it happens to everybody to say things like 'stop it' or 'come with me' or whatever else. Spending so much time together, it's quite silly that she had no clue.
Char was stupid and the elf useless.
Mandy was lovely and fun, and she had the best lines of it all. Minnie Driver played Mandy, and she was adorable.
Anne Hathaway played Ella, and did a good job. I'm not a big fan, but still, if this movie is not completely rubbish is 20% Mandy (she has little space) and 80% Hathaway. She's really good here, and the scenes when she's forced to do or say things are the best in the movie.
ITA Ella enchanted-il magico mondo di Ella
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