I am not really a fan of Musicals, but after watching Spirited (2022) I was impressed and uplifted. It is amazing to see Ryan Reynolds on the screen again since Adam's Project and I must say his performance in this movie was spectacular. When you watch this movie you get to see another side of Reynolds as an actor.
Are you a lover of Musicals, don't go yet, stick around for this movie is for you. Spirited is an American Christmas-themed, musical, and comedy film. The movie was directed by Sean Anders and it's a modern retelling of Charles Dickens's 1843 novella titled A Christmas Carol where we have Will Ferrell and Ryan Reynolds be the lead characters alongside Octavia Spencer.
This movie is about Christmas Carol whereby each Christmas eve of a year, the ghost of the Christmas present selects one dark soul on earth to be reformed into a good soul through visitation from three spirits (Christmas Past, Present, and yet-to-come) and help from all afterlife spirits. We were meant to understand that the Ghost of Christmas present (Scrooge) was due for retirement decades ago but refused to do so even with the possibility of a chance to live a new life on earth.
Scouting for a new soul to redeem on earth, the three Ghosts of Christmas came across Clint, a famous controversial media consultant who is deemed unredeemable by the afterlife association. Scrooge was highly convinced that Clint was the soul they were looking for and needed for a massive ripple of goodness and kindness in the world. With much persuasion from Scrooge, the afterlife association took on Clint as the soul to work on and redeem for Christmas eve.
As the preparation to redeem Clint's soul began, Scrooge saw the ugly side of him when Clint was helping his Niece figure out a way to win her class election. Finally, Scrooge got the chance to interact with Clint one-on-one which made him realize that Clint is going to be an almost impossible soul to redeem. This made Scrooge question his life and existence which is why he thinks, was he really redeemed? Will Scrooge succeed in his assignment? Will Clint give him the chance to redeem his soul? Will Clint accept the change?
My Opinion About The Movie And Rating.
I have watched a few Christmas movies that have retold Charles Dickens's book and they were all not interesting to me, but you see this movie, it deserves an award. This movie is a fantastic and thrilling Christmas movie. It stands out from other movies and is unique in its own way. I won't forget this movie because it is one of the best Christmas movies I have watched since 2010. It will be a Christmas classic that will never age and only become more revered as the years go by.
Positives
Spirited, retells Dickens's Christmas Carol story in a unique way and totally different from other movies based on this story by looking at the story more from the Ghosts perspective. There was also a captivating twist that involves the origin of Scrooge's character and his actual identity, like where he actually came from, and his background story in the movie. In the movie, we got to know that the Classic Christmas Carol story was centered around him.
At first, I didn't want to watch this movie because I am not a fan of Will Farrel's works, but then I couldn't resist Ryan Reynolds' face on the movie poster so I went for it. I must say, Ryan Reynolds and Will Ferrel are iconic duos in this movie. Their chemistry is fantastic and flows well in each scene they appear. Now I am starting to think that they both can make more movies.
Octavia Spencer's performance in this movie was amazing! She always has a good screen presence, but in this movie, she was able to command attention from the audience while sharing the spotlight with others without overshadowing any of their performances. Then I love her chemistry with Scrooge. One could feel the connection between them even with the awkwardness. Their romance wasn't forced but flowed well with the scenes, but then I was praying during their " about to kiss scene" that they don't kiss, and bam! It happened. I am glad it didn't go further😁. All the characters did amazingly well as their performances flowed effortlessly.
What stood out to me in this movie was the music. Wow! I was super impressed with it. The songs were written by Justin Paul and Benj Pasek. The music had a stage-like performance added to it and all the music was performed with good dancers, and choreographers to top it up, TAP DANCE! Anytime the music scenes start, you would get your attention drawn to the background dancers and the singers. The singing and dancing happen effortlessly, it flows naturally with the plot and it doesn't seem awkward or weird like in some musicals. Octavia Spencer surprised me with her singing, I never thought she could pull off a thing like that. Then Ryan, who would ever think that the funny guy could sing? His performance with the singing and dancing was good.
Negatives
As they say, no one or nothing is perfect, there will always be some imperfections. Despite the fact that this movie is good, it still had some flaws which I will be talking about here. Yes, the movie is a comedy, but it didn't dig deep into that aspect. I was thinking with Ferrell and Reynolds there would be some comedic gold but no. The comedy rate in this movie is below average.
This movie's running time is about 2 hrs or more but I feel that it could have been compressed or shortened to an hour plus. I say this because some scenes in the movie dragged so much that it was starting to cringe me out and made me start to check how many minutes are left from the running time.
They say it is a family show, but it is not family-friendly as there were some inappropriate dialogues in the movie that are not meant for children's ears. So I think this movie is meant for teenagers and adults.
Ratings and Recommendations.
In conclusion, this movie is enjoyable, and a good watch for the family while the children are asleep. You know what I mean. The music was infectious, thrilling, and melodious. The dancing and choreography were amazing. Rating this movie, I give it 3.5 stars out of 5 stars.
Recommending this movie to Christmas movie lovers and Movie Musicals lovers. It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas.
All images above are from the movie screenshots
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