Spirited
Each Christmas Eve, the Ghost of Christmas Present selects one dark soul to be reformed by a visit from three spirits. But this season, he picked the wrong Scrooge. Clint Briggs turns the tables on his ghostly host until Present finds himself reexamining his own past, present and future.
- Released: 2022-11-11
- Runtime: 120 minutes
- Genre: Comedy
- Stars: Ryan Reynolds, Will Ferrell, Octavia Spencer, Sunita Mani, Aimee Carrero, Joe Tippett, Marlow Barkley, Maximilian Lee Piazza, Jen Tullock, Anne Reardon, Nico Tirozzi, Billy Concha, Peter Brownlee, Woody Fu, Brian Bradbury, Maddox Dalton, Daelan Dalton, Arasha Lalani
- Director: Sean Anders
Comments
- elliottkemp-53971 - 3 March 2024
Could have handled the musical part a little better, good elsewhere
Honestly the fact that this movie is a musical is its biggest flaw because of how it treats the musical formula. The original song in the afterlife or whatever has several characters being confused, and it's implied musicals aren't a thing in the real world. However that is immediately after contracting it by Ryan Reynolds singing a song. I feel that having the most cynical character in the movie sing right after it's addressed that it's odd really clashes. I think having his character refrain from it and having another character sing a villain song while he acts all exasperated would be better. Also later in the movie Will Ferrell sings a song in front of him, and having him make some annoyed remarks would work well. And then at the end of the movie with his redemption and the redemption of the villain song would work, by having him sing for the first time. Granted it still works in the movie I guess, but I think it would be better if they had another character sing it with him using dialogue in between song lines, and then at the end he says and sings those lines but differently and in a good way, as a redemption of the song. As is it still really works, but the way it handled the musical formula felt a little underdone and could have used some work. Other than that it's pretty solid, funny jokes, good characters, and I'm not opposed to the musical format of this movie just that they handled parts of it poorly. But the parts that they handled well, holy cow! Choreography is really great, songs are catchy, and they serve the musical format well. Also there's a callback to Elf. I like that. Overall a solid movie, could be better in some ways but definitely one worth watching, and again even if the musical part of it could be improved, the good musical parts were kinda fantastic. - yasdnilear - 3 January 2024
Watching it over and over
I had no idea what to expect with this movie and was pleasantly surprised to say the least. This has become one of my favorite Christmas movies, dare I say movies in general. Obviously I'm extremely biased because I love musicals and am a big Elf fan. If you like both of those things - this is probably the movie for you!
We particularly enjoyed the meta humor (similar to Schmigadoon). The side characters were also so good. Will Ferrell, Ryan Reynolds and Octavia Spencer were all excellent AND sang well - surprise! The dance numbers were incredible AND hilarious. We even involuntarily teared up toward the end. All in all hilarious, goofy, well-acted, excellent dance numbers and catchy fun songs to listen to all day. Bravo all. Happy to have a new musical to love!
