Strange Magic Review

BAD: It's a mixture of fairies, Shakespeare and Moulin Rouge. It's worse than "strange".

GOOD: It has some decent taste in music.

BAD: It uses a bizarre combination of photorealistic CG and modernised, Disney-esque quips.

GOOD: At least there's no toilet humour.

BAD: A film using characters like these is bound to be a failure, and George Lucas forgot all about that. George Lucas will always be a bastard.

GOOD: The visuals aren't meant to be cute, so I'll give it some credit.

BAD: For a movie about not judging people by their appearance, those shortstacks sure do look off-putting.

GOOD: At least the other creatures look interesting. No wonder the only poster for this film highlights them.

BAD: It shoves romance into your face so aggressively you'll end up disregarding its tagline.

GOOD: Dawn's actually pretty cute when she's love-dusted.

BAD: Most attempts at humour fall flatter than any creature who we may think really does get crushed by a rock.

GOOD: The Bog King's to this film what the Grand Duke to Rock-a-Doodle. His design is badass, he's basically Alan Cumming singing metal and he shares the most agreeable chemistry with the two princesses through any relationship in a bad film this year.

BAD: None of these relationships, not even B.K.'s, start off subtly.

GOOD: The film uses the "Disney Death" cliché but at least adds an interesting twist to it by trying to get its audience relieved when the bad guy survives.

BAD: Sunny infects a lizard with a love potion, making her act like a dog and apparently he calls it "falling in love". The way it's used just adds one extra layer of bestiality to the script.

GOOD: Any time the Bog King and Marianne were together, I found myself smirking and in some way rooting for them.

BAD: I'm not supposed to be smiling at or believing in anyone in this lovey-dovey, psuedo-Epic, Lucasfilm trash!