GodMothered Quick View; Grade: B-
Godmothered tells a story about a young fairy Godmother named Eleanor (Jillian Bell), whom is still learning at the Godmother School at Motherland. However those days of Godmother’s are soon about to become nonexistent, as they plan to shut down due to lack of wishes sent, as the Godmother’s are about to transition into becoming ToothFairies. Eleanor however has found a letter in the filing cabinet, as a young child requested help from a Fairy GodMother. Eleanor then proceeds to helping the child, only to find that little girl is no longer little, as MacKenzie (Isla Fisher) is now a grown adult. As MacKenzie is a single mother, working as a TV producer for a News Station, however she’s extremely unhappy. Eleanor believes she could still go through with her assignment and bring MacKenzie a happy ever after.
This film reminds me of Enchanted, mixed with some holiday film you’ve seen on Hallmark. Surprising enough... Godmothered though does lack in some ways of originality, I was surprised that I found this an enjoyable holiday family comedy film. I started watching Godmothered late at night, within the first seven minutes before I turn it off because I was too tired... I was honestly quite surprised, the fact it had me interested going into the next day, as it has a nice cute little setup that brings genuine laughs.
The story of Godmothered compares to the likes of Enchanted, as sequences feel similar and especially at the end, when they no longer hide the fact the main inspiration has came from Enchanted. You can also pin point some predictable cliches here and there, cliche comedic puns here and there we’ve seen before. However the story is actually not half bad, not only was I interested in what was going on, I also found it quite sweet, adorable, and also was surprised at the meaningful messages they display. There is a significant amount of character development by our main three characters Eleanor, MacKenzie, and MacKenzie’s daughter Jane (Jillian Shea Spaeder). All of them start out with characters whom have issues with themselves, as in the end they all became more complete individuals at the end... Well done.
There’s about three solid meaningful messages that this film displays. One on how we view the world. Instead of enforcing fear and shining a light on everything that is bad about the world we live in, we should instead enforce positivity, good news, and shine a light on everything that is good about the world we live in... Exactly what we all need right about now, especially the not enforcing fear part... Take notes California and New York. Another message being those whom are struggling to over come their fears, we should only encourage them to rise above the fears they are facing, instead of keeping them down. Lastly: A message that encourages others to assist in helping others, so they can learn to fix themselves. It strongly disregards in the idea in which we should have someone to fix our lives for us, as we should learn to take care of our own selves. A good half of today’s society is so lenient on handouts and wanting someone to take care of them, but in all reality that doesn’t help you grow as an individual nor helps you improve on your character and finding solutions towards your problems.
Godmothered is catered by solid performances from the entire cast. I liked Jillian Bell as Eleanor, thought she had solid performance as this uncommon misfit of a Godmother that doesn’t get taken seriously. I liked June Squibb in the brief supporting role, she always brings her A-Game in anything she does really. The comedy aspect of the film is fairly done, as the film brings some genuine good laughs in this film, which was a surprise.
Flaws for Godmothered come from lack of originality, as I said this film is heavily inspired from Enchanted. There is also a dub issue at the very end. Some of the comedy in this film does have it’s misses, especially this one supporting character whom comes every now and then to provide some comedy, yet he comes off rather annoying. It’s also worth mentioning MacKenzie’s lack of encouragement for her daughter in third act, as she suggest they just go find Eleanor, rather than provide support for her daughter.... I mean it does however redeem itself at the end, however I don’t get why she doesn’t just provide her daughter support in the first place. For a family comedy holiday film... I gotta say this honestly worked just fine with me, it was cute.
Overall, Godmothered was fairly decent. I recommend checking this film out, it’s on Disney Plus. -Mitch Smietana