{"id":41834,"date":"2023-11-22T00:11:55","date_gmt":"2023-11-22T05:11:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/?p=41834"},"modified":"2023-11-22T08:10:33","modified_gmt":"2023-11-22T13:10:33","slug":"wish-2023","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/2023\/11\/22\/wish-2023\/","title":{"rendered":"Wish (2023)"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>I say this with the utmost honesty, that despite the initial criticism of \u201cWish\u201d looking like generic AI produced junk, I was very optimistic about it. I defended it often. I loved Ariana DeBose in \u201cWest Side Story,\u201d I\u2019m a big fan of Chris Pine, I love Alan Tudyk, so its just so sad that Chris Buck, and Fawn Veerasunthorn\u2019s \u201cWish\u201d really does end up feeling like Disney is going for the bare minimum with audiences. In a year filled with humongous milestones like the 100 year anniversary and the SAG and WGA strike (which hurt their image with a lot of audiences), you\u2019d assume Disney would pull out all of the stops for their newest animated movie.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

But in a wholly unironic fashion, they seemed to just take a lot of old tropes from past films, and just mix it in to what is a fairly trite lesson about how we hold our own wishes in our hands, and trusting someone else to fulfill our wants, needs, and goals is a fool\u2019s errand. It takes ninety minutes to basically establish this while basically basking in the whole idea of the concept of wishes. Because Disney has made its name on making wishes come true, and believing in wishes, and trusting your heart to believe in wishes, and to always have a wish. And then they make a movie that tells us \u201cIt is a waste of time depending on others to fulfill your deepest wishes.\u201d<\/p>\n

“Wish” follows a 17-year-old tour guide named Asha who lives in the Kingdom of Rosas, a small makeshift nation more or less based on the Iberian Peninsula and formed by a powerful sorcerer named King Magnifico. People from all over the world immigrate to Rosas in exchange for giving Magnifico their deepest \u201cwish\u201d that he then holds for safekeeping. And once a month, Magnifico grants a single one of these wishes. All young Asha wants is to see her 100-year-old grandfather Sabino\u2019s (Victor Garber) wish granted before he passes away. But when Magnifico rejects this wish as too dangerous, Asha takes matters into her own hands by accidentally summoning a \u201cwishing star\u201d that could change Rosas forever. For all intents and purposes, once again, Ariana Debose is a wonderful singer, and manages to salvage the role of Asha who is, tragically, about as generic a heroine as they come.<\/p>\n

She\u2019s another one of those dutiful, heroic, outspoken firecrackers who looks like they simply reconditioned a model of Ana from \u201cFrozen,\u201d all the while she even has an opening song introducing her town. Said song is so by the numbers, you could sing \u201cWelcome to the family Madrigal!\u201d over the chorus and no one would really notice the difference. It\u2019s not to say that I don\u2019t love the concept of \u201cWish.\u201d I like the whole magic and sorcery, and ideas about power balance, and corrupt people in high positions sabotaging the system to fit their own selfishness. It\u2019s just that nothing in \u201cWish\u201d ever feels high stakes or emotional enough to care just enough. I was never hooked in to any one character, despite the animators filling the screen with an algorithm friendly diverse cast of supporting heroes.<\/p>\n

The premise involving the wishes and the town of Rosas was also unnecessarily convoluted, lacking in the simplicity that can usually be found with these kinds of animated movies. The writers for Disney always had a knack for giving us high concept tales with very understandable logic and concepts. But with \u201cWish\u201d I was never quite sure what the whole idea was behind the town of Rosas and Magnifico was, despite it being explained multiple times. \u201cWish\u201d is just not the home run I was hoping for in 2023. Rather than put their best foot forward especially in the light of a ton of lazy remakes, Disney opts instead to play it safe, and color in the lines.<\/p>\n

They\u2019ll make bank off of the merch for the movie\u2019s cute star sprite, though. I guess that\u2019s the bottom line, at the end of the day.<\/p>\n