Movie Review: Godmothered (PG – 110 minutes)

 

Godmothered is newly released on Disney+, and certainly worth a stream!

Eleanor is a young woman from the ‘Motherland’, where fairy godmothers are trained to assist young women by granting them ball gowns, kisses from princes, true love, and happily ever afters. Eleanor is loving her studies and assignments and while not excelling, is certainly enthusiastic.  The rest of the students are all older fairy godmothers who inform her that there has not been a request for assistance in years and that the motherland is in danger of shutting down.

Crushed that she may not become a fully-fledged fairy godmother, Eleanor finds one last request in the archive and with the assistance of her roommate Agnes, who is just the local DJ, not a student (what?), heads through to our world to track down young Mackenzie and help her find her prince.

Shortly after arriving and finding Mackenzie, Eleanor realizes that she is now an adult with kids of her own. After losing her husband, she is not warm to the idea of love and happily ever after.  Eleanor seems completely insane to everyone at first – she does turn their dog into a piglet and enlists a local raccoon for help with lights – but after spending time with each of the family members, she slowly gains their trust.  Hijinks ensue including sledding, tailgating, and parties with gowns. Eventually, the family helps Eleanor see that there is more to life than just princes and happily ever afters. 

The movie is directed by Sharon Maguire who did two Bridget Jones movies. It is exactly as charming and fluffy as you would expect from a Disney holiday family flick, but with an added element I did not expect.  After Eleanor’s interference, Mackenzie realizes she has been feeding her fears to her daughters instead of building them up and championing their hopes. It’s a really interesting take. Mackenzie also helps Eleanor realize that true love has many different forms, and that living happily may be better than focusing on happily ever after, and what a perfect message for this year!

Isla Fisher is perfectly cast as Mackenzie and seems mostly irritated with everyone and everything for the front half of the movie. As she slowly starts to realize what she has been doing to her family, she pivots to try to improve. 

Jillian Bell has been so good in so many things for a very long time and she shines here as Eleanor. She genuinely wants to help, but really just for her own ends. Her disappointment in herself as she realizes that fact is very well played.

June Squibb plays Agnes, and while she has very little to do, she is very fun. Jane Curtin plays Moira, the head of the motherland school who is determined to shut everything down. 

Overall the movie is certainly family friendly enough for a streaming evening at home. I did find myself asking questions about the motherland itself – how do those godmothers get there, and how long do they live, and could they just choose to come here and be regular folks? Why is there a school for them to be fairy godmothers if they are born fairy godmothers?  And how can Eleanor have an allergy to shellfish if she is a fairy godmother? It certainly seems like magical folks should not have allergies. None of that is important, so just shut off your brain and enjoy another fun holiday flick.

6 out of 10.