"Encanto is enchanting, joyful, and vibrant." - check out Brandon's review of the latest Disney animated feature!

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You can’t choose your family, but having one like the Madrigals would be positively miraculous while slightly intimidating. Marking Walt Disney Animation Studios 60th animated feature, Encanto is enchanting, joyful, and vibrant. Directors Jared Bush and Byron Howard and co-director Charise Castro Smith capture a rich culture painted in gorgeous animation popping with grand, luscious colors. There’s just no stopping from getting swept away in it all.

Miracles come in many forms, and for the Madrigal family it’s a candle that gave them a home they would never have to flee. Nestled in the mountains of Colombia, it’s built on a fantastical foundation where everything is alive, including the magical doors that open up gifts from within the Madrigal children. The magic they have goes back generations. They have superhuman strength, can talk to animals, make flowers grow, hear from miles away, and shape shift into anyone. Well…except for Mirabel (Stephanie Beatrix).

Instead of the door glowing and thrusting a power onto her – it just disintegrates into thin air. Excitement rapidly turns into disappointment for her, her parents, and perhaps no one more than her grandmother, Abuela Alma (María Cecilia Botero) – the matriarch who was blessed with the wiling flame long ago after tragedy left her alone with her three newborns and no where to go. For Mirabel, she’s the odd one out due to being ordinary when encompassed by the extraordinary. She takes it in stride, but when cracks start to show in the house and in her family, she’s determined to repair them from the roof to the floors, and make the transcendent Madigral legacy stronger than ever before.

The real beauty of this musical animated adventure is its empathy combined with the delightful discovery of everyone having something special inside them. And like Mirabel, we at times don’t even realize it’s there until the occasion arises and reveals itself to the world. Additionally, she sees that her family’s supernatural abilities are a blessing and a curse, and no one better understands that more than her Uncle Bruno (a hilarious John Leguizamo). He was last seen the night Mirabel was robbed of her gift and left behind a vision that could be the key to unlocking the answers she seeks.

Encanto has the singing and the dancing that always follows when listening to original songs from Lin-Manuel Miranda. Although, these particular tunes aren’t the catchiest and surprisingly don’t really add much to the story, only existing to over explain. But that’s easy to forgive when the movie amazes in so many other aspects by having stirring scenes of self-acceptance, aloneness, and the changing tides of tradition. With all this talk about gifts, Encanto is a splendid one for the entire family, wrapped with a lot of heart.

Brandon Vick is a member of The Music City Film Critics’ Association, the resident film critic of the SoBros Network, and the star of The Vick’s Flicks Podcast. Follow him on Twitter @SirBrandonV and be sure to search #VicksFlicks for all of his latest movie reviews.

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