Ever After

"Ever After", starring Drew Barrymore, is a decent movie. At least it would be if it weren't starring Drew Barrymore. Actually, I'm not sure about that statement, since Drew Barrymore is so distracting that I really don't know if the movie is any good or not. In fact, I retract my earlier statement: it's probably a terrible movie.

I mean, the basic premise is okay. An emphysetic old lady (did they mass produce cigarettes back then?) tells a real life Cinderella story, and the cool thing is that Cinderella won the prince not by being pretty (although I think in the movie she's supposed to be pretty...fail!) but by being smart and well-read. Or at least as close to smart and well-read as Drew Barrymore can muster.

Here's the problem: apparently when casting was called, ALL THE ENGLISH PEOPLE EVERYWHERE IN THE WORLD DISAPPEARED. At least that's my guess. Despite the fact that the movie is supposed to take place in Renaissance France, which means that presumably everyone would be speaking, you know, French, the director decided that everyone should have an English accent. Apparently he decided this independently of the casting director, who only hired non-English people whose billing is inversely proportional to their ability to speak with an English accent.

Not since Dracula has there been such a bad decision regarding accents, when the chief British-accented people were Keanu Reeves and Winona Ryder (kill me now!) and the ACTUALLY British Anthony Hopkins and Gary Oldman put on unconvincing Dutch and Romanian accents, respectively.

But I digress. Ever After stars Drew Barrymore, Anjelica Huston, and some blonde lady who I think I saw on SVU once, all of whom are American. The prince is played by a Scottish actor. The other stepsister is from New Zealand. Other than the prince and the Anjelica Huston, who can pull off the accents fairly well since they seem pretty relaxed about the whole thing, it's painful to listen to.

Worst of all, however, is Drew Barrymore, who sadly has more lines than anyone else. I think her voice coach really hated her and instead of having her listening to tapes of English people talking he gave her tapes of hee-hawing donkeys and Larry the Cable Guy pretending to be Prince Charles. In that case I commend her abilities, as the likeness is spot on.

WHY DID THEY CAST DREW BARRYMORE????? WHY?????? This movie was okay muted with closed captions on. It would probably also be okay dubbed in Spanish.