"Enchanted" pays homage to other Disney films

By Borys Kit and Carolyn Giardina

LOS ANGELES (Hollywood Reporter) - "Enchanted" is a loving homage to many classic Disney princess movies of yore.

The movie, which opened Wednesday, starts out in a traditional 2-D animated world, where a fairy-tale princess (voiced by Amy Adams) about to marry her prince is thrust into the real world by an evil queen. The real world is represented by New York, and once there, the princess (now a flesh-and-blood Adams) begins to change her views on life and love when she meets a cynical divorce lawyer (Patrick Dempsey).

The movie references many Disney movies in obvious and subtle ways, but many of the references weren't in the initial script. "That was all (director) Kevin Lima's doing," producer Barry Josephson said.

Lima, a veteran Disney animator who also co-directed the company's 1999 feature "Tarzan," came on board the project two years ago, and from the first meeting with screenwriter Bill Kelly began peppering the script with homages.

"I have a lifetime of references running through my head," Lima said. "From the time I was 5 years old and I saw 'Jungle Book,' and my mom swears by this story, I turned to her and said, 'Mom I'm going to be a Disney animator when I grow up."'

The most obvious references involve slippers and poison apples, dragons and little people. But throwaways and background activities go beyond readily recognizable symbols and images.

A seedy motel is named the Grand Duke, which is the name of a character from "Cinderella." A restaurant is called Bella Note, a nod to "Lady and the Tramp." A woman Adams encounters in Central Park asks her if she wants to feed the birds, "just a dollar a bag." That's dialogue from "Mary Poppins," subbing out the word "tuppins."

Going a bit deeper, you'll find that Mary Ilene Caselotti, the reporter on TV, is named after the actresses who voiced Princess Aurora in "Sleeping Beauty" (Mary Costa), Cinderella (Ilene Woods) and Snow White (Adriana Caselotti). The Banks, a couple getting divorced in the movie, are named after the family in "Mary Poppins." And Churchill, Harline and Smith, the name of Dempsey's law firm, is named after the songwriters from "Snow White": Frank Churchill, Leigh Harline and Paul Smith.