Charming is an Animated Musical Comedy starring the voices of Avril Lavinge,Demi Lovato,Wilmer Valdermerra and Ashley Tisdale and tell the story of a handsome prince named Prince Charming(Wilmer Valdermerra) who is under a curse where every woman falls in love with him. Problems arise when Charming meets a runaway thief named Lenore(Lovato) in disguise who at first doesn't see eye to eye with the prince but romance blossoms between them. Will the prince lift the curse and find his actual true love ? The animation is gorgeous,the voice cast is great,and the chemistry between Demi and her real life ex(both serve as producers in the music department and the film)was sweet. One of the reasons I was drawn to this film was Demi Lovato as I am a massive fan of her's for 10 years. If you love Shrek and Tangled then you will love this film. Girls aged 6 would enjoy it too.

Decent watch at best, won't watch again, and can't recommend.

I didn't really appreciate the cg styling and the reduction of the princess characters. Even the exaggerated portrayal of the prince through his curse wasn't terribly interesting, and it didn't come into play all that much as the main story is to get away from an area where it would be relevant with someone who is immune.

There just isn't a lot interesting that is intended to be so other than the "gauntlet" itself and even that is only mildly interesting.

There are a lot of hidden messages about women and men, equality, and bias, and if I wasn't so bored, then I probably wouldn't have noticed.

Prince Charming (Wilmer Valderrama) is the smooth talking, cocky, and "charming" prince who's the subject of every woman's desire and every man's ire. Charming's irresistible is part of a curse place upon him from birth by sorceress Nemeny Neverwish (Nia Vardalos) which upon his 21st birthday will destroy all love forever. Pushed by his father to embark on a quest known as The Gauntlet to undo the curse and choose a bride from one of his three fiancees (Avril Lavigne's Snow White, Ashley Tisdale's Cinderella, and G.E.M.'s Sleeping Beauty). Charming enlists the help of a cunning street smart rogue Lenore (Demi Lovato) who reluctantly escorts Charming on his quest in exchange for treasure from interested parties disguised as a man to dissuade Charming's charm which she eventually falls for.

Originally announced in 2014, the movie marks another attempt by producer John H. Williams to cash in on his association with the Shrek franchise by producing something that feels like Shrek but on a much lower budget. Aside from Williams' work as a producer on the four Shrek movies and its Spin-Off Puss in Boots, Williams is best known for his company Vanguard Animation, which is well noted for producing low budget animated features with second tier celebrity voices as a way of making films that are very similar to the "ironic" and "snarky" tone of Dreamworks films, but often lack the polish or timing of those films. While Charming is certainly better than other Vanguard products, it still comes off like a half hearted rehash of tropes that have long since worn out their welcome.

The hook of the film is actually reasonably rich for comic potential. With three famous princesses Snow White, Cinderella, and Sleeping Beauty all unknowingly engaged to the same prince. When I first heard of this part of the movie I thought that the premise alone seemed like a way of getting a reasonable amount of laughs. That however is not the premise, in fact it barely even factors into the movie and could easily be cut out. The movie in actuality is a road movie type adventure with Charming and his reluctant companion Lenore going on an adventure and facing off against various encounters/obstacles, think Donkey and Shrek's journey if they were meant to fall in love over the course of it. Most of the encounters are fairly mundane with living swamps and rock golem serving as hurdles for our heroes, but there is a reasonably entertaining sequence involving a village of female giants that has some decent enough design work, a humorous gag of a "half oracle" who's only right half the time, and the best song in the movie with the best accompanying imagery. Yes, this is a musical, and unfortunately not a very good one. The majority of songs are over produced fluff that you forget about as soon as its over and are basically there to stretch the runtime to feature length (the movie barely touches 73 minutes and pads itself with 10 minutes worth of credits).

The movie feels like it's multiple ideas competing at once and never comes together cohesively. On the one hand Charming has the cynical side expected of a post Shrek fairly tale comedy with jokes aimed at the routine use of evil stepmothers trying to kill princesses being pointed out in "hit you over the head" fashion that's become increasingly a go to for movies of this ilk. On the other hand the movie tries to aim for moments of heart and sincerity complete with a third act break up that comes off as petty even by the standards of third act break ups. The movie wants to be both a subversive parody of fairy tales whilst also being a fairy tale, and while this approach CAN be done well as seen in Shrek, this movie doesn't have the talent to balance those two elements and is subject to tonal whiplash complete with an overwrought third act where Prince Charming contemplates suicide to end the curse.....you read that correctly.

If there's one thing to be said in Charming's favor, it's that it doesn't go overboard with low brow humor or pop culture references. While there are a few sequences that seem contemporaneous in their approach, they're not as in your face as one might expect and try to use them sparingly (which is rather surprising). Charming himself is a character who feels at odds with himself because while he's in this situation because he proposed to three different women, the movie paints him as a victim of circumstance and undercuts what comedy could be had from him because it's afraid to make him unlikable. Ruper Everett's charming from Shrek was a far more interesting take on the Charming character (third movie notwithstanding) and the fact that they've taken what should've been a simple premise and bungled it to this point is simply astounding.

Charming is rehash of a rehash of ideas that ran their course a long time ago. It's tonally a mess with an uneasy mixture of snark and sincerity, it's humor is scattershot with inconsistent characters who are too one note to be consistently funny, and it's approach to the material is workman like and uninspired. It's a movie that does the bare minimum and is content to ride on the coattails of outdated trends whilst not adding anything new to them. It's not poorly made or acted (mostly),but there's far more interesting films you could be watching.