The Details

Tangled

Voices of Mandy Moore, Zachary Levi and Donna Murphy

Directed by Nathan Greno

Rated PG

Beyond the Weekly

Tangled

IMDb: Tangled

Rotten Tomatoes: Tangled

Fitting squarely within the Disney fairy-tale tradition, Tangled may be computer-animated, but everything else about it is strictly old-school, with a spunky princess (Rapunzel, voiced by Mandy Moore) swept up by a charming rogue (Flynn, voiced by Zachary Levi) and challenged by a vengeful stepmother/witch (voiced by Broadway veteran Donna Murphy). The main character even gets a cute animal sidekick. The humor is old-fashioned but fun, with no pop-culture references to be found, and the story is straightforward and entirely predictable.

Very loosely based on the Rapunzel fable, Tangled allows its heroine to be a little more proactive in rebelling against her oppressive circumstances but otherwise follows the familiar beats from decades of Disney animated films. The CGI is even styled to look like hand-drawn animation, giving the movie a welcome retro feel. The songs (with music by Disney mainstay Alan Menken) are mostly just passable, and their presence is a little downplayed, but they too recall Disney’s animation heyday. After last year’s ambitious but muddled The Princess and the Frog, Tangled is a nice reminder that for Disney, sometimes simplicity is the best way to go.