This is the first CT episode I ever watched. I wasn't even a big fan of Encanto, but my whole Disney/musical theater nerd friends group was gushing about it and one of them (who is a special-needs children therapist) recommended your channel and sent me this video as an example. I'm rewatching a lot of your content nowadays and I now noticed that you two are wearing the family's middle generation's colors - Jono in turquoise (like Mirabel's mom) and Alan in orange (like Peppa). Please tell me that was intentional? I mean, you guys are wholesome as ****, but that being a coincidence would just be too much for my fangirling heart to take XD
My Father is a narcissist, I finally at 48 had to give up on him, when he destroyed the family. He stabbed us all in the back, I lost my rescue cats, and that was my life since I was 9. He has no kindness or integrity. I tried but you can hurt me all you want you hurt others and I'm done.
@shywolf4 Good points. They were a large family again by the time that the movie started, but poor Abuela was traumatized and still had to be alone with all that responsibility for years.
@Furienna I think I found one :). He is a very quiet man at work who liked me for a year but never said anything because he's so shy. And just like bruno hes so sweet. So good luck in finding your bruno friend :)
Right. Her being muscular makes folks think otherwise for some reason. But she is so sweet and feminine. She just has to do the work she has to do and keep her strong surface. That "glow cause I know what my worth is" was so diva in the best way.
The implications of Isabella being able to create ANY KIND OF PLANT are incredible, especially in a completely agrarian society. She could feed everybody in that village forever. She could provide every type of wood or medicinal plant they need at the drop of a hat. She's basically a goddess with that kind of power. And just because she was pushed into that role of 'beautiful princess', she wasn't able to do something that would have helped everybody SO MUCH MORE than just her making beautiful flowers.
I was just thinking it’s crazy how she’s the favorite when her gift is the least useful mainly pretty ornamental use but it’s cause Abuela prefers it over other helpful or different plants
A little late to the game, but something I noticed about Isabelle is that yes, flowers and being pretty are her thing, and everyone's talked about the superficial part of her where she's just decoration, but one of the things I just realized is - flowers are accessible they don't fight back when you pick them, cactuses and carnivorous plants aren't. She literally has to deal with people passing her around and handing her off, and essentially doing things to her and her life often without her consent to the point that her whole song was about wanting control of her own life and autonomy. I don't think her personality is prickly at all - and that she's probably really sweet and kind and may really love flowers, but is so tired of people grabbing at her the only way she could see out was to grow thorns.
Also, flowers represent perfection in their symmetry and as soon as they aren't perfect from loosing petals or wilting they are thrown out, so there's a pressure to stay perfect or get cast aside.
I will say also, she believed that flowers, things that looked good as she looked good, were all her family wanted from her. But, in the song We Don't Talk About Bruno, her line that he had told her that her power would grow like grapes on the vine. He told her, grapes not flowers. He was telling her if she dropped others expectations she could be more that just the pretty face, she could create more than flowers, but like everyone she misinterpreted his message.
Fun fact: Stephanie Beatriz was in active labor while recording Waiting on a Miracle. She didn't tell the producers because she 'didn't want to freak anyone out'. I can only imagine how hard it must have been to sing in this state but I bet that it plays heavily into how she was able to convey such amazing emotion in the song (in addition to the already amazing score and lyrics).
@katarzynazofia Yess, exactly! Glad I am not the only one thinking that it's a very toxic work ethic. I absolutely don't blame Stephanie Beatriz for continuing to record the song as she was going into labour, she did an amazing performance. But I am saddened by it, because I can't stop thinking that in a healthier society maybe she wouldn't have felt the pressure to keep on recording. It's heartbreaking that she thought that telling the producers she was going into labour could freak them out
@katarzynazofia I don't think of it as "dedication." I see it more as freedom that it was her body and she decided she wanted to finish the song. I agree that if they'd forced her to do that or if she'd felt obligated, then yes that would be toxic, but if she wanted to sing at the early stages of her labor, that's her choice. They won't even admit you to the hospital until the baby is about ready to be fully born anyway- they tried to send me home with my first two (and good thing the only place I went to was their waiting room or my second son might have been born in a car!).
I was going to say that too- that is so cool! I took my three year old to see Bolt at the theater when I was in the early stages of labor with my second son. Totally nutty idea, but at the time I was feeling emotional about us not being able to go to the movies for a while once his baby brother was born. He ended up having a great time and I still enjoyed that parts in between contractions- lol.
This movie hit hardest with me when Mirabel said “I will never be good enough for you” because I had that exact conversation with my own grandmother. She instilled deep trauma in both myself and my mother. The difference is that we didn’t get the apology, she chose to double down and said “I guess not.” Unfortunately I can’t go no-contact because I have a wonderful relationship with my grandfather and I’m not willing to sacrifice my relationship with him, but there are days where I feel as if I’ve been robbed of a parent figure. Why did I get such a nasty grandmother when other people got spoiled? Anyway, this movie got me bawling on my best friend’s couch. Not fair.
I don't mean this in a demeaning, diminishing, or invalidating way: at least you can hang on to the relationship you have with your grandfather. I never had one. I don't know what that's like. My mom's dad died decades before I was born and I only met my dad's dad once when I was like nine years old. I only ever had one grandmother and that was it. Fortunately we were very close, but still... she's the only grandparent I ever had, and she died back in 2005 when I was 21. So hold on to your grandfather and take comfort in at least having him! 💜
Sending many hugs, my love. My father never loved me and wasn't afraid to let me know about it. I promise you, you and your mom are very worthy, even if your grandmother doesn't have the strength to admit it. 💖❤️🔥
Trust me... You're good enough. Even if everyone in your familia rejects you... You will find others on the outside that will build you up. I believe in you, because I believe in myself.
I really relate to that. I never got any love from my mother or grandmother because I was born female (I'm non-binary.) My half-brother and uncle always got all the attention. My mother, and later on me, were treated like red-headed step children. When I was younger I remember going to my Nana's for Christmas and all my (non-blood related) cousins got gift cards to Nordstrom and Forever 21 and Victoria's Secret and I got… one t-shirt. Not even kidding.
I just want to point out that during the argument, Abuela tells Mirabel “I don’t know what you weren’t given a gift, but it doesn’t give you the right to hurt this family!” THIS family. Not your family or our family. That whole scene is heartbreaking, but hearing Abuela say that line makes my blood boil. I also want to add how much Abuela isolates Mirabel from the family too. There’s a lot of more obvious moments in the film, but one more subtle one is the scene mentioned above. Abuela is standing with the family behind her on one side while Mirabel is alone on the other side.
How about the part where Mirabel was left in the nursery for a decade? They couldn’t be bothered to give her her own room in all that time, just cuz she didn’t get a magical one??? They did lots of construction on the rest of the town.
You're absolutely right. Mirabel throws an insult back out of her anger, which hits Abuela where it hurts most - protecting herself and her family. Mirabel felt isolated and excluded her entire life. It took to the last scene before she could accept the SHE was the gift. She didn't need special powers.
@LordofFullmetal actually, is really impersonal to say "la familia" is way more common to say "está familia". Well, when we (Spanish speaker) are angry we talk like abuela. If I'm angry with my sister (one of the people I love the most) I will say to my dad "your other daughter did X thing". When a kid misbehave is normal fro parents to say "your son"
@First Last That's still completely irrelevant to the discussion though? The intent is based on an english language interpretation because it was written in english. Nobody thought "ohhh boy this'll get 'em if they translate it to Spanish" Also, get out of here with the stuff about it being their story. That has nothing to do with the interpretation of the line, it's just virtue signaling.
Fun fact: The crew had to fight for Luisa to be a large muscular woman because they thought no one would like a buff woman and they merchandized the heck out of Isabela because they thought she'd be the favorite of little girls but actually Luisa ended up being much more popular with girls
@Nikki Budders (Edited to add: Holy shit this turned into a novella, I'm sorry!! You're forewarned. 😅) I literally had my parents listen to Luisa's song in order to communicate to them how I was feeling. I was the baby of three, but I ended up being the strong and responsible one. After both of my sisters died (breast cancer and liver failure), those roles fell to me even more and it was becoming crushing. I do want to clarify, though, that it wasn't crushing because of my parents forcing it upon me. I took it upon myself and never gave any real indication that it was growing too heavy for me to shoulder. I had just always been the one to take care of everything, fix everything (figuratively and more literally as my parents have gotten older now), make all the calls and appointments, do the errands, etc. It was me, not them. Luisa's song just gave me the words I needed in order to tell my parents I was on the brink of breaking. Ever since then they've been mindful of asking "Is this too much?" when it comes to different things, and I either tell them "No it's fine, don't worry about it 🙂" or "Can that wait at all? I'm starting to feel overloaded and I don't have many spoons left.😥" Because I WANT to do things to take care of them because I love them and want to do it in return for the life they've given me up until now... I just had to admit that I had a cup that wasn't bottomless, and my supply of spoons is finite. (Although ngl it was pretty amusing explaining the spoon metaphor to my 70-something dad and then hear him start using it followed by "...was that right??" 😂)
i was in a therapy appointment having a sort of breakdown about my role in the family (eldest daughter) and after a second my therapist goes “… have you seen encanto?” and i hadn’t, so i said no and she recommended i watch it and the next day i did and boy… it’s helped me see that i’m not alone. i struggle heavily with toxic perfectionism + the pressure my family puts on me because of it. mirabel, luisa, and isabella’s issues are all a part of mine and it felt nice to just be seen.
the scene that hurt me the most in this movie is the picture scene where they say the whole family and they don't even recognize that Mirabel wasn't in it. that would've been my villain arc, she was WAY too strong. something i also don't get is how the townspeople and the Madrigals were so angry at Bruno for using HIS gift when they asked for it. his gift was to predict the future, not cause it!
@Chubby Cherry l don't see how her parents could have done much more though. They showed her their love as much they could in a toxic environment, where they all had to play their roles.
i think luisa is a beautiful representation of eldest daughter syndrome. i suggest reading the book, but most of use eldest daughters were treated as a second of third parent and were expected to mature and grow up faster than the average child. often were the family’s “thearpist, or were our parent(s) confidant growing up. luisas song has made me cry multiple times. it’s hard to be the strong one who can always be depended on in your family unit at age 9
Weirdly enough, according to Google, Luisa is actually the middle child, Isabella is the eldest. But Luisa is definitely still the rock of the family, trying to keep it all together
I'm a guy with 2 younger sisters of 6 and 8 years younger than me. My parents had the same expectations on top of being snob so we had to be perfect. My relation with them as always been a disaster because I've always put my foot down on being myself. That led to me always being put aside by my parents as punishements. I left the house at 18 yo as soon as I could and they helped me move out because they also wanted me out. I'm 28 yo and only regain contact with my sisters last year and unfortunetly they are also slowly cutting ties with our parents.
So, my take on Mirebel’s lack of a gift is that *she* is the gift She brought the family together, she let all the tension and stress be released, she got people to get their issues off their chest She saved the family, and helped everyone in the family Abuela was worried about the big picture, the family, the miracle, the casita Mirebel saw the forrest for the trees
I think that's the final point in the movie - we discover that it's Abuela herself that's the gift, and Mirabel is there to carry that on to future generations to come.
You know.... They say that Mirabelle didn't get a gift but she's literally seeing the inside of the people she connects to. She's seeing all of Luisa's fears, she's seeing Isabella for who she is, she LITERALLY saw Abuella's past. She's experiencing who these people are and not just via a connection or anything. She's seeing what's causing their pain. She's EXPERIENCING IT while helping them.
That's what I've been saying, the movie is showing the audience that Mirabel has a gift from the start, the family just couldn't see it because it requires them being invested in their own emotions
@Purple 42 no u got it right. But Empaths abilities varies. More only sense/feel it and don't always have a choice in doing so. Only stronger ones can physically see the pain (but usually still feel it too) and can help. Being an Empath is a heavily double edged sword
Isn't that basically what "An Empath" does? Feel peoples pain and often helps the person going though that pain? Or am I making Empathic people out to be some sort of super hero? I might misunderstand the meaning "Empath"
@Kelsey Chlovechok you're also not obligated to forgive someone. At some point, forgiving that other person is something you would need to do for your own mental health, but you're not obligated to do it just because they had a reason or apologize, etc.
@DAVID PRINCE Actually, Colombia had to go through yet another civil war around fifty years after the one where Pedro died. So I must say that Abuela unfortunately was right about that violence existed outside of their protected valley and didn't go away even if the men who killed Pedro were dead. However, her zeal to keep everyone safe eventually made her lose her son for ten years and was hurting other family members as well. So in the end, they lost their gifts and their magic protection to make a change possible...
@Furienna It really does feel like Abuela is trying to protect the family and the community from this threat of death that just isn't around anymore. She can't see or deal with the day to day problems because she and her family need to be the perfect magical guardians.
@Tahrae The storyteller But I'm sure that the Madrigals had a lot of discussions with each other about what had happened over the years. But it had to be kept off screen because the story would have become too long for being a Disney movie otherwise. There are some signs though in the "All of you" music number that they're working on their mental health while building the new Casita. Luisa needs a lot of help from her sisters to not feel worthless without her super strength. Later on, we see that Bruno still wears a bucket on his head while doing masonry and needs Mirabel to pass a tool from him to a villager. And I must interpret that as that he's still struggling with anxiety and with his interactions with the people who treated him like a monster for years. Later still, Mirabel and Abuela acknowledge that they're not perfect and thus admit that new problems will undoubtedly arise. And now, it is confirmed by director Jared Bush that Bruno and Abuela at least have tons of work to do to mend their relationship. All of this is maybe still not enough for some people, who can't see why Abuela or even other members of the family should be forgiven. But I've got no problem with how the movie handled this issue especially as it's clear that weeks or even months passed during the "All of you" music number.
As an infertile couple, my husband and I often felt in our families that we never got to the adult stage, as others did by having children. I realized in this movie that Mirabelle couldn't leave the nursery because she didn't have her gift. That resonated!
Contrast that flashback moment with the fairy-tale version that Abuela told little Mirabel at the start of the movie. The emotional weight of that event was soft, vague... "Disneyfied", you could say. It was just a backdrop to the story of how the miracle and the Encanto were created, with Alma, apparently habitually, minimizing its effect on her. Then we (and Mirabel) see what actually happened, the pure raw grief and anguish that Alma felt in that moment, the softening fairy-tale presentation utterly stripped away to show the very real, very human, very traumatic impact. It made the scene hit like a ton of bricks. We can feel her pain and resonate with it. The animators did an incredible, incredible job.
Something I liked a lot about Luisa's song was the mythology under tone (Hercules, her holding the scales, flying close to the sun, holding the earth on her shoulders, ect.) when a lot of the ancient mythologies focus on humans flaws. Idk if it was on purpose but I've decided it is now.
Funnily enough, I get major Persephone vibes from Luisa. 🌺🌹🌷 She's very goddess-like, both with her feats and her beauty, but she also has a surprisingly quiet and sensitive soul. A lot of people debate what her room looks like, but I personally believe that it would resemble a Grecian-inspired temple.
@vcool122 oh man I get you, there were 4 of us at the time and the two younger ones listened some but my brother (closest to my age) would not listen at all, always conflict. Just because my mom put me in charge and made me responsible does not mean that they listened. I became a very bossy person because of that , luckily it has worn off lol.
@Priscilla Stephens yeah right, I'm also the older sibling. My younger sisters are 6 and 8 years younger than me. Try to get autority on 2 little demons when you're 10 or 12 yo. I was in the spot where my parents saw me older enough than my sisters that I should be able to babysit them, but I was too close in age to my sisters that they wouldn't listen to anything I would ask them to do.
As an oldest sister, the line give it to your sister, your sister is stronger hit hard. Everything was my responsibility and everything that they did was my fault, why did you let them?….
The fact that Encanto was the reason my mom saw my mental illnesses and decided to talk about them with me with a therapist is crazy. Growing up with a physically disabled brother, a diabetic grandma with a sweet addiction, a widowed working mom, and the scars my dad left behind from his death is tough, in the end I stepped up, I did it for us but also because no one else could, I had no other choice. Me and so many others had their childhoods ripped away from us so we could step up and take so many responsibilities. To all the kids carrying their families on their shoulders, I know you need a break but you’re not in a position to take one, I wanted to say that I hear you. Your voice is valid, you are not as strong as you want to be. Don’t have unrealistically high expectations for yourself, even if others have them for you. Hang in there, even if you don’t see the light at the end of the tunnel, I promise you it’s there, you just need to walk and turn a little longer. If no one else notices, I at least believe in you.
Out of the many many things that are so well done with this movie, the struggles of Isabella and Louisa have been discussed a lot by my husband and me. It’s so well done. These kids are all defined by their gifts (or lack thereof) and how they can be of use. Louisa is TOO useful. Her gift is endlessly relied upon to the point where the guy with the donkeys doesn’t even seem to realize he should maybe be contributing to keeping them contained himself? She is run ragged but genuinely wants to be of use. It’s just become so hard on her that she fears she will be less valued if she does less. She is so good natured and sweet, but I see that becoming broken with time and turned to bitterness and depression. Isabella’s gift isn’t “useful” in the same obvious way. She is seen as decorative. All she does it makes things pretty which isn’t “useful” like Louisa’s gift. Obviously beauty and nature are extremely valuable and her gift will clearly develop into even more as she explores her limits. But for Isabella, she sees her value as entirely surface level. So much so that when she finally had a chance to do something truly useful (marry and produce more miracle workers) she throws herself into it even though she doesn’t even like the man she would spend the rest of her life with! She’s so desperate to contribute something if real value that she will sacrifice her happiness to do so. When she realizes she can do more than make flowers and be decorative, she is suddenly filled with energy and joy. They are both so tragic and it’s utterly beautiful seeing Mirabels eyes opened to what her sisters are up against. Mirabel has been longing for a gift like theirs only to find that it is breaking them. So so well done.
There is a great little detail for Isabella and that's when Dolores tells says that Mariano wants 5 babies, flowers sprout from Isabella's head and Abuella takes out the one white flower, the "not as pretty one" and fixes her hair. I think Abuella projected a lot of what she wanted to be in Isabella, if you notice or at least for me she looks like young Abuella the most.
The fact that Abuela actually says the words “I am so sorry” not once, but twice, meant SO much to me. I would often be told to apologize, but I rarely, if ever, received one.
Love the writers for this. Its like a sorry from "our" family members, who did something wrog, but cant apologize. I think thats why many people will cry in this scene, because they know i have a family member like this, or one who did something smilar... but i will never get the apologize from him/her i actually need. This scene is a little bit like a therapist telling you: you deserved a better treatment, you deserved an apologize. Just seeing/hearing this like in this movie maybe helps people to accept some things and move on. And thats just... wonderful.
I'm so glad you talked about Abuela not being the villain. She is the antagonist but most definitely not the villain. As someone who has seen people like her and similar behaviours, i still think that the fact that she apologized and showed her capacity to accept criticism and change, is a wonderful thing. We all hurt people without intending to sometimes. What matters is how we respond to it. Do we deny our mistakes and continue hurting people? Or do we apologize and change for the better? i didn't think the family entirely forgave Abuela either, i think they were just willing to give her a second chance. And that's always a good start to fixing things. Also, i like that while most of the family members don't think that there's a problem, except for Luisa (and well, Mirabel of course). Unlike the others, Luisa has actually registered that this much pressure is unhealthy and harmful. She knows that placing too much expectations on people is wrong, but she feels like she's in a spot where she can't back out, because there's no one to do her job. I also love that she's the only one who believed that Mirabel saw the cracks. Abuela thought she was making it up because she was jealous, and Julieta thought that Mirabel was just upset and feeling left out. But Luisa says "when you saw the cracks", not "if" or "you said you saw". She believed Mirabel's statement completely.
@GTGV Good Times, Good Vibes Like I said, what I think is that Abuela did what she did to keep the guests from panicking. It is true that retaining a façade of perfection was important to her, but it was only important to her since she thought that it kept the magic strong and gave them protection. Telling people that there were cracks in the Casita would have seemed like a really bad idea to Abuela, even if she had to humiliate Mirabel instead. But to her, it was only natural that her family had to make sacrifices for the greater good even if it meant hurting somebody's feelings now and then...
I think Abuela saw the cracks, and was willing to put Mirabells credibility on the line to protect the families image. She admitted to her deceased husband that she knew about the cracks. She wouldn't believe her at the time seen as disabled daughter without seeing it herself.
@Furienna An antagonist is the character who opposes / stands in the way of the protagonist. So Abuela is absolutely the antagonist. And while it is about the family as a whole, the trauma stemmed from Abuela, thus why she's the antagonist. That doesn't necessarily make her the bad guy, just the person who started the conflict.
But I wouldn't say that Abuela is even an antagonist. This story is not about fighting against one particular person, it is about healing a generational trauma. Abuela actually did believe Mirabel about the cracks being there, which is made clear later on when she talks to Pedro. But what I think is that she was afraid that all the guests would panic unless she pretended that Mirabel was the problem.
I think a lot of us are (understandably) projecting our abusers - in particular narcissistic abusers, seems to be the consensus - on Abuela; and since WE know most people who are *like* Abuela never actually apologize or grow, we're bitter about that, and resistant to the idea that she deserves her character/"redemption" arc.
Yeah, lots of people who can't forgive Abuela seem to have had a person who hurt them and never changed in their lives. That is really sad, especially as they don't see why she turned out the way she did and that she was in pain too.
So much cultural/generational trauma, so little time. The voice acting throughout all of the songs is stunning. The single line, "how far do these roots go down?" matches the tone of the song on paper, but in practice Isabella is lamenting her missed/stifled potential, and only returns to excited when Mirabel validates her feelings. It's a whole emotional arc in like two lines of _one_ song.
Sadly, most Hispanic families are this demanding and expecting this much from each member to help the family grow and stau together. This movie hit home for me. Kids cannot be kids because they are expected to do their part in this well oiled machine. Got PTSD flash backs from my childhood when I watched this.
@Bellanoche that's horrible. If I were you I'd tell them I would hope to see them all in deepest pits of hell as soon as I was 18 and get the hell out of that home. Having to work is already horrible but not trying to give your kids even the smallest chance to be a kid? Yeah screw that.
@Leland Unruh that's true. This video is however, certainly about the pressure of Latino families placed on their children and the overwhelming expectations. That being said, Mexico is indeed a 3rd world country which leads back to my point that, yes, im correct in describing my childhood as child laborer that robbed me of the joys of being a child. The vast difference in social classes is abysmal and saying no to your Padres meant, you disobeyed and disrespected them. Because indeed, family is first.
@Bellanoche Interesting, so there's a huge class component here. But if I may gently push back, you're almost certainly wrong here: "Glad you grew up that way but it really isn't the norm." My upbringing, in a working-class and lower-middle-class world, is the norm for Hispanic families--if we're defining "Hispanic" formally; if what you meant was "Latin American families outside of the USA" then I take your word for it. My brother lives in Mexico and married into a working-class family there, and this sort of thing is certainly on display there quite a lot. But that specific issue isn't unique in any way to poor people in Mexico or Latin America, that's the norm in virtually every developing country on the planet.
@Leland Unruh I was a migrant worker with other migrant families, as well as my own cousins, family members. This was the norm and you didnt have a choice.I worked and so have every Hispanic child I grew up since we were 8 or 9. We worked to help support the family help pay for bills. Every. Single. Family. I knew. It really was rare to see Mexican family not have their kids act like adult. Glad you grew up that way but it really isn't the norm. Specially in very low income households. In fact, Mexico has a huge child labor issue. About 3.5 million children are working due to poverty. Which the life I had.
"most Hispanic families are this demanding and expecting this much" I'm not sure I agree with this. There are definitely certain behaviors and expectations more common in Latino households, particularly when it comes to a domineering matriarch and family members having a role to fulfill. But I did not find in my own family (including my cousins) the "kids cannot be kids" aspect of your statement. Nor have I really witnessed that very much among friends' families growing up. Perhaps there is a generational or geographic aspect to this (my family is Salvadoran and we grew up surrounded by Mexican Americans and Tejanos; perhaps there's just a cultural difference of which I'm ignorant).
I can't even get through this review of this movie without ugly sobbing, it's so beautiful. A friend of me also pointed out that in a lot of latin cultures, butterflies represent the spirit of ancestors visiting the living, so you could interpret it that the yellow butterfly that leads them to the river is the spirit of Abuelo
I'm surprised they didn't specifically talk about Luisa's line: "I'm pretty sure I'm worthless if I can't be of service." because that's the one that always hits me the most in terms of what it says about her in such a concise manner.
Same! As the second kid in a large family who as always been strong and tried to comfort others when things were going to heck, and who did a lot of the chores when my siblings were sick, I related to Luisa more than any other character. Her whole song had me crying, but that line hit especially hard.
and give it to your sister and never wonder if the same pressure would have pulled you under. in other words no one in the family wonders what it would be like to be her to carry everything
A detail I loved about Abuela’s design is that for most of the movie she wears a black shawl (later seen that she’s been wearing it since her husband died) showing how she had been holding onto that grief for sooo long and it’s not until she apologizes and recognizes her wrongs that she takes it off and actually deals with her grief
My favourite song is Luisa's. You guys are 100% correct, she has the "masculine" traditional strength, and has some more "masculine" build characteristics, but she's very traditionally feminine in her wardrobe and her emotions. A very subtle way they show her femininity is her behaviour in her song. She's shown not only saving Mirabel, which is a metaphor for her caring and attempting to protect her family, but she also does very small things like fixing Mirabels glasses. Those tiny animation details (especially as an artist) get me every time. It shows she cares about Mirabel (and by extension her whole family and the town) on a very deep level without having to say a word. Fixing the glasses is such an intimate and seemingly tiny issue compared to the bigger issues we see in her song. Also, BIG PROPS to Disney. I'm gay, and while I'm masculine, I'm definitely the more masculine personality wise in my husbands and my relationship, I'm still the smaller one. I'm not the top. And I like it that way. This mix of feminine and masculine in personality and appearance, showing you don't have to choose. That you can still be your gender and not be affected by fragile masculinity. In Luisa's case, it'd obviously be the other way around. It's just refreshing.
There was a different version of the ending where Mirabel runs right out of the valley and ends up in a big city (apparently the same one the family fled from in their backstory). Abuela follows her to bring her back, but she isn't regretting the fall of the casita, she just wants Mirabel back so they can all be together and 'perfect' again. Upon arriving in the city, Abuela finds a massive mural dedicated to the memory of her late husband - in the years since his death he's become a martyr and everyone remembers him for being a great guy who taught them that true love means loving without conditions or restraint. Abuela then realises not only has she been a horrible person to her children and grandchildren, she's disrespected her husband's memory by forgetting that he taught her the same message about love. Consequently, when she finds Mirabel, she's ready to admit that the miracle wasn't something for the family, but the miracle WAS the family. Not sure why it wasn't put in the final film, but it's a emotional piece.
One of my favorite subtle details of the movie: there are 2 moments where the Madrigal family take a family photo 1) when Antonio gets his gift and 2) at the very end just before the credits after the Madrigal family have rebuilt their home. 1) When Antonio gets his gift, Abuela Alma feels that it's a perfect night and gathers the family to take a perfect, picturesque photo. Everybody is smiling and in picture-perfect poses, Isabela is throwing flowers, Antonio got his gift, etc. But the moment is very much imperfect because two people from the family are missing from that photo: Mirabel and Bruno. At this moment, the perfect Madrigal family is very much a façade--nobody talks about the mistake the family made with Bruno and family members suffer due to the relenting pressure from Abuela Alma to maintain the appearance of a strong and perfect family. 2) At the end when the family takes the photo, the photo is very imperfect: everybody is awkwardly positioned and crunched in together, awkward smiles, almost nobody is looking at the camera, it's blurry because Antonio's tiger jumped into the photo at the last minute, etc. But by this point in the story, the family's arc is complete and everybody has come to accept that their family is imperfect. That realization has enabled reconciliation with Bruno and Mirabel, love, and happiness within the family. Hate to admit how many times I watched Encanto before I caught on to that (my 2-yo wants to watch Encanto every single day 😅) but what a beautiful way to to convey one of Encanto's most important themes: we need to accept imperfection in ourselves and others in order to develop empathy and enable genuine connection with one another.
That said, we see Mirabel holding a different family photo where she was included just a few minutes later on in the movie. It is weird that nobody remembered to ask her to join the picture from Antonio's party, but it was clearly an exception rather than a rule that they forgot her like that.
The first photo was more of a "look at the perfect Madrigal family" kind of photo, the last one was more of a genuinely warm family photo with jokes and laughs
At 23:37. Perfectionist kids do tend to lash out at the kids who are allowed to be "free" and "without rules" by the adults. I was a perfectionist older brother, but my younger brother had so much fun just being wild and not caring about school. My parents tolerated that about him--oh, that's just my brother being my brother. But with me, since I had been so good and perfect for so long, they put all their expectations ON ME. That felt like a lot. So I harbored deep resentment, lashing out at my younger brother because, hey, how come he's not sacrificing himself like I am? Why am I expected to squeeze into this tiny box while he gets to run around all over the place? So I totally get why Isabel hasn't seen Mirabel for who she really is and borderline hates her, and why Mirabel so deeply dislikes perfect Isabel...
"think of the family!" "i was thinking of my daughter" i LOVE the father bc he's the only one who stands up to Abuela. the relationships this movie subtly lets on is impressive
I love Augustin! Also all the moments where he is so obviously scared of his mother-in-law like dude she is TERRIFYING! Also I remember I was learning Spanish and at one point (apparently this is a cut off curse word, think “gosh”) he literally uses “Wednesday” as an expletive. I was so confuse I literally couldn’t pay attention to the movie going “why is WEDNESDAY an expression??!!”
@S. Opal Burnham Who is the only person to leave the party after Mirabel saw the cracks to check on her though? Not Agustín, because he plays the piano for the guests while Julieta heals Mirabel's hand and tries to comfort her. And as much as they both are very good parents normally, both of them forget to make sure that Mirabel is in the family picture from the party. I think you miss that Julieta was doing her best in a toxic environment while carrying the burden of being the only healer in the Encanto. There was only so much, that she could do...
@The Geeky Preacher It is true that we don't see Julieta interact with their other daughters, but we can see some signs that Agustín and Luisa are close to each other. But yeah, we would have seen more of their interactions with Isabela and Luisa if this hadn't been Mirabel's story. And as for Pepa and Félix interacting with their kids, we don't see much of that either as far as I remember. Because again, this is Mirabel's story and the focus was never meant to be on anybody else except for when she interacted with them or if they talked about her.
@Sandy_Carpets The Second Nope. A good parent should be able to choose their kids, even when going up against family. My dad never hesitated to get into a fight with my grandma if she stepped out of line where his kids were concerned, even though he loves her so much. Even now, when most of his children are adults, my dad always sides with us when she is out of bounds. Julieta is unwilling to put her children above her relationship with her mother, is never firm enough with the boundary's Abuela should have when it comes to her grandkids, and while she does occasionally stand up for her children, she only goes half-way. To be a parent means going all the way, which only Augustine does. He is a great dad, and Julieta is at best, an okay mom.
This line and him hit home. That's my dad, in a Latin family we have to respect our olders but my dad taught us everyone is meant to be respected in the same manner. And boy did he give it to my moms family. Breaking unhealthy cultural "norms".
One important thing to note is how Mirabel listens to and give a safe space to her loved ones when they've needed it the most. Another thing is that, while Alma cares, it's HOW she's expressed her care for the family. Her method of care means everyone has to be quiet and compliant.
I love how Alan gets emotional for so many movies 😂 Bless this man. I think I'm bad for crying at stuff in movies. This makes me feel less embarrassed about it 😊
29:20 Butterflies (especially the yellow ones) which seem to appear through magic is also a part of the novel "One hundred years of solitude" by Gabriel Garcia Marquez. I have not read it myself, but my research tells me that "Encanto" is almost the same story as a family-friendly musical. Colombia happens to also be the country in the world with the highest number of species of butterflies. And I don't know if Garcia Marquez did it intentionally, but it sure fits as a theme in these stories about Colombia.
The first time I watched the movie, “Waiting On A Miracle” resonated with me so much; I’m 22 and I’ve been seeing all my friends go to college, getting married, getting apartments and starting their lives but for me I’m still figuring things out but can’t help feeling like I’m stuck, even asking “When is it my turn?” Mirabel’s journey reminded me that even though I haven’t accomplished grand things, I’m still worthy of love and compassion and can chose to show that love and empathy back towards the people in my life. Mirabel is who she is meant to be, and so am I. ❤
I really love the bit where Isabel has just made the cactus and she starts realising what it means and singing and mirabel tries to hug her and falls because it’s like a representation of the fact that she still isn’t quite understanding the point (the point of the cactus), she still isn’t quite realising the sacrifices that Isabel has made/the struggles that she has been keeping in. The imagery and the meaning behind the characters’ movements and what happens to them is so subtle but full of meaning. It’s lovely
“A broken family is a family in which any member must break herself into pieces to fit in. A whole family is one in which each member can bring her full self to the table knowing that she will always be both held and free.” ― Glennon Doyle. I always think of this quote whenever I watch this movie.
You're responsible for a lot of tears the least you could do is pay for the tissues 😭😂 but seriously tho, thanks. It's probably not that deep, but whatever : as someone who is really struggling with the guilt of breaking away from a toxic family, this is a bit of reassurance that I'm not being over-dramatic and "not understanding their perspective" - they were genuinely harming each other and there was no way I could change to "fix" it.
I love the moment around 8:00 when you’re talking about how you can’t really cry while you’re singing and Stephanie Beatriz did such a great job with sounding like she was crying - she may not have been crying but she was in labor. She refused to tell the director until after she’d given birth! Talk about badass.
Yeah that one hit way too close to home for me. It's how I feel with my parents, doesn't help that they often compare me to other people who in their eyes are doing better than me. It really stings.
My grandparents lived some of the "age of violence" we had in Colombia, my grandpa specifically worked in the coffee farms since he was 12, he lived with his uncle because he lost his parents and some brothers too. It was truly a disastrous time to live in, I always try to make some good memories with him, playing guitar or watching t.v. I know he likes to share time in the living room with me.
I’m surprised you didn’t talk about Pepa’s emotions controlling the weather, and how Abuela was either dismissing those emotions or making out that Pepa stressing was not a good image. Especially when Pepa seemed to be going through mood swings, one minute being happy, next minute the opposite: distressed and worried, like she was trying to keep up a joyous demeanour so the weather would be rainbows and sun so that she (no pun intended) doesn’t rain on other people’s parades.
So the song Dos Oroguitas is actually about two caterpillars, who love each other - but they have to separate so that they can go form their chrysalises. And the song is saying "Once you turn into butterflies, you'll be able to fly away together. But you have to split up for now, otherwise you'll never reach your full potential." It's actually really beautiful. It's used as a metaphor for Abuela and Pedro - who are in love, but ultimately have to separate.
My favorite subtle detail in this movie is the difference in Abuela's weeping between the opening exposition and when she tells Mirabel her story. The first time, it's rather gentle "pretty crying," but the second time she is full on sobbing and screaming in pain. It shows the difference between a child's understanding taking a story at face value, and a mature person seeing and empathizing with someone else's tragedy
i see it more as abuela washing down the story and making it softer because she’s made herself believe that it’s not a big deal.. she was forced to just get up and do what she needed to and in doing so minimizes all of her trauma. she also starts wearing that black shawl/scarf thingy after that, that represents her grief and trauma she carries with her that no one else sees.
13:09 as on older sister who basically had to raise my little sister (changing her diapers when I was only a year older than her, making sure she ate when our parents forgot) this song never fails to make me sob. The first time I heard it I had to fully pause my life and have like an hour long cry. Hits far too close to home.
Curiosity: The fans have been doing a lot of theories about Encanto and one of them is that the grandma wasn't the one who created the house, especially not by her grief and pain. It was the grandpa, with his love and care to protect his family-when they met, you can see butterflies everywhere and, when he dies, there are butterflies in the candles. When the grandmother admits her mistakes to Mirabel, the butterflies appear again, she even tells her "he (the grandfather) sent me you". He had no "special gift" like others but love and, due to that, people started to think that maybe Mirabel has the same gift as her grandfather: the Miracle itself. To care for others and have empathy. You can even see that, after people talk to her about their fears, they feel better because she comforts them, she does not judge or press even more. I like this theory a lot, btw.
"I don't have a lot of gifts" Jono, I remember you telling us about a letter that you wrote to your mother when you were 6, about being heard. Do you know many 6 year olds that can look at a hurt relationship, and respond not in anger, but in love? That is a wonderful talent. You can see into these relationships and pick out the love that is there and bring it to the surface. That is beautiful, and valuable. Not many people have that ability. You are a beautiful, valuable and talented person and you need to love yourself more. Also, shoutout to whoever edits these things. I've always loved the quick clips to lines from other films that perfectly add to the moment [kronk: riiiiiight]. or calling out Alan on his 2 Emmys. Thank you for what you add to these videos. I see you, and I love you.
Louisa's song "Surface Pressure" is a masterpiece. If you listen close, in between each line at the beginning she takes a shaky breath to steady herself for the stoic facade. If you are a middle child, it's like nothing else in media representation. It's incredible.
This story reminded me of my family dynamic and I too used to villainize Abuella because of my trauma and couldn't see the good in her even if it was right in front of my face. You guys actually helped me understand this story a whole lot better and while I personally can't reconnect with my mother until she takes all the blame off of her three children and my dad that everything wrong with her life was our fault I hope for the day that she opens her eyes and I can
This film absolutely broke me. I am a 1st generation immigrant from a Colombian family who left to escape the cartel violence in the 80's. I always disliked seeing people online criticizing Abuela because I have seen firsthand what it is like having family members who have experienced this degree of trauma and reckoning with it's lasting effects. People too often seem to conflate any kind of trauma but it is a spectrum. The fact that Abuela raised such a wonderful family is a miracle in and of itself.
@Kate Workman Well, it is hardly a stretch to imagine that the re-building of the Casita in "Encanto" also took some time. So even if it may look like they solved everything with a song if you take "All of you" too literally, it is really just a brief summary of several weeks or even months of events. Most of their healing process had to happen off screen because the movie would have been too long otherwise. But we can see that Luisa still needs encouragement from her sisters to learn that she doesn't need to be strong all the time. Later, we see that Bruno is still wearing a bucket on his head while doing masonry and needs Mirabel to pass a tool from him to a villager. And I must interpret that as him still struggling not only with anxiety, but with any interactions with the people who treated him like a monster for years. So things are not perfect, and I remember that Mirabel and Abuela even state that THEY aren't perfect. And I don't remember anybody claiming that the Madrigals will never have to face any problems again or never make any mistakes again. But they got a new chance and can use it to do better than they did before, and that is what is important here. And I want to point out that it's not true that Abuela Alma only changed because Mirabel had an outburst. But she got a shock when the Casita crumbled and the magic that she had done everything to retain for fifty years disappeared. And I can see how that was enough to make her see that Mirabel was right and admit her failings and want to change. It is definitely not less realistic than the scene where Abuelita Elena's heart melts in "Coco". And yeah, you bring up an interesting point about what abused kids in real life who watch this movie might learn from it. But we can only hope that they will find a non-abusive adult to talk to and not blame whatever bad decisions they make in life on a Disney movie. Kids don't have to be that old to tell the difference between reality and fiction, so I don't think that "Encanto" is harmful in that way...
@Mere Hakopa I welcome constructive criticism, because that truly is a valid way of learning. And I thank you that you came at this from a perspective of wanting to understand. Frankly, anyone jumping to me "attacking Colombian culture" isn't worth engaging with because they're deciding to purposely skew what I'm saying. Further, I loved Coco and how that movie ended. (I don't think it's exactly the same culture, Coco is based in Mexico if I remember correctly? It's been awhile since I've seen it.) But that's an example of Disney focusing on another culture, but doing the ending *right.* It showed the kid playing guitar for his great grandmother, it showed the grandmother resisting it, and then in the very end montage, it showed things a year later, at the next Day of the Dead, and the kid was playing guitar, surrounded by his family, who now fully support him playing music. It made it perfectly clear that time had passed and his personality and interests were accepted over that time. Anyway, though, thank you for being honestly curious and wanting to engage in where I'm coming from.
@Kate Workman I understand that you're coming from a standpoint of protection for vulnerable children who may be victims of abuse - whether intentional or not - and your major concern is harm reduction or risk mitigation to ensure those children stay safe. I think some of the differing opinions expressed by others maybe saw your message as an attack on Colombian culture/families through criticisms of Abuela, instead of a question about actual long-term change she made and the dangers of confrontation/reconciliation being instigated by a minor/child possibly playing out in real life with tragic results. I believe you genuinely are concerned from a psychological viewpoint but others could see it as an outsider passing judgement on their culture (hence their defensive questions), because whether we like it or not there will always be differences in how different people/cultures see the world. Often for people of colour the world reflected back in the media is determined by a dominant white majority (be it Hollywood/Disney/major media outlets in general) so to have any kind of positive representation on-screen is cause for celebration. In saying that, it would be wonderful to have a series that could deep-dive into the many challenges and opportunities for genuine growth and understanding to develop between the main characters. I'm sure it could be the space to celebrate all of the wonderful diversity of Colombia and the Madrigal family while addressing the issues you've identified in a meaningful way. Please don't take this as a criticism of your ideas and concerns because everyone is entitled to their views (so long as they don't hurt others in my opinion). I just wanted to share some of my thoughts about how I read and perceived the chat history on this post.
@Mere Hakopa As I said in response to another comment along this thread, (or maybe it was a separate comment under this video, not sure,) it would be great if there was an Encanto series, like they did with Rapunzel. It could actually show how the characters adapt to having Bruno back, how his prophecies can still inspire fear until the characters remember, "Wait, this is how it went bad to begin with," and show Abuela either consistently treating Mirabel better, or back sliding, but realizing her mistake. Just from a psychological standpoint, it's incredibly harmful to kids, especially with abusive parents, to have them think that one outburst from them will get an abuser to change, because that's just not reality. And fine, yes, I get it, this is Disney, there's a magical house, there's singing animals. But kids look at this stuff and want to model their lives after it. And if an abused kid thinks that they can take on their abuser, yell at them once and tell them the reality of what they're doing, and that that will change the abuser's behavior? Depending on the abuse, that kid could wind up dead. Not to mention, these different movies, whether it's Encanto, Coco, Turning Red, they all have the issue of inter-generational trauma being solved by the youngest person, who is still just a child. And kids will internalize that, thinking it's their responsibility to change their parents for the better. I've personally seen exactly how damaging that mindset is.
@Kate Workman I'm not dismissing your arguments as it's obviously a subject you feel strongly about, but I would like your opinions on how the writers/Disney could have portrayed the kind of charge you expected to see at the end from Abuela? It's all very well to complain that long-term change isn't shown so what solution(s) would you propose to resolve the issues you've identified?
I was raised to be a Luisa and had to teach myself to be a Maribel. My family raised us all to be able to "do it all yourself" I started working in the family business when I was 13, construction, demolition, heavy duty cleaning. Everyone thought I played too hard as a kid because I'd always get hurt, (dislocations and sprains mostly) but at 25 I found out that my problem was genetic and not something I could just work harder or get stronger to fix. I had to transition from showing people affection through acts of service and always jumping up to help people, to having to step back and start asking for help myself. It was a big change and it took a lot of therapy to come to terms with the facts of my situation, and to accept that I still had worth even if it wasn't monetary or in what I could do for my family.
Id also like to emphasize how in Luisa’s song she says “I’m pretty sure I’m worthless if I can’t be of service” and that really gives you the whole dynamic of the family (for lack of a better word) and it really shows what she’s feeling and how abuela really makes everyone feel
Adding on to how Isabella sees Mirabel, she also sees her as someone free of the pressure of having to be perfect and as someone who isn't grateful for what she has/doesn't have. Also, is there any chance that you could do the Rise of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles movie sometime? It is an incredible movie with incredible themes and character you an analyze as well as incredible cinematography and sound effects. I genuinely think that you would enjoy seeing and analyzing it.
Y’know, when I first watched this movie, I didn’t cry. I mean i dont really cry in general. But recently, my mom and I had a fight. Where a lot of stuff came to light. About how she treated me and how the stuff she told me and made me feel for my whole life has affected. Reliving my trauma with her and she bawled to me, saying she was so sorry, that she tried to make me strong, by trying to make me tough with forgetting my problems and never paying attention to them, dismissing them and me basically. We worked a lot of stuff out and she got me a therapist because of how much stuff I have. Watching the end, hit me so much harder. It reminded me of the fight and I’m glad we had it. Cause now I’m starting to realize my worth. Thank you cinema therapy.
I love that Mirabel actually does everything she says she would do in her solo. The mountains open up around the encanto, she helps Isabella grow new flowers, she heals the broken home and family.
Never seen the movie, but that’s a great idea. It speaks to the everyday power of belief: “I am GOING to do these things (whatever those might be), and because I am so driven to achieve them, I am going to figure out whatever I have to do to get to that goal, and do it”
What you (Jonathon) said at 28:10 really resonates with me, especially right now. Ironically, my grandmother (who disowned me and blames me for a lot of things that aren’t actually my fault) just reached out to my mom and we were discussing her life and I came away with this same conclusion. Does it make sense, with the life she’s lived, that she behaves this way? Certainly. Does that make it okay? No, it doesn’t. Thanks for putting this into the words I didn’t have.
I would’ve love to hear them talk about the line “Give it to your sister and never wonder if the same pressure would’ve pulled you under.” It’s one of my favorite lines from the whole movie and personally hit home the hardest. I think it’s also a really good insight as to how Luisa sees herself within the family structure
It actually seems like the house is like an embodiment of Mirabel; she's always trying to help, always there for the rest of her family. The first big crack in the floor is between her and everyone else, like she just split from her family. And at the end, the door handle for the new house has an M on it, and it comes alive when she touches it. Everyone's rooms are kind of an embodiment of each of them, so the house seems to be the same for Mirabel.
Thanks, guys! This is my new favorite movie, and though I’ve been waiting to gather up the courage to watch y’all, I’ve been dealing with my own toxic perfectionism in my family, but now you guys have a new, and likely loyal subscriber. Thank you! I put on a brave face watching it with my family (twice) but I’ve been constantly laughing and crying watching this video you made since I was alone to feel emotionally safe and not upset any member of my family! Thank you guys! 🥹
I like how Mirabel kind of grows during Isabella’s song. It becomes actually forming a connection with each other and understanding her instead of just a superficial make up hug.
@Shambhav Where are you getting your information? There are lots of stories where the antagonist is liked. There's US Marshal Sam Gerard in The Fugitive. He goes on to be the protagonist in the sequel U.S. Marshals. The Medjai in The Mummy. They attack in the first half of the movie and later joins the protagonists. In the anime Death Note the protagonist Light is the villain while the antagonist L is an anti-hero. Elsa in Frozen is more popular than Anna. Antagonist just means that they oppose the protagonist. It has nothing to do with personality or morals.
I think the trauma was the antagonist, created by the villains that murdered the abuelo. Abuela was a victim who needed help out of that, along with the whole family. If Abuela were the antagonist, then every other “gifted” family member is just like her, because they’re also trapped in the lies & issues from the wounds like she is.
@Shambhav was also curious what you mean by an antagonist will become a protagonist if the viewer roots against the action but not the antagonist themselves? The protagonist is the main character of the story, you can have multiple but it seems very uncommon for a second protagonist to be introduced as an antagonist at the very beginning. That I've seen. There could be dueleragonist, which literally means second main character. However just because the audience seems to enjoy the antagonist character doesn't mean they become a protagonist? It literally only matters what the author decides. Author could make the antagonist of the first book the protagonist of the second book in a series and that makes perfect sense. It all depends on what the author wants you to experaince
Luisa's whole song is such a realistic depiction of the ''reliable kid". Like, I have an older brother, but I've always been the kid in my family that my mom depends on for everything. And it's like "I'm fully mid crisis right now, the entire world is crashing down on me, but I'm still going to catch you when you fall, I'm going to fix your glasses, all of this" Like, even when you're really struggling, you can't drop any of your responsibility
You have resumed all the point of why I do what I do for living, lifting people with my art and helping them as I can (I’m a VFX artist, who worked for Disney) thanks for saying the right words ❤️
I still sob at this knowing full well I have a family dynamic like this, matriarchal and all! But in Latino/Hispanic families feelings are almost never talked about or even shut down. I've been in Mirabel's position more times than I'd like to count, had explosive arguments with the family too, but I love my family members so much I could always bring myself to understand. Forgiveness on the other hand isn't always given. And I love this movie for not always GIVING that forgiveness of everything all at once, rather they swear to build a better future. Yall really hit the nail on the head with this one! Man does it suck being in that position, but ya gotta forge your own path with the people you choose to have around you.
Every time I see Mirabel look down and see that Bruno has drawn a plate with his name on it because he loves his family and never wanted to leave it it makes me tear up.
I've said it before and I'll say it probably many more times because this movie hits HARD. But as the only child of a parent who has both serious trauma and a completely untreated personality disorder, I felt like I saw aspects of myself in all 3 sisters at once. Bouncing between the different "roles" (golden child, scapegoat, forgotten child) sometimes more than once in the same day. I'll never get the moment Mirabel did, when Abuela saw her, saw the damage she had done, apologised and changed. But I can still see, understand and forgive my parent even as I maintain the boundaries I need to keep myself safe.
Honestly, most people didn't think much of this movie when the trailer came out (myself included). Man, did this movie hit home for a lot of people. It's so nice seeing a lot of media that emphasize emotional intelligence, family structures and mental health awareness. Movies like Inside Out, Soul and Encanto are so important for people of all ages.
There is SO MUCH to appreciate about this movie. The two things that stood out to me is that there is NO VILLAIN - just good people trying their best, imperfectly - and it gives kids a story that can help them identify and address real problems that real people have, just like the other movies you mention, spectre. (I will say that Tangled did make gaslighting and negging super obvious for kids, and I appreciate that too.) I think that not having an actual villain is very important, because most of the people you encounter in life are not villains - just imperfect people who are missing the mark and causing unintended harms.
@Micia Rokiri I agree, though I’m not entirely sure how someone would sell Encanto without spoiling a lot of it. That said, the trailers making it seem like a fairly standard Disney animated adventure did it no justice.
I feel like we didn't really get a lot from the trailers for this. I had NO CLUE what the movie was actually about until I watched it. And it's BEAUTIFUL. The trailers seemed to be "Hey look! We made another cultural movie and LIN MANUEL MIRANDA did the music!" Classic Disney move, but really unfortunate. I feel like this would have done better when it came out if there were better trailers.
I felt so validated to hear that Alan is a college dropout like me. My parents both graduated and I don't think that they really understand what my talents are. I have ADHD and can't consistently focus on studying like they can.
When abuela says to Mirabel "the cracks started with you" she is right but not for the reason she thinks. Notice that the cracks start when Mirabel sings "Waiting on a miracle", when she feels the most useless and neglected, right after she sees Alma tell Antonio that his gift is just as special as he is which is almost the exact same thing she told Mirabel right before she didn't receive her own. The house starts breaking the moment Mirabel starts doubting herself, because at that point she already somewhat is the glue that is holding them together. Antonio looks up to her a lot more than he does to anyone else because he sees how special she is and doesn't want to go through his ceremony without her. That shows how much Mirabel already does for her family without being noticed or praised for it. Of course we see later that Bruno has been patching up cracks for years and my guess is those have been appearing since or maybe before he left, but they weren't visible until the beginning of the movie. Which is a quite direct metaphor to the family having issues for years under the surface but them coming out only after Mirabel reveals all of it, because she thinks she is causing her family suffering.
I found it a real breakthrough moment is when Mirabel found out Isabella wasn't going to marry this guy for love, but pretty much sacrificing her life because it's what Abuela wants. She never wanted to be the perfect one. She had to keep it inside and finally got to express her freedom. Mirabel almost hated her this entire time for being the perfect child and never saw how much pressure she was under to stay that way in Abuela's eyes. The same with Luisa and the rest of the family to always be perfect. Mirabel was always the underdog in her eyes, so the rest of the family (mostly Isabella) treated her that way. It was so disheartening to see how they treated her. If she didn't love them unconditionally so much, I wonder if she would've just left.
This is IMMENSELY morbid and hysterical, but when Encanto came out, my therapist watched it and at the beginning of our next session, didn't even preface it with anything, she said "Oh yeah I watched Encanto the other day and when I heard Luisa's song I immediately thought that it described you perfectly!" Which like, props, you are correct, Luisa is a lot like me (eldest child/daughter, rock of the family, always helping others no matter my personal life, etc. etc.), but Jesus wept I'm not sure if I should be offended or moderately impressed that my life was so succinctly summed up. On a separate note, I have a lot of issues with my Grandma that perfectly mirrors Mirabel and her grandmother, so the moment 25:25 when I watched it in theaters absolutely broke me.
Yknow, I really appreciate seeing people who aren’t afraid to cry on camera. It’s hard sometimes to show emotions in front of others, to show vulnerability. But seeing you so openly show them made me feel like it was ok to do it too. For the first time when seeing this movie I didn’t hold back the tears to keep from “embarrassing myself”, I just let them flow freely and sobbed until it felt better. I needed it.
A friend of mine discussed how all the Madrigal family "gifts" are expressions of different types of generational trauma responses (Pepa's weather control = mood swings; Dolores' super-hearing = hyper-vigilance; Luisa's strength = trying to be "the strong one"; etc.). I'd love to see you do a movie on that theme!
@Michael Weinacht That's really dark, but makes perfect sense if you consider the idea that all the gifts come from _Abuela_, from her pain and fear as she can't let go of the trauma. Small flames seem to be an almost universal symbol for hope in dark times, and what triggered the magic was the pain from the trauma itself. It's easy to see the candle as physical representation of Abuela's fervent wish that what happened to her must never happen again. This could interact with the angle that the 'Gifts' all match up to personality traits of those with intergenerational trauma, with Abuela's Candle being able to see each child's reaction to the trauma and effectively weaponizing it to try and grant Abuela's wish. Mirabel might have been the first of all the children that wasn't directly and emotionally affected by it, the beginning of the long road to recovery of the family, and the idea that the trauma might 'age out' of the family if everything somehow goes well enough, but the family is so entrenched by it that their treatment of Mirabel 'refreshes' the trauma so to speak, allowing the situation to affect Antonio. He takes comfort from animals because he likes Mirabel, but nobody else seems to accept her, but the animals don't seem to care. It takes action from the one person who _hasn't_ internalized this initial situation, who has an otherwise _disconnected_ trauma, to finally be the catalyst that forces Abuela to confront her own actions and the damage that they're perpetuating. (By 'disconnected' here, I mean that, under this interpretation, the other family members have internalized trauma to some degree before they were _5 years old_, and that Mirabel did begin developing such until _after_ her Candle ceremony.) Note that the magic returns, rather than everyone becoming okay with living without it, because while the initial trauma has been confronted, the family still needs time to heal. It's not simply gone, which helps counter the idea that someone can fix there problems with a single epiphany or confrontation. The whole family is also on the door at the end, showing that they'll heal as a unit, by depending on each other, rather than simply 'helping the Family'.
@Angelica Licari it's an interesting theory, kind of like the characters in Winnie the Pooh. One that I thought of is how the gift was "triggered" by Abuelo's sacrifice against invaders, and all of the powers are useful if the invaders come back or find them. Dolores will hear them coming, Camilo can infiltrate, Julieta can heal the wounded, Luisa is obvious, Bruno can see them coming and predict their moves, Pepa can disrupt supply lines and battlefields, Isabela can grow food or create barriers, and Antonio can call animals for fighting or reconnaissance.
@Coastalwaves360 he is amazing but after watching Encanto has anyone ever asked him how he's doing speaking as a writer I use personal experience in my writing a lot as a way of dealing with my own personal issues
Lin-manual Maranda was trying to express the family aspect of Latinos where this happens I watched it and I wonder has anyone asked how Maranda is doing seeing as he wrote all of the songs in the movie
I have always seen Mirabel’s gift as her being the foundation of the family, that is the reason her door is the door to the whole house. She is the one everyone turns to when they need someone to turn to, to talk to when they feel like there is no one else to turn to. Everyone goes home, be it parental or marriage, when they need somewhere to go to recoup and make sense of things that are on their mind.
25:20 god, if i could ever tell my dad that he has never been there for me and my sister or say that he is a user to his face that would be the biggest achievement of my life! Mirabel is such a rolemodel for having the courage to say that to her grandmother
this movie will always remind me of my grandma, also Colombian, perfectionist, with a lot of trauma. I learnt to appreciate her by all the sacrifices she had to do for being an inmigrant to help out her family. I wished she had gotten the same resolution as encanto grandma tho
It was kind of the opposite for me as a child. I constantly got straight A+’s but hardly ever got recognized for my achievements by my family. Most of the attention was given to my brother cause he had a learning disability and really struggled with school, so my family was always trying to help him. Which of course it’s important to help a struggling child and give praise when they do something well, but isn’t it also important to give praise to the child that is almost always doing well? I cried when I first watched “what else can I do?” In this movie, because I relate to Isabella in a way. The standards weren’t put on me by my parents though, I put them on myself in an attempt to get more praise and attention from my parents. When I decided not to go into mathematical physics for uni, I felt like and idiot because the reason was that it would be too hard for me. When really, I’m not an idiot for that at all! It takes someone realllly smart with a big interest in math and physics to go into that, and my interests lie more in chemistry and biology. Anyway, if you feel like you constantly have to do better, be better, be smarter than everyone else, you don’t. You should look at your own interests and abilities without thinking of other people that are “smarter” than you, and prioritize your own happiness and capabilities. At least that’s what I’ve been doing lately.
Honestly. Especially since Abuela had said that same line to Mirabel “Your gift will be just as special as you are.” (Paraphrasing) before her ceremony. You can tell it hit her hard.
Mirabelle has so many gifts though. She sings, dances, designs and creates. Sewing, painting, drawing, making clothes and candles and paper holders and works SO hard in the home.
My favorite part of the film (or one of them anyway. There are too many to count lol) is the family photo at the end of the movie. First Mirabel and Bruno are included, front and center. It starts out as a perfectly posed before Casita squishes them all in resulting in a slightly blurred photo with everyone slightly disheveled. Presents the Madrigals as more human and relatable as a family. Because families are wonderful things but they can be chaotic, crazy and a bit messy. But that's part of the fun of it. Also the "All of You" song makes me ugly happy cry. Because Mirabel is finally in sync with everyone else around her. Accepted for who she is and loved inspite of the fact she wasn't granted an active gift like her relatives. It's a wonderful moment.
Its honestly so personally comforting to me to see how often jono cries on this show because these stories touch me just as much and I've always felt so stupid for becoming so emotional over cartoons, but its nice to have someone to cry with
My favorite moment in the movie is when the second go around of Mirabels door fading, Abuelita keeps her eyes on Mirabel, not the door, not the candle, but Mirabel.
I haven't heard the theory that the miracle was born from Abuela's grief before! I've always interpreted is as her husband's loving sacrifice manifesting as a physical form of protection. That's why when the family struggled to love each other as people instead of aspirations the house started to break. But I just saw this movie for the first time this week so I'm kinda new to this lol
@E 🪴 I agree and relate to this WAY to much for my liking. :) One of my great-aunts lost her eldest son, and in my culture, having your first child being a male was a sign of hope to continue the family name. She has worn all black and a similar shall ever since his funeral. The rest of her children were all female. I don't like to accuse people of favoritism, because I think it's unfair, but this shows how much culture influences actions on the past generations.
I wish they would’ve talked more about Luisa’s role in the family, in a lot of Latin American cultures, the eldest daughter often takes on the role of a parent. Held to the highest standards, expected to cook and clean and look after her younger siblings as well as her own parents. It hits really hard during Luisa’s song when she says “give it to your sister and never wonder if the same pressure would’ve pulled you under”. They kind of talked about it as pride, which it kind of is, but also that’s just how a lot of families are. However I also didn’t really expect them to know this since as they’re both white men it’s not their lived experience. I remember watching that scene for the first time and telling my ( white ) boyfriend all about it and he originally didn’t realize why it was so important to me so I had to explain it to him. I really believe Luisa’s character is a direct metaphor of those family dynamics
"I will NEVER be good enough for you, will I? No matter how hard I try, no matter how hard ANY of us tries! Isabela will never be perfect enough, Luisa will never be strong enough!" This whole movie is a punch in the feelings but this line (and the whole of "Surface Pressure" but that's a whole different thing to unpack) is always what BREAKS me. I can't count the amount of times I've had this conversation (or some variant of it) with my mother and father and yet they have never apologised or said they're proud and meant it. They'll spit out an apology in the moment but literally a week later go back to treating me as lesser than and nothing but a disappointment just because I'm disabled and can't do what my younger sister can do/didn't do what THEY wanted. I had a chance to do what I was good at, but THEY held me back from it and now my disability is so bad I can't do the ONLY thing I was good at and honestly I'm still really hurt about it. But I can't ever have that convo with them because I can't ever point out ways they've hurt us kids without them IMMEDIATELY flipping the coin to the "Oh well now I feel like a shitty horrible human being so I guess I'll never speak again :(" side so at this point I've just given up. I'm never gonna do anything "good" enough for them and I'll just have to be OK with that :/
I haven't even started the video and Im already crying with the intro. I found your channel yesterday and I love your videos! Im on a binge 💕 Greetings from Las Vegas!
The ending of Encanto always tears me up not because of the story but how much I wish I had gotten that kind of acceptance and support when I was going through a bad time as a teen. Instead to this day my sisters still view me as "The Problem" and are always searching for a mistake or misspoken word to start in on me. I'm 62 btw...
I always considered that Mirabelle's power was Empathy; and it manifests in a way where she is able to get others to truly open up to her (usually in Musical numbers haha).
Ok, let me tell you: The moment that the abuela entered when Isabela and Mirabel were hanging out you can see in Isabela's face the panic. She looks at her dress, she disappears the flowers (kind of like quickly cleaning a mess that made someone angry), put her head down and try to distance herself from the situation by getting away from Mirabel and from abuela (without completely going away because you know that in those situations that is the worse you can do). She probably was thinking something a long the lines of "I'm a mess, I made a mess, abuela is going to be mad at me" and "Mirabel, stop talking you are making the situation worse. Just shut up". It probably seems like a coward's act to not step up for her little sis while she is practically been attacked but I've been there and fear takes a hold of you. After that you probably feel like a hipocrite and a coward, specially as an older sibling, for not defending your little sibling and instead allowing them to take all the blame, then you think "they should have shut up and obey" and then you feel worse for thinking something like that whle knowing its not their fault. I hate-love that scene because I see in Isabela so much of me everytime I'm i a situation like that. Her posture and her facial expressions are just too real.
@NinjaGidget thank you. If I'm honest I'm wating on a miracle (pun somewhat intended) right now; I'm underage, in my country you can't work until you are 18 and if I stay here to study only God knows when I will be able to get some kind of space from my family, and I know I need that to heal (my aunt is a 30 year old respected lawyer, who still lives under my grandparents roof, my other aunt lives next to them with her son and husband, my family lives across their backyard; I wouldn't be surprise that if I'm unable to move for college I would be spendong the rest of my life just like I am right now and gosh I don't know how much time I can continue like this). I'm doing what I can to be able to get a scholarship and move for college, I just can pray that I'm able to. Still: it terrifies me. Things in home have gotten better in recent years but I don't want to leave my siblings in here and not be able to at least make them know they are not alone if things get bad again. Both of them are kind of reluctant to make friends so we truly only have each other when facing that stuff. They are strong but I don't want them to feel alone. I really don't know, I feel selfish because I know that if I have the opportunity to go I will take it, but it still hurts to know that it will mean leaving them. They are my best friends after all.
@theveryfirstlostgirl there's a difference between forgiveness and reconciliation, and you can do one without the other. Sometimes that's the healthiest thing to do.
@Black Cat first of all, I wish I could be there for you more than just through a chat thread. I've been where you are. I'm the oldest sibling, and I've been either/both Isabella and Luisa most of my life. Secondly, let me assure you that finding wholeness for yourself is possible, but it will take more than just you. I know it seems impossible, but there are people out there who can accept and love the real you. Find them and hold on to the truths they give you. Finally, regarding your family: your healing may "hurt" them, in that they may feel pain in connection with you changing. But I promise you, it will not *harm* them. It will present them with a choice: to move forward and seek wholeness themselves or to slink back into the old way of doing things. And *you* are not responsible for the choice they make.
@Black Cat Honestly, the eldest are always the one most "fearful" breaking the rules than the younger ones because they do bear the direct for any rules broken so I do feel for Isabella in the regard
@Black Cat Narcissistic emotional manipulators always have to have the upper hand. Always. If they feel you are figuring them out and not being controlled by their tactics, they will change it up to throw you off.
When I first watched this movie I never saw abuela as a villain since it’s obvious how passionate she is about helping her community (although to a fault). I loved this movie so much because I relate to Louisa’s struggles so much and it’s nice to feel validated in how I feel.
I interpreted it as Mirabel being abuelas successor. Abuela also doesn't have a gift, but she is the families matriarch. But her creating the valley was based on grief and fear, so when the mantle is slowly transferring to mirabel the foundation was badly shaken and in the end mitabel gave casita life just like abuela did once
Definitely sobbing now, but thank you for this. All of it. And I absolutely think Bruno is a representation of all of us “Black sheep”…those of us who were gifted, but not in ways our families wanted; those of us with mental illnesses that our families don’t understand, and even things like autism and being anything other than cis and hetero…he is a representation of how anyone who isn’t perfect and makes ppl a little uncomfortable are cast out. Mirabel is tolerated because despite not having a “Gift”, she still “fits in” with the villagers and is always willing to help others…it’s the other side of the same coin.
I genuinely love this channel. I just watched it for the first time and subscribed today. How the guy in the orange sweater can share his feelings and how you both can unpack things in the movie and relate makes this channel a breath of fresh air.
I honestly relate to this movie for such a diffrent reason, I'm an only child so I never had siblings to be compared to, it did happen with random kids however my mum passed away when I was 14 and my grandparents never were able to heal even a little from it. Because of that I'm being compared to my mother and being heald up to her standards and when I don't fit that ideal I'm like my drunkard deadbeat dad instead of being seen as my own person.
The only real “villain” or antagonist in this movie is trauma itself and our inability to address it and heal as best we can. Augustine sings about Mirabel taking after Julieta and that moment showed me how much she takes after both of them. Mirabel has always had her gift. She has acute insight and compassion into other peoples pain. She can see what people need to hear and she says it and as we see with her sisters it makes a world of difference. Augustine can see what hurts others emotionally and does his best to help even if he sometimes struggles to get through to others. Julieta struggles with Mirabel’s pain because her gift only heals physical hurt. She tries desperately to protect Mirabel from the pains she can’t heal but is unsure how to help the pain already there. Luisa and Isabella are also hurting but it’s not as easily identifiable as Abuela being hard on Mirabel and gets overlooked. Anyway I really love this movie and it makes me cry every time I watch it so I’m going to go now. 😭
Yes! Everyone needs to understand an antagonist can be an idea. Like it's usually the intent of media, in the end, to convey a conflict with a behavior or an idea over the personification themselves.
@DragonTamerRi your insites are indeed profound. I very much agree with you. I think the antagonist that is most apparent as you said holds no character it is how I see it fear. Fear of not being able to fix, fear of not being able to love, etc. This causes all of them discourse and as you said they are not against each other in opposition but seems so because of their reactions. These reactions again are caused by fear. Of not being able to achieve goals, of not being pretty enough, fear of not being strong enough, as well as fear of just not being good enough. This struggle is what is the antagonist. In the end when they all work together and it becomes glorious. The antagonist has been removed. Not quite sure if this makes sense to you but in my head this is how I see it. This is my granddaughter's favorite movie and she can sing every word she is now three... We watch it all week LOL. Each time she is a different character in the movie and we have quite a bit of fun with this movie✌️
I only just realized how many replies I received on this comment. Thanks so much! The horsemen who killed Abuelo Pedro felt more symbolic to me. I agree that they villains but they were literally faceless, nameless, and held no real humanity or character. They murdered an innocent man after destroying their home. However they could have been swapped out with any village wrecking disaster that Abuelo helped everyone else escape. The reason I don’t truly consider Abuela the antagonist is because her goals and Mirabels are the same but they have very different ideas about how to reach those goals. For Abuela to truly be an antagonist to Mirabel she would need to have a goal in direct opposition to her. She does display very antagonistic behavior but that is not the same as an antagonist. Thanks to everyone engaging with my comment! You are all so awesome.
I've had a whole "why me" mindset as a child and coming into my more teenage life. And it's not like "Why me" but it's more like "why is this all happening" "why do I feel like this? " "why am I like this?" And I've struggled with this for so long and I didn't realize that it came from my mom who has a "why me" mindset and I'm slowly having to brake tht down for myself
Use CTS55 to get 55% off your first month at Scentbird sbird.co/3f88thD
This is the first CT episode I ever watched. I wasn't even a big fan of Encanto, but my whole Disney/musical theater nerd friends group was gushing about it and one of them (who is a special-needs children therapist) recommended your channel and sent me this video as an example. I'm rewatching a lot of your content nowadays and I now noticed that you two are wearing the family's middle generation's colors - Jono in turquoise (like Mirabel's mom) and Alan in orange (like Peppa). Please tell me that was intentional? I mean, you guys are wholesome as ****, but that being a coincidence would just be too much for my fangirling heart to take XD
My Father is a narcissist, I finally at 48 had to give up on him, when he destroyed the family. He stabbed us all in the back, I lost my rescue cats, and that was my life since I was 9. He has no kindness or integrity. I tried but you can hurt me all you want you hurt others and I'm done.
@liza bette Oooh, good luck with that!
@shywolf4 Good points.
They were a large family again by the time that the movie started, but poor Abuela was traumatized and still had to be alone with all that responsibility for years.
@Furienna I think I found one :). He is a very quiet man at work who liked me for a year but never said anything because he's so shy. And just like bruno hes so sweet. So good luck in finding your bruno friend :)
"I like how Luisa is... very girly" THANK YOU for noticing this. I'm so tired of people calling her masculine just because of her muscles!
@Therese Ivy everyone has masculine and feminine energies really.
Right. Her being muscular makes folks think otherwise for some reason. But she is so sweet and feminine. She just has to do the work she has to do and keep her strong surface. That "glow cause I know what my worth is" was so diva in the best way.
lqokn
@mittenista YOU DID NOT JUST DO THAT
The implications of Isabella being able to create ANY KIND OF PLANT are incredible, especially in a completely agrarian society. She could feed everybody in that village forever. She could provide every type of wood or medicinal plant they need at the drop of a hat. She's basically a goddess with that kind of power. And just because she was pushed into that role of 'beautiful princess', she wasn't able to do something that would have helped everybody SO MUCH MORE than just her making beautiful flowers.
Goated plug
I was just thinking it’s crazy how she’s the favorite when her gift is the least useful mainly pretty ornamental use but it’s cause Abuela prefers it over other helpful or different plants
@Bard88 From the same place the music and lighting comes from.
@Bard88 i’m starting to think that this movie isn’t very realistic at all
@K A nobody even said that wtf
A little late to the game, but something I noticed about Isabelle is that yes, flowers and being pretty are her thing, and everyone's talked about the superficial part of her where she's just decoration, but one of the things I just realized is - flowers are accessible they don't fight back when you pick them, cactuses and carnivorous plants aren't. She literally has to deal with people passing her around and handing her off, and essentially doing things to her and her life often without her consent to the point that her whole song was about wanting control of her own life and autonomy. I don't think her personality is prickly at all - and that she's probably really sweet and kind and may really love flowers, but is so tired of people grabbing at her the only way she could see out was to grow thorns.
@FindKnight God loves you, hope you have a nice day
Also, flowers represent perfection in their symmetry and as soon as they aren't perfect from loosing petals or wilting they are thrown out, so there's a pressure to stay perfect or get cast aside.
No but roses do have thorns that hurt if you touch them and their suppose to be the most beautiful flowers
I will say also, she believed that flowers, things that looked good as she looked good, were all her family wanted from her. But, in the song We Don't Talk About Bruno, her line that he had told her that her power would grow like grapes on the vine. He told her, grapes not flowers. He was telling her if she dropped others expectations she could be more that just the pretty face, she could create more than flowers, but like everyone she misinterpreted his message.
I love the way you explained this and i totally agree!!
Fun fact: Stephanie Beatriz was in active labor while recording Waiting on a Miracle. She didn't tell the producers because she 'didn't want to freak anyone out'. I can only imagine how hard it must have been to sing in this state but I bet that it plays heavily into how she was able to convey such amazing emotion in the song (in addition to the already amazing score and lyrics).
@katarzynazofia Yess, exactly! Glad I am not the only one thinking that it's a very toxic work ethic. I absolutely don't blame Stephanie Beatriz for continuing to record the song as she was going into labour, she did an amazing performance. But I am saddened by it, because I can't stop thinking that in a healthier society maybe she wouldn't have felt the pressure to keep on recording. It's heartbreaking that she thought that telling the producers she was going into labour could freak them out
@katarzynazofia I don't think of it as "dedication." I see it more as freedom that it was her body and she decided she wanted to finish the song. I agree that if they'd forced her to do that or if she'd felt obligated, then yes that would be toxic, but if she wanted to sing at the early stages of her labor, that's her choice. They won't even admit you to the hospital until the baby is about ready to be fully born anyway- they tried to send me home with my first two (and good thing the only place I went to was their waiting room or my second son might have been born in a car!).
Omg! And people are saying it's dedication?! It's a very toxic work ethic, makes me sick just to think hiw sth like that can be admired 😑🥺
@Jessica Henry thats such a sweet story I hope you tell it him sometime
I was going to say that too- that is so cool! I took my three year old to see Bolt at the theater when I was in the early stages of labor with my second son. Totally nutty idea, but at the time I was feeling emotional about us not being able to go to the movies for a while once his baby brother was born. He ended up having a great time and I still enjoyed that parts in between contractions- lol.
This movie hit hardest with me when Mirabel said “I will never be good enough for you” because I had that exact conversation with my own grandmother. She instilled deep trauma in both myself and my mother. The difference is that we didn’t get the apology, she chose to double down and said “I guess not.” Unfortunately I can’t go no-contact because I have a wonderful relationship with my grandfather and I’m not willing to sacrifice my relationship with him, but there are days where I feel as if I’ve been robbed of a parent figure. Why did I get such a nasty grandmother when other people got spoiled? Anyway, this movie got me bawling on my best friend’s couch. Not fair.
I don't mean this in a demeaning, diminishing, or invalidating way: at least you can hang on to the relationship you have with your grandfather. I never had one. I don't know what that's like. My mom's dad died decades before I was born and I only met my dad's dad once when I was like nine years old. I only ever had one grandmother and that was it. Fortunately we were very close, but still... she's the only grandparent I ever had, and she died back in 2005 when I was 21. So hold on to your grandfather and take comfort in at least having him! 💜
Just act like she doesnt exsist.
Sending many hugs, my love. My father never loved me and wasn't afraid to let me know about it.
I promise you, you and your mom are very worthy, even if your grandmother doesn't have the strength to admit it.
💖❤️🔥
Trust me... You're good enough. Even if everyone in your familia rejects you... You will find others on the outside that will build you up. I believe in you, because I believe in myself.
I really relate to that. I never got any love from my mother or grandmother because I was born female (I'm non-binary.) My half-brother and uncle always got all the attention. My mother, and later on me, were treated like red-headed step children. When I was younger I remember going to my Nana's for Christmas and all my (non-blood related) cousins got gift cards to Nordstrom and Forever 21 and Victoria's Secret and I got… one t-shirt. Not even kidding.
I just want to point out that during the argument, Abuela tells Mirabel “I don’t know what you weren’t given a gift, but it doesn’t give you the right to hurt this family!” THIS family. Not your family or our family. That whole scene is heartbreaking, but hearing Abuela say that line makes my blood boil.
I also want to add how much Abuela isolates Mirabel from the family too. There’s a lot of more obvious moments in the film, but one more subtle one is the scene mentioned above. Abuela is standing with the family behind her on one side while Mirabel is alone on the other side.
How about the part where Mirabel was left in the nursery for a decade? They couldn’t be bothered to give her her own room in all that time, just cuz she didn’t get a magical one??? They did lots of construction on the rest of the town.
You're absolutely right. Mirabel throws an insult back out of her anger, which hits Abuela where it hurts most - protecting herself and her family. Mirabel felt isolated and excluded her entire life. It took to the last scene before she could accept the SHE was the gift. She didn't need special powers.
@Sleeping Tom You wouldn't say "nuestra" if you are angry
@LordofFullmetal actually, is really impersonal to say "la familia" is way more common to say "está familia". Well, when we (Spanish speaker) are angry we talk like abuela. If I'm angry with my sister (one of the people I love the most) I will say to my dad "your other daughter did X thing". When a kid misbehave is normal fro parents to say "your son"
@First Last That's still completely irrelevant to the discussion though? The intent is based on an english language interpretation because it was written in english. Nobody thought "ohhh boy this'll get 'em if they translate it to Spanish"
Also, get out of here with the stuff about it being their story. That has nothing to do with the interpretation of the line, it's just virtue signaling.
Fun fact: The crew had to fight for Luisa to be a large muscular woman because they thought no one would like a buff woman and they merchandized the heck out of Isabela because they thought she'd be the favorite of little girls but actually Luisa ended up being much more popular with girls
@Nikki Budders (Edited to add: Holy shit this turned into a novella, I'm sorry!! You're forewarned. 😅)
I literally had my parents listen to Luisa's song in order to communicate to them how I was feeling. I was the baby of three, but I ended up being the strong and responsible one. After both of my sisters died (breast cancer and liver failure), those roles fell to me even more and it was becoming crushing.
I do want to clarify, though, that it wasn't crushing because of my parents forcing it upon me. I took it upon myself and never gave any real indication that it was growing too heavy for me to shoulder. I had just always been the one to take care of everything, fix everything (figuratively and more literally as my parents have gotten older now), make all the calls and appointments, do the errands, etc. It was me, not them. Luisa's song just gave me the words I needed in order to tell my parents I was on the brink of breaking.
Ever since then they've been mindful of asking "Is this too much?" when it comes to different things, and I either tell them "No it's fine, don't worry about it 🙂" or "Can that wait at all? I'm starting to feel overloaded and I don't have many spoons left.😥" Because I WANT to do things to take care of them because I love them and want to do it in return for the life they've given me up until now... I just had to admit that I had a cup that wasn't bottomless, and my supply of spoons is finite.
(Although ngl it was pretty amusing explaining the spoon metaphor to my 70-something dad and then hear him start using it followed by "...was that right??" 😂)
@Katie S Someone is salty Luisa is popular
Because she's such a soft and feminine personality. The middle child trying to hold everyone together.
can confirm that i love luisa and i dont like isabela very much
i was in a therapy appointment having a sort of breakdown about my role in the family (eldest daughter) and after a second my therapist goes “… have you seen encanto?” and i hadn’t, so i said no and she recommended i watch it and the next day i did and boy… it’s helped me see that i’m not alone. i struggle heavily with toxic perfectionism + the pressure my family puts on me because of it. mirabel, luisa, and isabella’s issues are all a part of mine and it felt nice to just be seen.
Good on your therapist for recommending Encanto! Movies can teach us valuable lessons. :)
the scene that hurt me the most in this movie is the picture scene where they say the whole family and they don't even recognize that Mirabel wasn't in it. that would've been my villain arc, she was WAY too strong. something i also don't get is how the townspeople and the Madrigals were so angry at Bruno for using HIS gift when they asked for it. his gift was to predict the future, not cause it!
@Chubby Cherry l don't see how her parents could have done much more though.
They showed her their love as much they could in a toxic environment, where they all had to play their roles.
@Conor Murphy Keep telling yourself that, hon.
@KrisCynical no no no… it’s to make them feel inferior
@Conor Murphy To make yourself feel superior, yes. Pretty sad, trust me.
@KrisCynical trust me, the condescension was very necessary.
i think luisa is a beautiful representation of eldest daughter syndrome. i suggest reading the book, but most of use eldest daughters were treated as a second of third parent and were expected to mature and grow up faster than the average child. often were the family’s “thearpist, or were our parent(s) confidant growing up. luisas song has made me cry multiple times. it’s hard to be the strong one who can always be depended on in your family unit at age 9
luisa is the middle child
Weirdly enough, according to Google, Luisa is actually the middle child, Isabella is the eldest. But Luisa is definitely still the rock of the family, trying to keep it all together
I'm a guy with 2 younger sisters of 6 and 8 years younger than me. My parents had the same expectations on top of being snob so we had to be perfect. My relation with them as always been a disaster because I've always put my foot down on being myself. That led to me always being put aside by my parents as punishements. I left the house at 18 yo as soon as I could and they helped me move out because they also wanted me out. I'm 28 yo and only regain contact with my sisters last year and unfortunetly they are also slowly cutting ties with our parents.
So, my take on Mirebel’s lack of a gift is that *she* is the gift
She brought the family together, she let all the tension and stress be released, she got people to get their issues off their chest
She saved the family, and helped everyone in the family
Abuela was worried about the big picture, the family, the miracle, the casita
Mirebel saw the forrest for the trees
I think that's the final point in the movie - we discover that it's Abuela herself that's the gift, and Mirabel is there to carry that on to future generations to come.
You know.... They say that Mirabelle didn't get a gift but she's literally seeing the inside of the people she connects to. She's seeing all of Luisa's fears, she's seeing Isabella for who she is, she LITERALLY saw Abuella's past. She's experiencing who these people are and not just via a connection or anything. She's seeing what's causing their pain. She's EXPERIENCING IT while helping them.
That's what I've been saying, the movie is showing the audience that Mirabel has a gift from the start, the family just couldn't see it because it requires them being invested in their own emotions
Also, seeing how the house breaks when she feels separated from the family, she might be holding it together,
@Purple 42 no u got it right. But Empaths abilities varies. More only sense/feel it and don't always have a choice in doing so. Only stronger ones can physically see the pain (but usually still feel it too) and can help. Being an Empath is a heavily double edged sword
Isn't that basically what "An Empath" does? Feel peoples pain and often helps the person going though that pain? Or am I making Empathic people out to be some sort of super hero? I might misunderstand the meaning "Empath"
@Elys :P Oh, my bad! I'm new to the channel so I didn't know
I really like when he says "Her past doesn't justify her actions but it makes them understandable and *that* makes it easier to forgive"
@Kelsey Chlovechok you're also not obligated to forgive someone. At some point, forgiving that other person is something you would need to do for your own mental health, but you're not obligated to do it just because they had a reason or apologize, etc.
@Furienna Learning history sucks sometimes.
@DAVID PRINCE Actually, Colombia had to go through yet another civil war around fifty years after the one where Pedro died.
So I must say that Abuela unfortunately was right about that violence existed outside of their protected valley and didn't go away even if the men who killed Pedro were dead.
However, her zeal to keep everyone safe eventually made her lose her son for ten years and was hurting other family members as well.
So in the end, they lost their gifts and their magic protection to make a change possible...
@Furienna It really does feel like Abuela is trying to protect the family and the community from this threat of death that just isn't around anymore. She can't see or deal with the day to day problems because she and her family need to be the perfect magical guardians.
@Tahrae The storyteller But I'm sure that the Madrigals had a lot of discussions with each other about what had happened over the years.
But it had to be kept off screen because the story would have become too long for being a Disney movie otherwise.
There are some signs though in the "All of you" music number that they're working on their mental health while building the new Casita.
Luisa needs a lot of help from her sisters to not feel worthless without her super strength.
Later on, we see that Bruno still wears a bucket on his head while doing masonry and needs Mirabel to pass a tool from him to a villager.
And I must interpret that as that he's still struggling with anxiety and with his interactions with the people who treated him like a monster for years.
Later still, Mirabel and Abuela acknowledge that they're not perfect and thus admit that new problems will undoubtedly arise.
And now, it is confirmed by director Jared Bush that Bruno and Abuela at least have tons of work to do to mend their relationship.
All of this is maybe still not enough for some people, who can't see why Abuela or even other members of the family should be forgiven.
But I've got no problem with how the movie handled this issue especially as it's clear that weeks or even months passed during the "All of you" music number.
As an infertile couple, my husband and I often felt in our families that we never got to the adult stage, as others did by having children. I realized in this movie that Mirabelle couldn't leave the nursery because she didn't have her gift. That resonated!
When Abuela lost her husband... They animated such a desperate face on her. I had never seen such a thing. bursted out crying just with her face.
Contrast that flashback moment with the fairy-tale version that Abuela told little Mirabel at the start of the movie. The emotional weight of that event was soft, vague... "Disneyfied", you could say. It was just a backdrop to the story of how the miracle and the Encanto were created, with Alma, apparently habitually, minimizing its effect on her. Then we (and Mirabel) see what actually happened, the pure raw grief and anguish that Alma felt in that moment, the softening fairy-tale presentation utterly stripped away to show the very real, very human, very traumatic impact. It made the scene hit like a ton of bricks. We can feel her pain and resonate with it. The animators did an incredible, incredible job.
Something I liked a lot about Luisa's song was the mythology under tone (Hercules, her holding the scales, flying close to the sun, holding the earth on her shoulders, ect.) when a lot of the ancient mythologies focus on humans flaws. Idk if it was on purpose but I've decided it is now.
Funnily enough, I get major Persephone vibes from Luisa. 🌺🌹🌷 She's very goddess-like, both with her feats and her beauty, but she also has a surprisingly quiet and sensitive soul. A lot of people debate what her room looks like, but I personally believe that it would resemble a Grecian-inspired temple.
@vcool122 oh man I get you, there were 4 of us at the time and the two younger ones listened some but my brother (closest to my age) would not listen at all, always conflict. Just because my mom put me in charge and made me responsible does not mean that they listened. I became a very bossy person because of that , luckily it has worn off lol.
@Priscilla Stephens yeah right, I'm also the older sibling. My younger sisters are 6 and 8 years younger than me. Try to get autority on 2 little demons when you're 10 or 12 yo. I was in the spot where my parents saw me older enough than my sisters that I should be able to babysit them, but I was too close in age to my sisters that they wouldn't listen to anything I would ask them to do.
As an oldest sister, the line give it to your sister, your sister is stronger hit hard. Everything was my responsibility and everything that they did was my fault, why did you let them?….
@Spoopy Virgil And it also shows us that Luisa is smarter than what you might think and definitely not a "dumb muscle".
The fact that Encanto was the reason my mom saw my mental illnesses and decided to talk about them with me with a therapist is crazy. Growing up with a physically disabled brother, a diabetic grandma with a sweet addiction, a widowed working mom, and the scars my dad left behind from his death is tough, in the end I stepped up, I did it for us but also because no one else could, I had no other choice. Me and so many others had their childhoods ripped away from us so we could step up and take so many responsibilities.
To all the kids carrying their families on their shoulders, I know you need a break but you’re not in a position to take one, I wanted to say that I hear you. Your voice is valid, you are not as strong as you want to be. Don’t have unrealistically high expectations for yourself, even if others have them for you. Hang in there, even if you don’t see the light at the end of the tunnel, I promise you it’s there, you just need to walk and turn a little longer. If no one else notices, I at least believe in you.
We're all in this shit together
Thank you.
Out of the many many things that are so well done with this movie, the struggles of Isabella and Louisa have been discussed a lot by my husband and me. It’s so well done. These kids are all defined by their gifts (or lack thereof) and how they can be of use. Louisa is TOO useful. Her gift is endlessly relied upon to the point where the guy with the donkeys doesn’t even seem to realize he should maybe be contributing to keeping them contained himself? She is run ragged but genuinely wants to be of use. It’s just become so hard on her that she fears she will be less valued if she does less. She is so good natured and sweet, but I see that becoming broken with time and turned to bitterness and depression.
Isabella’s gift isn’t “useful” in the same obvious way. She is seen as decorative. All she does it makes things pretty which isn’t “useful” like Louisa’s gift. Obviously beauty and nature are extremely valuable and her gift will clearly develop into even more as she explores her limits. But for Isabella, she sees her value as entirely surface level. So much so that when she finally had a chance to do something truly useful (marry and produce more miracle workers) she throws herself into it even though she doesn’t even like the man she would spend the rest of her life with! She’s so desperate to contribute something if real value that she will sacrifice her happiness to do so. When she realizes she can do more than make flowers and be decorative, she is suddenly filled with energy and joy.
They are both so tragic and it’s utterly beautiful seeing Mirabels eyes opened to what her sisters are up against. Mirabel has been longing for a gift like theirs only to find that it is breaking them.
So so well done.
There is a great little detail for Isabella and that's when Dolores tells says that Mariano wants 5 babies, flowers sprout from Isabella's head and Abuella takes out the one white flower, the "not as pretty one" and fixes her hair. I think Abuella projected a lot of what she wanted to be in Isabella, if you notice or at least for me she looks like young Abuella the most.
The fact that Abuela actually says the words “I am so sorry” not once, but twice, meant SO much to me. I would often be told to apologize, but I rarely, if ever, received one.
Love the writers for this. Its like a sorry from "our" family members, who did something wrog, but cant apologize. I think thats why many people will cry in this scene, because they know i have a family member like this, or one who did something smilar... but i will never get the apologize from him/her i actually need. This scene is a little bit like a therapist telling you: you deserved a better treatment, you deserved an apologize. Just seeing/hearing this like in this movie maybe helps people to accept some things and move on. And thats just... wonderful.
Same. Such a powerful movie.
relatable
Same my step mom always wants me to be the one to apologize for the things I’ve done but never does her her part of apologizing
Me too I love this note thank yoj
I'm so glad you talked about Abuela not being the villain. She is the antagonist but most definitely not the villain. As someone who has seen people like her and similar behaviours, i still think that the fact that she apologized and showed her capacity to accept criticism and change, is a wonderful thing.
We all hurt people without intending to sometimes. What matters is how we respond to it. Do we deny our mistakes and continue hurting people? Or do we apologize and change for the better? i didn't think the family entirely forgave Abuela either, i think they were just willing to give her a second chance. And that's always a good start to fixing things.
Also, i like that while most of the family members don't think that there's a problem, except for Luisa (and well, Mirabel of course). Unlike the others, Luisa has actually registered that this much pressure is unhealthy and harmful. She knows that placing too much expectations on people is wrong, but she feels like she's in a spot where she can't back out, because there's no one to do her job. I also love that she's the only one who believed that Mirabel saw the cracks. Abuela thought she was making it up because she was jealous, and Julieta thought that Mirabel was just upset and feeling left out. But Luisa says "when you saw the cracks", not "if" or "you said you saw". She believed Mirabel's statement completely.
@GTGV Good Times, Good Vibes Like I said, what I think is that Abuela did what she did to keep the guests from panicking.
It is true that retaining a façade of perfection was important to her, but it was only important to her since she thought that it kept the magic strong and gave them protection.
Telling people that there were cracks in the Casita would have seemed like a really bad idea to Abuela, even if she had to humiliate Mirabel instead.
But to her, it was only natural that her family had to make sacrifices for the greater good even if it meant hurting somebody's feelings now and then...
I think Abuela saw the cracks, and was willing to put Mirabells credibility on the line to protect the families image. She admitted to her deceased husband that she knew about the cracks. She wouldn't believe her at the time seen as disabled daughter without seeing it herself.
@Furienna An antagonist is the character who opposes / stands in the way of the protagonist. So Abuela is absolutely the antagonist. And while it is about the family as a whole, the trauma stemmed from Abuela, thus why she's the antagonist. That doesn't necessarily make her the bad guy, just the person who started the conflict.
But I wouldn't say that Abuela is even an antagonist.
This story is not about fighting against one particular person, it is about healing a generational trauma.
Abuela actually did believe Mirabel about the cracks being there, which is made clear later on when she talks to Pedro.
But what I think is that she was afraid that all the guests would panic unless she pretended that Mirabel was the problem.
I think a lot of us are (understandably) projecting our abusers - in particular narcissistic abusers, seems to be the consensus - on Abuela; and since WE know most people who are *like* Abuela never actually apologize or grow, we're bitter about that, and resistant to the idea that she deserves her character/"redemption" arc.
Yeah, lots of people who can't forgive Abuela seem to have had a person who hurt them and never changed in their lives.
That is really sad, especially as they don't see why she turned out the way she did and that she was in pain too.
So much cultural/generational trauma, so little time. The voice acting throughout all of the songs is stunning. The single line, "how far do these roots go down?" matches the tone of the song on paper, but in practice Isabella is lamenting her missed/stifled potential, and only returns to excited when Mirabel validates her feelings. It's a whole emotional arc in like two lines of _one_ song.
Sadly, most Hispanic families are this demanding and expecting this much from each member to help the family grow and stau together. This movie hit home for me. Kids cannot be kids because they are expected to do their part in this well oiled machine. Got PTSD flash backs from my childhood when I watched this.
@Bellanoche that's horrible. If I were you I'd tell them I would hope to see them all in deepest pits of hell as soon as I was 18 and get the hell out of that home. Having to work is already horrible but not trying to give your kids even the smallest chance to be a kid? Yeah screw that.
@Leland Unruh that's true. This video is however, certainly about the pressure of Latino families placed on their children and the overwhelming expectations. That being said, Mexico is indeed a 3rd world country which leads back to my point that, yes, im correct in describing my childhood as child laborer that robbed me of the joys of being a child. The vast difference in social classes is abysmal and saying no to your Padres meant, you disobeyed and disrespected them. Because indeed, family is first.
@Bellanoche Interesting, so there's a huge class component here. But if I may gently push back, you're almost certainly wrong here: "Glad you grew up that way but it really isn't the norm." My upbringing, in a working-class and lower-middle-class world, is the norm for Hispanic families--if we're defining "Hispanic" formally; if what you meant was "Latin American families outside of the USA" then I take your word for it. My brother lives in Mexico and married into a working-class family there, and this sort of thing is certainly on display there quite a lot. But that specific issue isn't unique in any way to poor people in Mexico or Latin America, that's the norm in virtually every developing country on the planet.
@Leland Unruh I was a migrant worker with other migrant families, as well as my own cousins, family members. This was the norm and you didnt have a choice.I worked and so have every Hispanic child I grew up since we were 8 or 9. We worked to help support the family help pay for bills. Every. Single. Family. I knew. It really was rare to see Mexican family not have their kids act like adult. Glad you grew up that way but it really isn't the norm. Specially in very low income households. In fact, Mexico has a huge child labor issue. About 3.5 million children are working due to poverty. Which the life I had.
"most Hispanic families are this demanding and expecting this much"
I'm not sure I agree with this. There are definitely certain behaviors and expectations more common in Latino households, particularly when it comes to a domineering matriarch and family members having a role to fulfill. But I did not find in my own family (including my cousins) the "kids cannot be kids" aspect of your statement. Nor have I really witnessed that very much among friends' families growing up. Perhaps there is a generational or geographic aspect to this (my family is Salvadoran and we grew up surrounded by Mexican Americans and Tejanos; perhaps there's just a cultural difference of which I'm ignorant).
I can't even get through this review of this movie without ugly sobbing, it's so beautiful. A friend of me also pointed out that in a lot of latin cultures, butterflies represent the spirit of ancestors visiting the living, so you could interpret it that the yellow butterfly that leads them to the river is the spirit of Abuelo
I'm surprised they didn't specifically talk about Luisa's line: "I'm pretty sure I'm worthless if I can't be of service." because that's the one that always hits me the most in terms of what it says about her in such a concise manner.
Same! As the second kid in a large family who as always been strong and tried to comfort others when things were going to heck, and who did a lot of the chores when my siblings were sick, I related to Luisa more than any other character. Her whole song had me crying, but that line hit especially hard.
I was about to comment that as well when I heard them talking over it when listening to the song.
and give it to your sister and never wonder if the same pressure would have pulled you under. in other words no one in the family wonders what it would be like to be her to carry everything
i think she if not all of them deserve their own video
Hits me hard because I can relate to it-
A detail I loved about Abuela’s design is that for most of the movie she wears a black shawl (later seen that she’s been wearing it since her husband died) showing how she had been holding onto that grief for sooo long and it’s not until she apologizes and recognizes her wrongs that she takes it off and actually deals with her grief
My favourite song is Luisa's. You guys are 100% correct, she has the "masculine" traditional strength, and has some more "masculine" build characteristics, but she's very traditionally feminine in her wardrobe and her emotions. A very subtle way they show her femininity is her behaviour in her song. She's shown not only saving Mirabel, which is a metaphor for her caring and attempting to protect her family, but she also does very small things like fixing Mirabels glasses. Those tiny animation details (especially as an artist) get me every time. It shows she cares about Mirabel (and by extension her whole family and the town) on a very deep level without having to say a word. Fixing the glasses is such an intimate and seemingly tiny issue compared to the bigger issues we see in her song.
Also, BIG PROPS to Disney. I'm gay, and while I'm masculine, I'm definitely the more masculine personality wise in my husbands and my relationship, I'm still the smaller one. I'm not the top. And I like it that way. This mix of feminine and masculine in personality and appearance, showing you don't have to choose. That you can still be your gender and not be affected by fragile masculinity. In Luisa's case, it'd obviously be the other way around. It's just refreshing.
There was a different version of the ending where Mirabel runs right out of the valley and ends up in a big city (apparently the same one the family fled from in their backstory). Abuela follows her to bring her back, but she isn't regretting the fall of the casita, she just wants Mirabel back so they can all be together and 'perfect' again. Upon arriving in the city, Abuela finds a massive mural dedicated to the memory of her late husband - in the years since his death he's become a martyr and everyone remembers him for being a great guy who taught them that true love means loving without conditions or restraint. Abuela then realises not only has she been a horrible person to her children and grandchildren, she's disrespected her husband's memory by forgetting that he taught her the same message about love. Consequently, when she finds Mirabel, she's ready to admit that the miracle wasn't something for the family, but the miracle WAS the family. Not sure why it wasn't put in the final film, but it's a emotional piece.
One of my favorite subtle details of the movie: there are 2 moments where the Madrigal family take a family photo 1) when Antonio gets his gift and 2) at the very end just before the credits after the Madrigal family have rebuilt their home.
1) When Antonio gets his gift, Abuela Alma feels that it's a perfect night and gathers the family to take a perfect, picturesque photo. Everybody is smiling and in picture-perfect poses, Isabela is throwing flowers, Antonio got his gift, etc. But the moment is very much imperfect because two people from the family are missing from that photo: Mirabel and Bruno. At this moment, the perfect Madrigal family is very much a façade--nobody talks about the mistake the family made with Bruno and family members suffer due to the relenting pressure from Abuela Alma to maintain the appearance of a strong and perfect family.
2) At the end when the family takes the photo, the photo is very imperfect: everybody is awkwardly positioned and crunched in together, awkward smiles, almost nobody is looking at the camera, it's blurry because Antonio's tiger jumped into the photo at the last minute, etc. But by this point in the story, the family's arc is complete and everybody has come to accept that their family is imperfect. That realization has enabled reconciliation with Bruno and Mirabel, love, and happiness within the family.
Hate to admit how many times I watched Encanto before I caught on to that (my 2-yo wants to watch Encanto every single day 😅) but what a beautiful way to to convey one of Encanto's most important themes: we need to accept imperfection in ourselves and others in order to develop empathy and enable genuine connection with one another.
So you can sing every word to "We Don't Talk About Bruno" now too?
Lol
That said, we see Mirabel holding a different family photo where she was included just a few minutes later on in the movie.
It is weird that nobody remembered to ask her to join the picture from Antonio's party, but it was clearly an exception rather than a rule that they forgot her like that.
The first photo was more of a "look at the perfect Madrigal family" kind of photo, the last one was more of a genuinely warm family photo with jokes and laughs
At 23:37. Perfectionist kids do tend to lash out at the kids who are allowed to be "free" and "without rules" by the adults. I was a perfectionist older brother, but my younger brother had so much fun just being wild and not caring about school. My parents tolerated that about him--oh, that's just my brother being my brother. But with me, since I had been so good and perfect for so long, they put all their expectations ON ME. That felt like a lot. So I harbored deep resentment, lashing out at my younger brother because, hey, how come he's not sacrificing himself like I am? Why am I expected to squeeze into this tiny box while he gets to run around all over the place? So I totally get why Isabel hasn't seen Mirabel for who she really is and borderline hates her, and why Mirabel so deeply dislikes perfect Isabel...
"think of the family!" "i was thinking of my daughter" i LOVE the father bc he's the only one who stands up to Abuela. the relationships this movie subtly lets on is impressive
I love Augustin! Also all the moments where he is so obviously scared of his mother-in-law like dude she is TERRIFYING! Also I remember I was learning Spanish and at one point (apparently this is a cut off curse word, think “gosh”) he literally uses “Wednesday” as an expletive. I was so confuse I literally couldn’t pay attention to the movie going “why is WEDNESDAY an expression??!!”
@S. Opal Burnham Who is the only person to leave the party after Mirabel saw the cracks to check on her though?
Not Agustín, because he plays the piano for the guests while Julieta heals Mirabel's hand and tries to comfort her.
And as much as they both are very good parents normally, both of them forget to make sure that Mirabel is in the family picture from the party.
I think you miss that Julieta was doing her best in a toxic environment while carrying the burden of being the only healer in the Encanto.
There was only so much, that she could do...
@The Geeky Preacher It is true that we don't see Julieta interact with their other daughters, but we can see some signs that Agustín and Luisa are close to each other.
But yeah, we would have seen more of their interactions with Isabela and Luisa if this hadn't been Mirabel's story.
And as for Pepa and Félix interacting with their kids, we don't see much of that either as far as I remember.
Because again, this is Mirabel's story and the focus was never meant to be on anybody else except for when she interacted with them or if they talked about her.
@Sandy_Carpets The Second Nope. A good parent should be able to choose their kids, even when going up against family. My dad never hesitated to get into a fight with my grandma if she stepped out of line where his kids were concerned, even though he loves her so much. Even now, when most of his children are adults, my dad always sides with us when she is out of bounds. Julieta is unwilling to put her children above her relationship with her mother, is never firm enough with the boundary's Abuela should have when it comes to her grandkids, and while she does occasionally stand up for her children, she only goes half-way. To be a parent means going all the way, which only Augustine does. He is a great dad, and Julieta is at best, an okay mom.
This line and him hit home. That's my dad, in a Latin family we have to respect our olders but my dad taught us everyone is meant to be respected in the same manner. And boy did he give it to my moms family. Breaking unhealthy cultural "norms".
One important thing to note is how Mirabel listens to and give a safe space to her loved ones when they've needed it the most.
Another thing is that, while Alma cares, it's HOW she's expressed her care for the family. Her method of care means everyone has to be quiet and compliant.
I love how Alan gets emotional for so many movies 😂 Bless this man. I think I'm bad for crying at stuff in movies. This makes me feel less embarrassed about it 😊
29:20 Butterflies (especially the yellow ones) which seem to appear through magic is also a part of the novel "One hundred years of solitude" by Gabriel Garcia Marquez.
I have not read it myself, but my research tells me that "Encanto" is almost the same story as a family-friendly musical.
Colombia happens to also be the country in the world with the highest number of species of butterflies.
And I don't know if Garcia Marquez did it intentionally, but it sure fits as a theme in these stories about Colombia.
The first time I watched the movie, “Waiting On A Miracle” resonated with me so much; I’m 22 and I’ve been seeing all my friends go to college, getting married, getting apartments and starting their lives but for me I’m still figuring things out but can’t help feeling like I’m stuck, even asking “When is it my turn?” Mirabel’s journey reminded me that even though I haven’t accomplished grand things, I’m still worthy of love and compassion and can chose to show that love and empathy back towards the people in my life. Mirabel is who she is meant to be, and so am I. ❤
I really love the bit where Isabel has just made the cactus and she starts realising what it means and singing and mirabel tries to hug her and falls because it’s like a representation of the fact that she still isn’t quite understanding the point (the point of the cactus), she still isn’t quite realising the sacrifices that Isabel has made/the struggles that she has been keeping in. The imagery and the meaning behind the characters’ movements and what happens to them is so subtle but full of meaning. It’s lovely
“A broken family is a family in which any member must break herself into pieces to fit in. A whole family is one in which each member can bring her full self to the table knowing that she will always be both held and free.” ― Glennon Doyle.
I always think of this quote whenever I watch this movie.
Damn, thats just way to accurate
Wow, what a beautiful quote❤ I've never heard it before, thanks for citing the author. I'm going to see if the library has the book
You're responsible for a lot of tears the least you could do is pay for the tissues 😭😂 but seriously tho, thanks. It's probably not that deep, but whatever : as someone who is really struggling with the guilt of breaking away from a toxic family, this is a bit of reassurance that I'm not being over-dramatic and "not understanding their perspective" - they were genuinely harming each other and there was no way I could change to "fix" it.
Thanks, now I'm crying!
Oh gosh, that quote has me reaching for the Kleenexes! Thanks for sharing it.
I love the moment around 8:00 when you’re talking about how you can’t really cry while you’re singing and Stephanie Beatriz did such a great job with sounding like she was crying - she may not have been crying but she was in labor. She refused to tell the director until after she’d given birth! Talk about badass.
The "I will never be good enough for you" line makes me cry every time.. I can handle everything else but that line just hits hard
Yeah that one hit way too close to home for me. It's how I feel with my parents, doesn't help that they often compare me to other people who in their eyes are doing better than me. It really stings.
Yup, me too...and the part where Antonio says, "I need you." Gets me every.single.time.
My grandparents lived some of the "age of violence" we had in Colombia, my grandpa specifically worked in the coffee farms since he was 12, he lived with his uncle because he lost his parents and some brothers too. It was truly a disastrous time to live in, I always try to make some good memories with him, playing guitar or watching t.v. I know he likes to share time in the living room with me.
I’m surprised you didn’t talk about Pepa’s emotions controlling the weather, and how Abuela was either dismissing those emotions or making out that Pepa stressing was not a good image. Especially when Pepa seemed to be going through mood swings, one minute being happy, next minute the opposite: distressed and worried, like she was trying to keep up a joyous demeanour so the weather would be rainbows and sun so that she (no pun intended) doesn’t rain on other people’s parades.
So the song Dos Oroguitas is actually about two caterpillars, who love each other - but they have to separate so that they can go form their chrysalises. And the song is saying "Once you turn into butterflies, you'll be able to fly away together. But you have to split up for now, otherwise you'll never reach your full potential." It's actually really beautiful.
It's used as a metaphor for Abuela and Pedro - who are in love, but ultimately have to separate.
My favorite subtle detail in this movie is the difference in Abuela's weeping between the opening exposition and when she tells Mirabel her story. The first time, it's rather gentle "pretty crying," but the second time she is full on sobbing and screaming in pain. It shows the difference between a child's understanding taking a story at face value, and a mature person seeing and empathizing with someone else's tragedy
i see it more as abuela washing down the story and making it softer because she’s made herself believe that it’s not a big deal.. she was forced to just get up and do what she needed to and in doing so minimizes all of her trauma. she also starts wearing that black shawl/scarf thingy after that, that represents her grief and trauma she carries with her that no one else sees.
@Zoe Otaku I absolutely saw it this way. I think in a lot of ways we hide our grief from our children thinking we are protecting them.
Exactly what I was thinking when I saw the movie.
That part made me immediatly cry because we really see the pain in her expression. Such a powerful moment.
🤯
13:09 as on older sister who basically had to raise my little sister (changing her diapers when I was only a year older than her, making sure she ate when our parents forgot) this song never fails to make me sob. The first time I heard it I had to fully pause my life and have like an hour long cry. Hits far too close to home.
Curiosity: The fans have been doing a lot of theories about Encanto and one of them is that the grandma wasn't the one who created the house, especially not by her grief and pain. It was the grandpa, with his love and care to protect his family-when they met, you can see butterflies everywhere and, when he dies, there are butterflies in the candles. When the grandmother admits her mistakes to Mirabel, the butterflies appear again, she even tells her "he (the grandfather) sent me you". He had no "special gift" like others but love and, due to that, people started to think that maybe Mirabel has the same gift as her grandfather: the Miracle itself. To care for others and have empathy. You can even see that, after people talk to her about their fears, they feel better because she comforts them, she does not judge or press even more. I like this theory a lot, btw.
"I don't have a lot of gifts"
Jono, I remember you telling us about a letter that you wrote to your mother when you were 6, about being heard. Do you know many 6 year olds that can look at a hurt relationship, and respond not in anger, but in love? That is a wonderful talent. You can see into these relationships and pick out the love that is there and bring it to the surface. That is beautiful, and valuable. Not many people have that ability. You are a beautiful, valuable and talented person and you need to love yourself more.
Also, shoutout to whoever edits these things. I've always loved the quick clips to lines from other films that perfectly add to the moment [kronk: riiiiiight]. or calling out Alan on his 2 Emmys. Thank you for what you add to these videos. I see you, and I love you.
Louisa's song "Surface Pressure" is a masterpiece.
If you listen close, in between each line at the beginning she takes a shaky breath to steady herself for the stoic facade.
If you are a middle child, it's like nothing else in media representation. It's incredible.
This story reminded me of my family dynamic and I too used to villainize Abuella because of my trauma and couldn't see the good in her even if it was right in front of my face. You guys actually helped me understand this story a whole lot better and while I personally can't reconnect with my mother until she takes all the blame off of her three children and my dad that everything wrong with her life was our fault I hope for the day that she opens her eyes and I can
This film absolutely broke me. I am a 1st generation immigrant from a Colombian family who left to escape the cartel violence in the 80's. I always disliked seeing people online criticizing Abuela because I have seen firsthand what it is like having family members who have experienced this degree of trauma and reckoning with it's lasting effects. People too often seem to conflate any kind of trauma but it is a spectrum. The fact that Abuela raised such a wonderful family is a miracle in and of itself.
@Kate Workman Well, it is hardly a stretch to imagine that the re-building of the Casita in "Encanto" also took some time.
So even if it may look like they solved everything with a song if you take "All of you" too literally, it is really just a brief summary of several weeks or even months of events.
Most of their healing process had to happen off screen because the movie would have been too long otherwise.
But we can see that Luisa still needs encouragement from her sisters to learn that she doesn't need to be strong all the time.
Later, we see that Bruno is still wearing a bucket on his head while doing masonry and needs Mirabel to pass a tool from him to a villager.
And I must interpret that as him still struggling not only with anxiety, but with any interactions with the people who treated him like a monster for years.
So things are not perfect, and I remember that Mirabel and Abuela even state that THEY aren't perfect.
And I don't remember anybody claiming that the Madrigals will never have to face any problems again or never make any mistakes again.
But they got a new chance and can use it to do better than they did before, and that is what is important here.
And I want to point out that it's not true that Abuela Alma only changed because Mirabel had an outburst.
But she got a shock when the Casita crumbled and the magic that she had done everything to retain for fifty years disappeared.
And I can see how that was enough to make her see that Mirabel was right and admit her failings and want to change.
It is definitely not less realistic than the scene where Abuelita Elena's heart melts in "Coco".
And yeah, you bring up an interesting point about what abused kids in real life who watch this movie might learn from it.
But we can only hope that they will find a non-abusive adult to talk to and not blame whatever bad decisions they make in life on a Disney movie.
Kids don't have to be that old to tell the difference between reality and fiction, so I don't think that "Encanto" is harmful in that way...
@Mere Hakopa I welcome constructive criticism, because that truly is a valid way of learning. And I thank you that you came at this from a perspective of wanting to understand.
Frankly, anyone jumping to me "attacking Colombian culture" isn't worth engaging with because they're deciding to purposely skew what I'm saying. Further, I loved Coco and how that movie ended. (I don't think it's exactly the same culture, Coco is based in Mexico if I remember correctly? It's been awhile since I've seen it.) But that's an example of Disney focusing on another culture, but doing the ending *right.* It showed the kid playing guitar for his great grandmother, it showed the grandmother resisting it, and then in the very end montage, it showed things a year later, at the next Day of the Dead, and the kid was playing guitar, surrounded by his family, who now fully support him playing music. It made it perfectly clear that time had passed and his personality and interests were accepted over that time.
Anyway, though, thank you for being honestly curious and wanting to engage in where I'm coming from.
@Kate Workman I understand that you're coming from a standpoint of protection for vulnerable children who may be victims of abuse - whether intentional or not - and your major concern is harm reduction or risk mitigation to ensure those children stay safe. I think some of the differing opinions expressed by others maybe saw your message as an attack on Colombian culture/families through criticisms of Abuela, instead of a question about actual long-term change she made and the dangers of confrontation/reconciliation being instigated by a minor/child possibly playing out in real life with tragic results.
I believe you genuinely are concerned from a psychological viewpoint but others could see it as an outsider passing judgement on their culture (hence their defensive questions), because whether we like it or not there will always be differences in how different people/cultures see the world. Often for people of colour the world reflected back in the media is determined by a dominant white majority (be it Hollywood/Disney/major media outlets in general) so to have any kind of positive representation on-screen is cause for celebration. In saying that, it would be wonderful to have a series that could deep-dive into the many challenges and opportunities for genuine growth and understanding to develop between the main characters. I'm sure it could be the space to celebrate all of the wonderful diversity of Colombia and the Madrigal family while addressing the issues you've identified in a meaningful way.
Please don't take this as a criticism of your ideas and concerns because everyone is entitled to their views (so long as they don't hurt others in my opinion). I just wanted to share some of my thoughts about how I read and perceived the chat history on this post.
@Mere Hakopa As I said in response to another comment along this thread, (or maybe it was a separate comment under this video, not sure,) it would be great if there was an Encanto series, like they did with Rapunzel. It could actually show how the characters adapt to having Bruno back, how his prophecies can still inspire fear until the characters remember, "Wait, this is how it went bad to begin with," and show Abuela either consistently treating Mirabel better, or back sliding, but realizing her mistake.
Just from a psychological standpoint, it's incredibly harmful to kids, especially with abusive parents, to have them think that one outburst from them will get an abuser to change, because that's just not reality. And fine, yes, I get it, this is Disney, there's a magical house, there's singing animals. But kids look at this stuff and want to model their lives after it. And if an abused kid thinks that they can take on their abuser, yell at them once and tell them the reality of what they're doing, and that that will change the abuser's behavior? Depending on the abuse, that kid could wind up dead.
Not to mention, these different movies, whether it's Encanto, Coco, Turning Red, they all have the issue of inter-generational trauma being solved by the youngest person, who is still just a child. And kids will internalize that, thinking it's their responsibility to change their parents for the better. I've personally seen exactly how damaging that mindset is.
@Kate Workman I'm not dismissing your arguments as it's obviously a subject you feel strongly about, but I would like your opinions on how the writers/Disney could have portrayed the kind of charge you expected to see at the end from Abuela? It's all very well to complain that long-term change isn't shown so what solution(s) would you propose to resolve the issues you've identified?
I was raised to be a Luisa and had to teach myself to be a Maribel. My family raised us all to be able to "do it all yourself" I started working in the family business when I was 13, construction, demolition, heavy duty cleaning. Everyone thought I played too hard as a kid because I'd always get hurt, (dislocations and sprains mostly) but at 25 I found out that my problem was genetic and not something I could just work harder or get stronger to fix. I had to transition from showing people affection through acts of service and always jumping up to help people, to having to step back and start asking for help myself. It was a big change and it took a lot of therapy to come to terms with the facts of my situation, and to accept that I still had worth even if it wasn't monetary or in what I could do for my family.
Id also like to emphasize how in Luisa’s song she says “I’m pretty sure I’m worthless if I can’t be of service” and that really gives you the whole dynamic of the family (for lack of a better word) and it really shows what she’s feeling and how abuela really makes everyone feel
I work waiting tables in a restaurant and I keep singing Luisa’s song in my head.
Adding on to how Isabella sees Mirabel, she also sees her as someone free of the pressure of having to be perfect and as someone who isn't grateful for what she has/doesn't have. Also, is there any chance that you could do the Rise of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles movie sometime? It is an incredible movie with incredible themes and character you an analyze as well as incredible cinematography and sound effects. I genuinely think that you would enjoy seeing and analyzing it.
Y’know, when I first watched this movie, I didn’t cry. I mean i dont really cry in general. But recently, my mom and I had a fight. Where a lot of stuff came to light. About how she treated me and how the stuff she told me and made me feel for my whole life has affected. Reliving my trauma with her and she bawled to me, saying she was so sorry, that she tried to make me strong, by trying to make me tough with forgetting my problems and never paying attention to them, dismissing them and me basically. We worked a lot of stuff out and she got me a therapist because of how much stuff I have. Watching the end, hit me so much harder. It reminded me of the fight and I’m glad we had it. Cause now I’m starting to realize my worth. Thank you cinema therapy.
This movie had me SOBBING. Even revisiting it here made me shed some tears. It was some powerful storytelling.
I love that Mirabel actually does everything she says she would do in her solo. The mountains open up around the encanto, she helps Isabella grow new flowers, she heals the broken home and family.
Never seen the movie, but that’s a great idea. It speaks to the everyday power of belief: “I am GOING to do these things (whatever those might be), and because I am so driven to achieve them, I am going to figure out whatever I have to do to get to that goal, and do it”
@Denia Juarez Happy to provide your goosebumps for the day. This movie is so well done with all the foreshadowing of events.
First time ive gotten goosebumps from reading a comment. Ive watched this movie at least 20 times and i never noticed that 🥺
@Sentient mushroom she made pepa happy silly.
@Raquel Lady sorry I accidentally commented on the wrong section of the song
What you (Jonathon) said at 28:10 really resonates with me, especially right now. Ironically, my grandmother (who disowned me and blames me for a lot of things that aren’t actually my fault) just reached out to my mom and we were discussing her life and I came away with this same conclusion. Does it make sense, with the life she’s lived, that she behaves this way? Certainly. Does that make it okay? No, it doesn’t. Thanks for putting this into the words I didn’t have.
I would’ve love to hear them talk about the line “Give it to your sister and never wonder if the same pressure would’ve pulled you under.” It’s one of my favorite lines from the whole movie and personally hit home the hardest. I think it’s also a really good insight as to how Luisa sees herself within the family structure
It actually seems like the house is like an embodiment of Mirabel; she's always trying to help, always there for the rest of her family. The first big crack in the floor is between her and everyone else, like she just split from her family. And at the end, the door handle for the new house has an M on it, and it comes alive when she touches it. Everyone's rooms are kind of an embodiment of each of them, so the house seems to be the same for Mirabel.
Thanks, guys! This is my new favorite movie, and though I’ve been waiting to gather up the courage to watch y’all, I’ve been dealing with my own toxic perfectionism in my family, but now you guys have a new, and likely loyal subscriber. Thank you! I put on a brave face watching it with my family (twice) but I’ve been constantly laughing and crying watching this video you made since I was alone to feel emotionally safe and not upset any member of my family! Thank you guys! 🥹
I like how Mirabel kind of grows during Isabella’s song. It becomes actually forming a connection with each other and understanding her instead of just a superficial make up hug.
This movie did something incredible and real by not having an antagonist. The characters were real. Their struggles were real.
@Jayde419 I won't defend my words, because I find them kinda cringe now.
@Shambhav Where are you getting your information? There are lots of stories where the antagonist is liked. There's US Marshal Sam Gerard in The Fugitive. He goes on to be the protagonist in the sequel U.S. Marshals. The Medjai in The Mummy. They attack in the first half of the movie and later joins the protagonists. In the anime Death Note the protagonist Light is the villain while the antagonist L is an anti-hero. Elsa in Frozen is more popular than Anna. Antagonist just means that they oppose the protagonist. It has nothing to do with personality or morals.
@Shambhav AhEm, I present ZUKO, the kid with the greatest redemption arc in animation
I think the trauma was the antagonist, created by the villains that murdered the abuelo. Abuela was a victim who needed help out of that, along with the whole family. If Abuela were the antagonist, then every other “gifted” family member is just like her, because they’re also trapped in the lies & issues from the wounds like she is.
@Shambhav was also curious what you mean by an antagonist will become a protagonist if the viewer roots against the action but not the antagonist themselves? The protagonist is the main character of the story, you can have multiple but it seems very uncommon for a second protagonist to be introduced as an antagonist at the very beginning. That I've seen. There could be dueleragonist, which literally means second main character. However just because the audience seems to enjoy the antagonist character doesn't mean they become a protagonist? It literally only matters what the author decides. Author could make the antagonist of the first book the protagonist of the second book in a series and that makes perfect sense. It all depends on what the author wants you to experaince
Luisa's whole song is such a realistic depiction of the ''reliable kid". Like, I have an older brother, but I've always been the kid in my family that my mom depends on for everything. And it's like "I'm fully mid crisis right now, the entire world is crashing down on me, but I'm still going to catch you when you fall, I'm going to fix your glasses, all of this" Like, even when you're really struggling, you can't drop any of your responsibility
You have resumed all the point of why I do what I do for living, lifting people with my art and helping them as I can (I’m a VFX artist, who worked for Disney) thanks for saying the right words ❤️
I still sob at this knowing full well I have a family dynamic like this, matriarchal and all! But in Latino/Hispanic families feelings are almost never talked about or even shut down. I've been in Mirabel's position more times than I'd like to count, had explosive arguments with the family too, but I love my family members so much I could always bring myself to understand. Forgiveness on the other hand isn't always given. And I love this movie for not always GIVING that forgiveness of everything all at once, rather they swear to build a better future. Yall really hit the nail on the head with this one! Man does it suck being in that position, but ya gotta forge your own path with the people you choose to have around you.
Every time I see Mirabel look down and see that Bruno has drawn a plate with his name on it because he loves his family and never wanted to leave it it makes me tear up.
I've said it before and I'll say it probably many more times because this movie hits HARD. But as the only child of a parent who has both serious trauma and a completely untreated personality disorder, I felt like I saw aspects of myself in all 3 sisters at once. Bouncing between the different "roles" (golden child, scapegoat, forgotten child) sometimes more than once in the same day. I'll never get the moment Mirabel did, when Abuela saw her, saw the damage she had done, apologised and changed. But I can still see, understand and forgive my parent even as I maintain the boundaries I need to keep myself safe.
Honestly, most people didn't think much of this movie when the trailer came out (myself included). Man, did this movie hit home for a lot of people. It's so nice seeing a lot of media that emphasize emotional intelligence, family structures and mental health awareness. Movies like Inside Out, Soul and Encanto are so important for people of all ages.
@A Z I really enjoyed this movie alot very well made
There is SO MUCH to appreciate about this movie. The two things that stood out to me is that there is NO VILLAIN - just good people trying their best, imperfectly - and it gives kids a story that can help them identify and address real problems that real people have, just like the other movies you mention, spectre. (I will say that Tangled did make gaslighting and negging super obvious for kids, and I appreciate that too.)
I think that not having an actual villain is very important, because most of the people you encounter in life are not villains - just imperfect people who are missing the mark and causing unintended harms.
Inside Out had me bawling.
@Micia Rokiri I agree, though I’m not entirely sure how someone would sell Encanto without spoiling a lot of it. That said, the trailers making it seem like a fairly standard Disney animated adventure did it no justice.
I feel like we didn't really get a lot from the trailers for this. I had NO CLUE what the movie was actually about until I watched it. And it's BEAUTIFUL. The trailers seemed to be "Hey look! We made another cultural movie and LIN MANUEL MIRANDA did the music!" Classic Disney move, but really unfortunate. I feel like this would have done better when it came out if there were better trailers.
I felt so validated to hear that Alan is a college dropout like me. My parents both graduated and I don't think that they really understand what my talents are. I have ADHD and can't consistently focus on studying like they can.
When abuela says to Mirabel "the cracks started with you" she is right but not for the reason she thinks. Notice that the cracks start when Mirabel sings "Waiting on a miracle", when she feels the most useless and neglected, right after she sees Alma tell Antonio that his gift is just as special as he is which is almost the exact same thing she told Mirabel right before she didn't receive her own. The house starts breaking the moment Mirabel starts doubting herself, because at that point she already somewhat is the glue that is holding them together. Antonio looks up to her a lot more than he does to anyone else because he sees how special she is and doesn't want to go through his ceremony without her. That shows how much Mirabel already does for her family without being noticed or praised for it. Of course we see later that Bruno has been patching up cracks for years and my guess is those have been appearing since or maybe before he left, but they weren't visible until the beginning of the movie. Which is a quite direct metaphor to the family having issues for years under the surface but them coming out only after Mirabel reveals all of it, because she thinks she is causing her family suffering.
I found it a real breakthrough moment is when Mirabel found out Isabella wasn't going to marry this guy for love, but pretty much sacrificing her life because it's what Abuela wants. She never wanted to be the perfect one. She had to keep it inside and finally got to express her freedom. Mirabel almost hated her this entire time for being the perfect child and never saw how much pressure she was under to stay that way in Abuela's eyes. The same with Luisa and the rest of the family to always be perfect. Mirabel was always the underdog in her eyes, so the rest of the family (mostly Isabella) treated her that way. It was so disheartening to see how they treated her. If she didn't love them unconditionally so much, I wonder if she would've just left.
This is IMMENSELY morbid and hysterical, but when Encanto came out, my therapist watched it and at the beginning of our next session, didn't even preface it with anything, she said "Oh yeah I watched Encanto the other day and when I heard Luisa's song I immediately thought that it described you perfectly!" Which like, props, you are correct, Luisa is a lot like me (eldest child/daughter, rock of the family, always helping others no matter my personal life, etc. etc.), but Jesus wept I'm not sure if I should be offended or moderately impressed that my life was so succinctly summed up.
On a separate note, I have a lot of issues with my Grandma that perfectly mirrors Mirabel and her grandmother, so the moment 25:25 when I watched it in theaters absolutely broke me.
Yknow, I really appreciate seeing people who aren’t afraid to cry on camera. It’s hard sometimes to show emotions in front of others, to show vulnerability. But seeing you so openly show them made me feel like it was ok to do it too. For the first time when seeing this movie I didn’t hold back the tears to keep from “embarrassing myself”, I just let them flow freely and sobbed until it felt better. I needed it.
A friend of mine discussed how all the Madrigal family "gifts" are expressions of different types of generational trauma responses (Pepa's weather control = mood swings; Dolores' super-hearing = hyper-vigilance; Luisa's strength = trying to be "the strong one"; etc.). I'd love to see you do a movie on that theme!
@Michael Weinacht That's really dark, but makes perfect sense if you consider the idea that all the gifts come from _Abuela_, from her pain and fear as she can't let go of the trauma. Small flames seem to be an almost universal symbol for hope in dark times, and what triggered the magic was the pain from the trauma itself. It's easy to see the candle as physical representation of Abuela's fervent wish that what happened to her must never happen again.
This could interact with the angle that the 'Gifts' all match up to personality traits of those with intergenerational trauma, with Abuela's Candle being able to see each child's reaction to the trauma and effectively weaponizing it to try and grant Abuela's wish.
Mirabel might have been the first of all the children that wasn't directly and emotionally affected by it, the beginning of the long road to recovery of the family, and the idea that the trauma might 'age out' of the family if everything somehow goes well enough, but the family is so entrenched by it that their treatment of Mirabel 'refreshes' the trauma so to speak, allowing the situation to affect Antonio. He takes comfort from animals because he likes Mirabel, but nobody else seems to accept her, but the animals don't seem to care.
It takes action from the one person who _hasn't_ internalized this initial situation, who has an otherwise _disconnected_ trauma, to finally be the catalyst that forces Abuela to confront her own actions and the damage that they're perpetuating. (By 'disconnected' here, I mean that, under this interpretation, the other family members have internalized trauma to some degree before they were _5 years old_, and that Mirabel did begin developing such until _after_ her Candle ceremony.)
Note that the magic returns, rather than everyone becoming okay with living without it, because while the initial trauma has been confronted, the family still needs time to heal. It's not simply gone, which helps counter the idea that someone can fix there problems with a single epiphany or confrontation. The whole family is also on the door at the end, showing that they'll heal as a unit, by depending on each other, rather than simply 'helping the Family'.
@Angelica Licari it's an interesting theory, kind of like the characters in Winnie the Pooh. One that I thought of is how the gift was "triggered" by Abuelo's sacrifice against invaders, and all of the powers are useful if the invaders come back or find them. Dolores will hear them coming, Camilo can infiltrate, Julieta can heal the wounded, Luisa is obvious, Bruno can see them coming and predict their moves, Pepa can disrupt supply lines and battlefields, Isabela can grow food or create barriers, and Antonio can call animals for fighting or reconnaissance.
@Coastalwaves360 he is amazing but after watching Encanto has anyone ever asked him how he's doing speaking as a writer I use personal experience in my writing a lot as a way of dealing with my own personal issues
@Enticing Conversations Miranda is-
I just LOVE his works so much.
Lin-manual Maranda was trying to express the family aspect of Latinos where this happens I watched it and I wonder has anyone asked how Maranda is doing seeing as he wrote all of the songs in the movie
I have always seen Mirabel’s gift as her being the foundation of the family, that is the reason her door is the door to the whole house. She is the one everyone turns to when they need someone to turn to, to talk to when they feel like there is no one else to turn to. Everyone goes home, be it parental or marriage, when they need somewhere to go to recoup and make sense of things that are on their mind.
25:20 god, if i could ever tell my dad that he has never been there for me and my sister or say that he is a user to his face that would be the biggest achievement of my life! Mirabel is such a rolemodel for having the courage to say that to her grandmother
this movie will always remind me of my grandma, also Colombian, perfectionist, with a lot of trauma. I learnt to appreciate her by all the sacrifices she had to do for being an inmigrant to help out her family. I wished she had gotten the same resolution as encanto grandma tho
As someone who holds herself to impossibly high standards, I found this episode so relatable. Thank you for making it.
It was kind of the opposite for me as a child. I constantly got straight A+’s but hardly ever got recognized for my achievements by my family. Most of the attention was given to my brother cause he had a learning disability and really struggled with school, so my family was always trying to help him. Which of course it’s important to help a struggling child and give praise when they do something well, but isn’t it also important to give praise to the child that is almost always doing well? I cried when I first watched “what else can I do?” In this movie, because I relate to Isabella in a way. The standards weren’t put on me by my parents though, I put them on myself in an attempt to get more praise and attention from my parents. When I decided not to go into mathematical physics for uni, I felt like and idiot because the reason was that it would be too hard for me. When really, I’m not an idiot for that at all! It takes someone realllly smart with a big interest in math and physics to go into that, and my interests lie more in chemistry and biology. Anyway, if you feel like you constantly have to do better, be better, be smarter than everyone else, you don’t. You should look at your own interests and abilities without thinking of other people that are “smarter” than you, and prioritize your own happiness and capabilities. At least that’s what I’ve been doing lately.
Mirabel's face when Abuela says "a gift just as special as you" to Antonio instantly breaks me. I am sobbing.
I felt that on a personal level
Honestly. Especially since Abuela had said that same line to Mirabel “Your gift will be just as special as you are.” (Paraphrasing) before her ceremony. You can tell it hit her hard.
Mirabelle has so many gifts though. She sings, dances, designs and creates. Sewing, painting, drawing, making clothes and candles and paper holders and works SO hard in the home.
My favorite part of the film (or one of them anyway. There are too many to count lol) is the family photo at the end of the movie. First Mirabel and Bruno are included, front and center. It starts out as a perfectly posed before Casita squishes them all in resulting in a slightly blurred photo with everyone slightly disheveled. Presents the Madrigals as more human and relatable as a family. Because families are wonderful things but they can be chaotic, crazy and a bit messy. But that's part of the fun of it.
Also the "All of You" song makes me ugly happy cry. Because Mirabel is finally in sync with everyone else around her. Accepted for who she is and loved inspite of the fact she wasn't granted an active gift like her relatives. It's a wonderful moment.
Its honestly so personally comforting to me to see how often jono cries on this show because these stories touch me just as much and I've always felt so stupid for becoming so emotional over cartoons, but its nice to have someone to cry with
My favorite moment in the movie is when the second go around of Mirabels door fading, Abuelita keeps her eyes on Mirabel, not the door, not the candle, but Mirabel.
I haven't heard the theory that the miracle was born from Abuela's grief before! I've always interpreted is as her husband's loving sacrifice manifesting as a physical form of protection. That's why when the family struggled to love each other as people instead of aspirations the house started to break. But I just saw this movie for the first time this week so I'm kinda new to this lol
when I realized the black shawl Abuela wears through a lot of the movie is a mourning shawl, she never stopped suffering that loss
@Buzz-y Bee apparently I have a habit of just popping up
I am seeing you everywhere what the heck, lol. But yeah I never noticed that before it's an amazing and sad detail
She had to see her husband die. You don’t stop suffering from that
@E 🪴 I agree and relate to this WAY to much for my liking. :) One of my great-aunts lost her eldest son, and in my culture, having your first child being a male was a sign of hope to continue the family name. She has worn all black and a similar shall ever since his funeral. The rest of her children were all female. I don't like to accuse people of favoritism, because I think it's unfair, but this shows how much culture influences actions on the past generations.
@MrGBH good catch! 🏅 I haven't seen anyone else point that out
I wish they would’ve talked more about Luisa’s role in the family, in a lot of Latin American cultures, the eldest daughter often takes on the role of a parent. Held to the highest standards, expected to cook and clean and look after her younger siblings as well as her own parents. It hits really hard during Luisa’s song when she says “give it to your sister and never wonder if the same pressure would’ve pulled you under”. They kind of talked about it as pride, which it kind of is, but also that’s just how a lot of families are. However I also didn’t really expect them to know this since as they’re both white men it’s not their lived experience. I remember watching that scene for the first time and telling my ( white ) boyfriend all about it and he originally didn’t realize why it was so important to me so I had to explain it to him. I really believe Luisa’s character is a direct metaphor of those family dynamics
"I will NEVER be good enough for you, will I? No matter how hard I try, no matter how hard ANY of us tries! Isabela will never be perfect enough, Luisa will never be strong enough!" This whole movie is a punch in the feelings but this line (and the whole of "Surface Pressure" but that's a whole different thing to unpack) is always what BREAKS me. I can't count the amount of times I've had this conversation (or some variant of it) with my mother and father and yet they have never apologised or said they're proud and meant it. They'll spit out an apology in the moment but literally a week later go back to treating me as lesser than and nothing but a disappointment just because I'm disabled and can't do what my younger sister can do/didn't do what THEY wanted. I had a chance to do what I was good at, but THEY held me back from it and now my disability is so bad I can't do the ONLY thing I was good at and honestly I'm still really hurt about it. But I can't ever have that convo with them because I can't ever point out ways they've hurt us kids without them IMMEDIATELY flipping the coin to the "Oh well now I feel like a shitty horrible human being so I guess I'll never speak again :(" side so at this point I've just given up. I'm never gonna do anything "good" enough for them and I'll just have to be OK with that :/
I haven't even started the video and Im already crying with the intro. I found your channel yesterday and I love your videos! Im on a binge 💕 Greetings from Las Vegas!
Welcome!! 😊
The ending of Encanto always tears me up not because of the story but how much I wish I had gotten that kind of acceptance and support when I was going through a bad time as a teen. Instead to this day my sisters still view me as "The Problem" and are always searching for a mistake or misspoken word to start in on me. I'm 62 btw...
I always considered that Mirabelle's power was Empathy; and it manifests in a way where she is able to get others to truly open up to her (usually in Musical numbers haha).
Ok, let me tell you: The moment that the abuela entered when Isabela and Mirabel were hanging out you can see in Isabela's face the panic. She looks at her dress, she disappears the flowers (kind of like quickly cleaning a mess that made someone angry), put her head down and try to distance herself from the situation by getting away from Mirabel and from abuela (without completely going away because you know that in those situations that is the worse you can do). She probably was thinking something a long the lines of "I'm a mess, I made a mess, abuela is going to be mad at me" and "Mirabel, stop talking you are making the situation worse. Just shut up". It probably seems like a coward's act to not step up for her little sis while she is practically been attacked but I've been there and fear takes a hold of you. After that you probably feel like a hipocrite and a coward, specially as an older sibling, for not defending your little sibling and instead allowing them to take all the blame, then you think "they should have shut up and obey" and then you feel worse for thinking something like that whle knowing its not their fault.
I hate-love that scene because I see in Isabela so much of me everytime I'm i a situation like that. Her posture and her facial expressions are just too real.
@NinjaGidget thank you. If I'm honest I'm wating on a miracle (pun somewhat intended) right now; I'm underage, in my country you can't work until you are 18 and if I stay here to study only God knows when I will be able to get some kind of space from my family, and I know I need that to heal (my aunt is a 30 year old respected lawyer, who still lives under my grandparents roof, my other aunt lives next to them with her son and husband, my family lives across their backyard; I wouldn't be surprise that if I'm unable to move for college I would be spendong the rest of my life just like I am right now and gosh I don't know how much time I can continue like this). I'm doing what I can to be able to get a scholarship and move for college, I just can pray that I'm able to. Still: it terrifies me. Things in home have gotten better in recent years but I don't want to leave my siblings in here and not be able to at least make them know they are not alone if things get bad again. Both of them are kind of reluctant to make friends so we truly only have each other when facing that stuff. They are strong but I don't want them to feel alone. I really don't know, I feel selfish because I know that if I have the opportunity to go I will take it, but it still hurts to know that it will mean leaving them. They are my best friends after all.
@theveryfirstlostgirl there's a difference between forgiveness and reconciliation, and you can do one without the other. Sometimes that's the healthiest thing to do.
@Black Cat first of all, I wish I could be there for you more than just through a chat thread. I've been where you are. I'm the oldest sibling, and I've been either/both Isabella and Luisa most of my life.
Secondly, let me assure you that finding wholeness for yourself is possible, but it will take more than just you. I know it seems impossible, but there are people out there who can accept and love the real you. Find them and hold on to the truths they give you.
Finally, regarding your family: your healing may "hurt" them, in that they may feel pain in connection with you changing. But I promise you, it will not *harm* them. It will present them with a choice: to move forward and seek wholeness themselves or to slink back into the old way of doing things.
And *you* are not responsible for the choice they make.
@Black Cat Honestly, the eldest are always the one most "fearful" breaking the rules than the younger ones because they do bear the direct for any rules broken so I do feel for Isabella in the regard
@Black Cat Narcissistic emotional manipulators always have to have the upper hand. Always. If they feel you are figuring them out and not being controlled by their tactics, they will change it up to throw you off.
When I first watched this movie I never saw abuela as a villain since it’s obvious how passionate she is about helping her community (although to a fault).
I loved this movie so much because I relate to Louisa’s struggles so much and it’s nice to feel validated in how I feel.
I interpreted it as Mirabel being abuelas successor. Abuela also doesn't have a gift, but she is the families matriarch. But her creating the valley was based on grief and fear, so when the mantle is slowly transferring to mirabel the foundation was badly shaken and in the end mitabel gave casita life just like abuela did once
Definitely sobbing now, but thank you for this. All of it. And I absolutely think Bruno is a representation of all of us “Black sheep”…those of us who were gifted, but not in ways our families wanted; those of us with mental illnesses that our families don’t understand, and even things like autism and being anything other than cis and hetero…he is a representation of how anyone who isn’t perfect and makes ppl a little uncomfortable are cast out. Mirabel is tolerated because despite not having a “Gift”, she still “fits in” with the villagers and is always willing to help others…it’s the other side of the same coin.
I genuinely love this channel. I just watched it for the first time and subscribed today. How the guy in the orange sweater can share his feelings and how you both can unpack things in the movie and relate makes this channel a breath of fresh air.
I honestly relate to this movie for such a diffrent reason, I'm an only child so I never had siblings to be compared to, it did happen with random kids however my mum passed away when I was 14 and my grandparents never were able to heal even a little from it. Because of that I'm being compared to my mother and being heald up to her standards and when I don't fit that ideal I'm like my drunkard deadbeat dad instead of being seen as my own person.
The only real “villain” or antagonist in this movie is trauma itself and our inability to address it and heal as best we can. Augustine sings about Mirabel taking after Julieta and that moment showed me how much she takes after both of them. Mirabel has always had her gift. She has acute insight and compassion into other peoples pain. She can see what people need to hear and she says it and as we see with her sisters it makes a world of difference. Augustine can see what hurts others emotionally and does his best to help even if he sometimes struggles to get through to others. Julieta struggles with Mirabel’s pain because her gift only heals physical hurt. She tries desperately to protect Mirabel from the pains she can’t heal but is unsure how to help the pain already there. Luisa and Isabella are also hurting but it’s not as easily identifiable as Abuela being hard on Mirabel and gets overlooked. Anyway I really love this movie and it makes me cry every time I watch it so I’m going to go now. 😭
Yes! Everyone needs to understand an antagonist can be an idea. Like it's usually the intent of media, in the end, to convey a conflict with a behavior or an idea over the personification themselves.
@DragonTamerRi your insites are indeed profound. I very much agree with you. I think the antagonist that is most apparent as you said holds no character it is how I see it fear. Fear of not being able to fix, fear of not being able to love, etc. This causes all of them discourse and as you said they are not against each other in opposition but seems so because of their reactions. These reactions again are caused by fear. Of not being able to achieve goals, of not being pretty enough, fear of not being strong enough, as well as fear of just not being good enough. This struggle is what is the antagonist. In the end when they all work together and it becomes glorious. The antagonist has been removed. Not quite sure if this makes sense to you but in my head this is how I see it. This is my granddaughter's favorite movie and she can sing every word she is now three... We watch it all week LOL. Each time she is a different character in the movie and we have quite a bit of fun with this movie✌️
I only just realized how many replies I received on this comment. Thanks so much! The horsemen who killed Abuelo Pedro felt more symbolic to me. I agree that they villains but they were literally faceless, nameless, and held no real humanity or character. They murdered an innocent man after destroying their home. However they could have been swapped out with any village wrecking disaster that Abuelo helped everyone else escape. The reason I don’t truly consider Abuela the antagonist is because her goals and Mirabels are the same but they have very different ideas about how to reach those goals. For Abuela to truly be an antagonist to Mirabel she would need to have a goal in direct opposition to her. She does display very antagonistic behavior but that is not the same as an antagonist.
Thanks to everyone engaging with my comment! You are all so awesome.
Technically, there are villains, the ones who killed the grandfather
0:51 seconds in the video, Alan is already crying and SO AM I, i swear, the softness in that man's heart is breathtaking. so much respect for that
I've had a whole "why me" mindset as a child and coming into my more teenage life. And it's not like "Why me" but it's more like "why is this all happening" "why do I feel like this? " "why am I like this?" And I've struggled with this for so long and I didn't realize that it came from my mom who has a "why me" mindset and I'm slowly having to brake tht down for myself