Walt Disney Animation Studios' 60th feature film, Encanto, is a magical adventure featuring original songs by Lin-Manuel Miranda that aims to be an absolute show-stopper. Premiering in theaters on November 24, right in the middle of Thanksgiving week in the U.S., Encanto seeks to dazzle and delight the entire family with a star-studded, heartfelt tale of – well – an entire family!
Set in Colombia, home to both magical realism and some of the greatest biodiversity on Earth, the film tells the tale of an extraordinary family, the Madrigals, who live hidden in the mountains, in a magical house, in a wondrous, charmed place called an Encanto. The magic of the Encanto has blessed every child in the family with a unique gift from super-strength to the power to heal — every child except one, Mirabel (Brooklyn Nine-Nine and In the Heights' Stephanie Beatriz). But when Mirabel discovers that the magic surrounding the Encanto is in danger, she decides that she, the only ordinary Madrigal, might be her family’s only hope.
Directed by Byron Howard (Zootopia, Tangled), Jared Bush (Moana, Zootopia), and Charise Castro Smith, Encanto takes the animated musical to another level, telling a story with a very large ensemble, each character with their own personality, dimensions, and unique qualities. Speaking to the press, Howard spoke about just how integral Lin-Manuel Miranda was to the entire project. "I directed Tangled. Jared wrote Moana. And we knew that if we wanted to take a fresh approach to musicals, we were going to need to work with the best. And luckily on Moana Jared worked with [Miranda]. So we looked at a large, extended family and how these complex dynamics really work. And it became an exciting challenge for us."
The Songs of Lin-Manuel Miranda
Speaking to IGN, co-director Charise Castro Smith mentioned how Miranda's songs helped them all see the characters in new ways they'd never considered. "There are eight original songs in this movie that Lin-Manuel Miranda wrote and they are each mind-boggling in their own right," she shared. "It was such a joy collaborating with him on this. Jared and I were crafting the script, just coming up with ideas and bouncing them off him and when we were coming up with the song moments in the story we would pass those off to him and he would write incredible songs that would then inform characters through the rest of the movie. It would help form the story. He was a huge partner for us from the beginning and a very close collaborator with us throughout the entire process."
Director Jared Bush further explained how the songs worked to deepen a character. Regarding a song called "Surface Pressure," sung by Mirabel's ultra-strong sister Luisa (Jessica Darrow), Howard told IGN that Miranda's lyrics gave Luisa more depth.
"I think early on we knew that we had this sister who is incredibly strong and had all of these responsibilities but what [Miranda] added to that song, that really informed her character and changed her, was this notion of that responsibility being so hard and how behind-the-scenes with her it was a struggle," said Bush. "And I think he looked to his own family for that, and to give voice to that. It's a responsibility that some people take on, happily, but it does take a toll. And then knowing that with that character actually really grounded her. She's a fun, comedic, and broad character but to have this grounded soul really changed the way we saw her as she moved through the script."
One of Encanto's Heads of Animation, Kira Lehtomaki, broke down some of the process for animating these very large and complex musical numbers.
"The songs by Lin were a complete joy," she explained to IGN, "but also they were some of the most challenging things for us to animate. Because not only is there the musicality, which means the characters have to be dancing and moving to the beat and rhythm — so there is a constraint there and a technicality there — but also with Lin's songs you have very quick lyrics, and getting that lip-synced and the breathing correct was tricky."
"We wanted to make sure we got all of that right so we had a lot of people helping us," she continued. "We had professional singers who would talk about how they perform on stage. We had choreographers come in. The directors even wrote monologues for what each of the characters were thinking and feeling during the songs, and they would give them to Lin to help inspire him when he was writing the lyrics to the songs. Then once we got Lin's demos, we were able to engage our choreographer, Jamal Sims, and then our dance consultant, Kai Martinez, almost immediately."
Mirabel, the Relatable and Imperfect Heroine
Encanto features the voice (and singing) talents of Diane Guerrero, Wilmer Valderrama, John Leguizamo, Angie Cepeda, Rhenzy Feliz, and more, but it's Beatriz's Mirabel who the directors think audiences will most fall in love with.
"The movies that we worked on right before this — Zootopia and Moana — both had female characters at the center of them," Bush told IGN, "but to me it's actually really exciting to be at the center of this revolution where Mirabel is unlike any character we've ever put on screen before."
"She's unbelievably human," Bush added. "She's super flawed and she's imperfect and weird and she gets it wrong, and she keeps trying in ways that are not always the best. Which I really really love about her. What Stephanie [Beatriz] was able to do with Mirabel was absolutely bonkers. She ad-libbed a lot of what you hear on screen. She has to sing a lot in this movie, both on her own and with other characters, but for me I think that her unique personality is going to be something that a lot of people can relate to."
Relatability was the name of the game here, with the creation of Mirabel. "When I was first getting into animation I was in college," Howard explained, "and I saw The Little Mermaid for the first time and for me Ariel kind of brought a new life to Disney heroines. "She felt like she was a great step up in storytelling because she felt like people I knew. Whereas before, with the characters in the movies, I would say 'I like them,' but this new kind of relatability was huge with Ariel. And I think with Mirabel, she is, from the get-go, someone in your family who's very relatable. She's an underdog who feels like they're not worthy. I think all of us feel that way and for me that was key."
Disney's Encanto, along with the new Disney short Far From the Tree, will premiere theatrically in the U.S, on on November 24, 2021. Brush up on all the big movies debuting over the next few months by checking out IGN's Fall 2021 Movie Guide.