Barbie as the Princess and the Pauper (2004) (V)

User Rating:

5.9/10   

Director:

William Lau

Writers:

Cliff Ruby (written by) &
Elana Lesser (written by)

Release Date:

28 September 2004 (USA)

Genre:

Animation | Comedy | Family | Musical

Tagline:

Singing in her first movie musical

Plot:

In her first animated musical featuring seven original songs, Barbie comes to life in this modern re-telling...

Plot Keywords:

Princess | Barbie | Mistaken Identity | Prisoner | Talking Animal

Awards:

1 nomination

Cast

Kelly Sheridan	...	Anneliese, Erika (speaking)
Melissa Lyons	...	Singing Princess Anneliese
Julie Stevens	...	Singing Erika (voice)
Mark Hildreth	...	Dominic
Mark Luna	...	Singing Dominic
Alessandro Juliani	...	Julian
Martin Short	...	Preminger
Kathleen Barr	...	Serafina / Bertie
Ian James Corlett	...	Wolfie / Guard #3
Ellen Kennedy	...	Queen Genevieve
Pam Hyatt	...	Madam Carp
Brian Drummond	...	Nick / Guard #1
Jan Rabson	...	Midas / Nack
Colin Murdock	...	Royal Scheduler
Janyse Jaud	...	Palace Maid

Runtime:

New Zealand:85 min | USA:85 min | Argentina:85 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Color

Certification:

Argentina:Atp | Finland:K-3 | Australia:G | Netherlands:AL | New Zealand:G | USA:Not Rated

Company:

Mainframe Entertainment

Trivia:

This is the first in a series of Barbie movies that is an original musical.

Goofs:

Continuity: During the song "Free" Anneliese walks along her very long balcony whilst singing. A wide shot shows that she is halfway along the balcony, but then a shot after shows that she is only a few steps away from the edge, yet there has been no signs of her running or taking deliberately large steps.

Quotes:

Preminger: [Looking at himself in a mirror] Is that really me, in there? Looking at me, out here? Lucky me!

Movie Connections:

Featured in "Troldspejlet: (#32.11)" (2004)

Soundtrack:

Written in Your Heart

40-year-old heterosexual male finds surprisingly good music.

How's this for a commentary on the music in this movie: I sometimes specifically ask my wife if she has it in the car to listen to, pushing out Duran Duran or other music from the golden age of the early 80's. I am skeptical of musicals by nature, so when I heard that the Barbie people had produced a musical, I could only imagine how shallow the music was going to be, seeing that it would be directed towards our 7-year-old daughter's age group. I of course had no choice but to hear it several times after we bought the movie and our daughter and 3-year-old son wanted to listen to the CD in the car. I was surprised beyond anything I could imagine to find that there is some serious quality among the songs that are done here. As for the movie's animation, it may be my imagination that the production skimped a bit in that area to pay for the songwriting. And of course the Barbie series' animation was already nothing to get excited about in this day of Pixar, Dreamworks, and Blue Sky producing top-notch computer-generated material. But the music itself is really a find, and I would recommend it to anyone.