Friday, March 26, 2021

Secret Magic Control Agency - Light, Fun and Enjoyable Movie with Refreshing Take on a Classic Tale


As I just finished watching another series the other night and wanted to have something light before starting different series, I went through Netflix list of movies and stumbled across this one that happened to be newly released. It's a 3D animated movie with interesting premise and should be just perfect for what I was searching for. So let's move on with the movie.

Brief Story Line

Gretel (Sylvana Joyce) was an agent working for Secret Magic Control Agency (SMCA) which was responsible for ensuring magic was controlled and not being abused in the kingdom. When the King (Marc Thompson) was kidnapped, Gretel was assigned by SMCA leader Agent Stepmother (Georgette Reilly) to find out the truth.

Gretel was asked to partner with her estranged brother Hansel (Nicholas Corda) who was an illusionist and considered a charlatan. Despite their reluctance, they still investigate the case together which would bring them towards various experience and adventures that involved magic.

So how would the story conclude? Find them all in this enjoyable fun animated movie.

End of Brief Story Line

When I started to watch this movie and noticed that it was classified for 7+, I immediately concluded this would be for children. From the moment we were shown the wonderful colorful animation of the kingdom and introduced with the characters who were all very charming & interesting, I was already hooked by them. There were quite frequent funny moments that would make me laugh out loud. To me despite the classification was for children, as an adult I could still find joy watching this film.

I personally believed the writers and creators of this movie were very creative and smart. They managed to bring the classic Hansel and Gretel tale seamlessly into a quite modern story. It did not bring out too much horror that would make children afraid but still managed to be loyal to the original tale. However, there were few parts of the movie which I felt quite familiar as they have been used in other films (Shrek movies were the first came to mind). Nevertheless, they did not really bother me.

Aside from the funny scenes and the part where they were still a bit faithful to the original tale, I also found the animation were greatly done. They might not be as beautiful as animation from other production house, but Wizart Animation Studio did their job amazingly to my opinion. Oh btw, I noticed there were many Russian names credited during the closing credit scenes and after finding out more about this movie on the internet, apparently the studio was indeed a Russian company. It made me wonder whether the English dialogues were actually dubbed or it's originally made using English language. 

Btw, one thing that I also like about this movie was the creators were not tempted to make it into a musical animation. This is pure entertaining film with fast pace, good story telling, some hilarious moments and many adventures that would make young audience happy. The duration was not too long with around 104 minutes which was OK for me. I believe most of you who are familiar with the Hansel and Gretel story would know that this tale was compiled by Brothers Grimms from Germany and this different take of the tale was certainly refreshing.

So if you are looking for something light, fun, entertaining and fresh adaptation of the classic tale of Hansel & Gretel, this would be a really interesting choice. The quality of the animation were very good with voice acting done nicely by the voice actors and actresses. The story was very easy to understand with even a bit of moral message but very limited emotional moment. However, if you are looking for the Hansel & Gretel that did not deviate too much with the original tale, then this would not be to your liking. I myself like this movie quite a lot and would recommend it to be watched with family.

Mike's movie moments rating: 4 out of 5 stars

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