Sometimes, you end up respecting what a movie’s trying to discuss more than you enjoy the film itself. Case in point, Spellbound.

In the new animated feature, Princess Ellian (Rachel Zegler) is on the eve of her 15th birthday. Sadly, the celebration is a bit muted this time around. That’s because her parents, Queen Ellsmere (Nicole Kidman, eventually) and King Solon (Javier Bardem, after a fashion), aren’t quite themselves. A year earlier, they encountered a whirling black cyclone in the woods. It turned the couple from attractive royal types into big, brightly colored, childlike monsters. Ever since, Ellian has been struggling to find a solution to their conversion while hiding it from the kingdom of Lumbria. Growing desperate after a meeting with the Oracles of the Moon and Sun (Nathan Lane and Tituss Burgess, both as hammy as you please) goes poorly, the Princess decides to drag her parents back to the Dark Forest of Eternal Darkness, where the curse began.

As a plot goes, it’s fine. In practice, it often feels hobbled together from pieces of other films. There’s a bit of Brave here. A dash of How to Train Your Dragon there. If you squint, you can even spot some Frozen in its DNA. Fairy tales, by their nature, are remixed and rehashed from previous source material and other stories, so none of this is especially egregious. However, it isn’t what makes Spellbound interesting.

What does intrigue are the ways the filmmakers, headed by director Vicky Jenson (who also has a story by credit) and screenplay writers Lauren Hynek, Elizabeth Martin, and Julia Miranda, use the story to explore thorny issues. As Ellian and her monstrous parents travel through the forest towards their proverbial salvation, the film explores, via metaphor, the idea of taking care of parents with dementia and loved ones recovering from a sudden illness like a stroke. Then, the film ditches metaphor entirely to tangle with parental divorce. That’s a rarity in family films in general, never mind animated fairy tale family films.

Moreover, the messages offered on each topic are thoughtful and sensitive. They’re age-appropriate and easy to digest. Best of all, especially on the divorce count, there is no whiff of moralizing or stigma. It presents divorce as a sad thing but not a tragedy. Additionally, it places the cause firmly on the parents—neither portrayed as “bad”—and stresses that whatever the marriage’s problems, they are not because of the Princess in any way.

As thoughtful as Spellbound handles these topics, regrettably, that does not translate into a quality film. Zegler does well in the lead role, giving genuine feeling to a fairly thin part. She doesn’t read as “real teen,” but she does capture that sense of parentification a lot of kids in difficult situations without much adult support can exhibit. Almost everyone else in the cast gets very little nuance to play, though. That can be fun, in the case of Lane and Burgess’s paired roles, or can wear out its welcome as with royal advisor Bolinar (John Lithgow) who grows increasingly big (ironically in the context of the story) with less and less pay off as the movie progresses.

The music is similarly mostly underwhelming despite Zegler’s powerhouse voice and the songwriting talents of the legendary Alan Menken. The opening song has a bit of zip. Counting how many times Zegler says “monster” with the same slightly askew intonation is fun. The following hour or so, on the other hand, is an underwhelming catchy tune desert. To Spellbound’s credit, it does end strong, with three of its best tunes coming in the final quarter. However, one wants a musical with consistency and this film doesn’t deliver in that department.

The surest sign that the movie didn’t work is how often this critic returned to logistical questions. The royal family employs a massive staff of guards and attendants, all of whom see the monsterified King and Queen and have seen them for the better part of a year. Yet, somehow, the rest of the kingdom remains unaware? Not a single member of the castle staff went home and told their spouse, friend, sibling, or child, “Check out this weirdness I saw today!”? In a better film, one doesn’t spend a moment dwelling on such minutiae, but Spellbound leaves too much space for the mind to wander and pick at hanging logistical threads.

Ultimately, regardless of how much the film is willing to wrestle with topics other family features may dodge, it’s the entertainment that matters. By that rubric, Spellbound largely underwhelms. What it’s willing to consider may be magical, but the way it does is decidedly unenchanting.

Spellbound is currently attempting to cast a glimmer on Netflix.

Spellbound Trailer: