Upside-Down Magic

Fun. I liked the hippie teacher, reminds me of some of my favorite teachers I've had. The backstory is unexpectedly tragic for an otherwise light movie.

Terrible Hogwarts knockoff with even worse morals. All the adults were cartoonishly bad. I was rooting for the so-so villain. Main character was unlikeable and just wouldn't stop talking. There was so much filler, such as when they did the tryouts scenes 4 times. I hope they didn't make a sequel. Fav scene: waiting at the bus stop and then heading to school filled me with a curiosity for adventure, but then it immediately died when the kids were shown to be whiny.

Upside-Down Magic is cute enough. It is definitely riding on the coat-tails of Harry Potter but it does a lot of things that Harry Potter doesn't do so I'll give it some slack. This story is skewed more towards a younger audience so it tends to be a bit hokey compared with HP. That doesn't take away from the fun story it tells. I'd say that if you have a kid that is too young for the more mature themes in HP then show them this. I enjoyed it enough that I looked for the sequel.

Predictable and trite, although the child actors are enthusiastic enough.

More magic from Disney. Saw Magic Camp (2020) with my bonus daughter yesterday, which was "fake" magic. Here they do closely the same theme, except with "real" magic. Real creative Disney!