Susan Sarandon has been called many things. But this may be the first time anyone says she's an old witch.

That, at least, is one of the personae her wicked Queen Narissa takes in "Enchanted," Disney's latest princess product - with a twist. The idea here is that Narissa rules an animated world in which she hates the lovely and innocent Princess Giselle.

Sarandon tries to explain the metaphysics of the calculated commercial venture.

"In `Enchanted,' you see us as cartoons," the veteran actress says.

"Then, once I transform into the wicked whomever, the hag, I push Giselle down a vortex of some kind, and Amy Adams pops up in Times Square. From that point on, everybody who pops up in New York turns from a cartoon figure to flesh. That's a different style of acting."

Beside "Junebug" actress Adams, "Enchanted's" cast includes Patrick Dempsey from "Grey's Anatomy" as a puzzled human who falls for the lost princess and James Marsden ("Hairspray," "X-Men") as the even more befuddled prince who pursues his love into the real world.

As for her own nonanimated look, Sarandon says wryly, but with some relief, "I look a little like a drag queen, actually."

Not much to take issue with there. Especially compared with "Mr. Woodcock" and "In the Valley of Elah," the busy actress's two movies that opened this weekend. In the former comedy, Sarandon does a very vocal lovemaking scene with Billy Bob Thornton. And in the latter drama, the outspoken peace activist plays the devastated mother of a missing Iraq war soldier.

"It's not about if the war was right or wrong, it's about who's left afterward," says Sarandon, who's often been criticized by right-wingers. "It's about what fighting a war does to somebody. I would hope that would skew to everybody."