Snow
White and the Huntsman: ***/*****, or 6/10
Re-imagining
fairy tales feminist style seems to be getting all the rage lately.
After having young Alice don armour to fight the evil queen in Tim
Burton's recent Alice in Wonderland, Snow White now gets to do
the exact same thing (courtesy of the same producer, Joe Roth, no
doubt). Considering her previous failure as a comedian in Tarsem
Singh's Mirror, Mirror only two months ago, applying a more
action oriented approach might not have been a bad idea. It obviously
sets this Snow White apart from that disappointment. Unfortunately,
the resulting Snow White and the Huntsmen still leaves a lot
to be desired, and makes it frustratingly clear just how damn
subjective the term 'fair' actually is.
Snow
White and the Huntsmen does away with the overly feel-good style
of both its comedic predecessor and the classic Disney version,
instead traveling a grittier, bleaker and definitely gorier road,
making it feel more like a Tim Burton or Peter Jackson flick at
times. At least first time director Rupert Sanders took hints from
his accomplished peers instead of slavishly rehashing the many
versions of the Snow White tale that came before. His best
card comes in the shape of casting Charlize Theron as the evil queen,
in this version named Ravenna instead of just dubbed 'evil queen' as
happens more frequently. On the opposite side of the spectrum,
Sanders' biggest problem turns out to be Kristen Stewart's
performance as Snow White herself, a rather soulless and bland piece
of casting that fails to convince the audience to root for her as a
brave and inspiring leader of men in their desperate struggle against
tyranny. For this is basically what the tale of Snow White has
been turned into in this film, a typical fight between good and evil
that never leaves the viewer pondering whose side the characters are
on since both terms are clearly delineated and leave no room for
compromise.
The
movie opens with a lengthy but intriguing flashback revealing the
series of events that lead to the status quo as it is when the story
truly kicks off. For unclear reasons this prologue is narrated by the
Huntsman (Chris Hemsworth largely reprising his role as Thor,
playing an impulsive and stubborn though often foolish but ultimately
likeable strongman, but with a Scottish accent this time), who takes
no part in this background history himself, probably to give
Hemsworth something to do before entering the movie after it has been
running for 40 minutes already. The backstory tells of the birth of
Snow White in a beautiful kingdom under the happy reign of her wise
and beloved mother and father, before it falls into ruin and despair
when the queen dies and her husband is tricked into marrying the
beautiful Ravenna, only to be murdered by the treacherous wench on
his wedding night. When this pretender usurps the throne, young Snow
White is swiftly locked away and all those who oppose the new queen's
reign are ruthlessly disposed of. The movie does not hesitate at all
to portray Ravenna as a vile witch with no sense of good in her at
all, while Snow White simply can do no wrong and is eventually
heralded a female Messiah for the otherwise nameless fantasy realm
the movie takes place in. It's this overly simplistic way of
depicting both sides of the coin without any possibility for overlap
to the other side from either character that makes Snow White and
the Huntsmen loose touch with the older demographics the movie
aims for- the film is rated PG-13 in the USA, while it's '12' in the
Netherlands – since few people in the audience would ever swallow
good and evil are so easily and strictly defined.
At least
Charlize Theron got it easy, since her Ravenna is not just a
wholesomely despicable person, but also dabbles in the dark arts,
thus allowing the accomplished actress (who can currently be seen
delivering another stellar performance in Ridley Scott's Prometheus)
to have a ball playing this wicked witch, wearing impressive gowns,
surrounded by beautiful eerie castle sets and pointy props, going
around viciously intimidating and torturing people and poking into
bird guts in her spare time. She has good cause for engaging in such
naughty behavior, having been used and abused by men since childhood,
turning to black magic to ensure her ongoing beauty so she would
never be powerless against men again and instead could use them for
her own purposes. Thus, the movie gives the queen some much needed
character background most other versions of the fairy tale have
lacked, making Ravenna initially sympathetic until she does to Snow
White what has been done to her. Theron makes no secret she's
enjoying the role immensely, and delivers the movie's standout
performance, ranging from subtle manipulation of ill-fated prisoners
to boldly going over the top when throwing temper-tantrums at her
incompetent inferiors who keep messing up her plans for total
domination.
Perhaps
it's due to the excessive amount of screen time the poor Snow White
spends huddled in dark dungeons, wading through sewers or crawling in
mud that Kristen Stewart's portrayal pales so much in comparison. Stewart,
of Twilight fame, spends most of the movie running for her
life from the forces of the queen, ending up in the so-called Dark
Forest, a generally unpleasant place filled with creepy crawlies,
damp fog and the like, a place from which only one man has ever
returned. And so Ravenna tasks this man, the nameless Huntsman of the
title, to track the renegade royalty, since it conveniently occurred
she happened to escape on the very day the queen found out she had to
consume the girl's heart to gain eternal beauty and immortality,
after having locked her away for ten years without ever taking the
time to decide what to actually do with her. The Huntsman reluctantly
agrees to pursue the runaway in the exchange for the resurrection of
his dead wife by the queen, something both parties fully realize
isn't gonna happen at all.
Warning!
Here be spoilers! When the Huntsman locates Snow White after
about a five minute search, Stewart finally gets someone to play off
against, but again fails to prove her worth as an actress, instead
delivering a fairly uncompelling performance against Hemsworth's more
agreeable portrayal of a man who lived a shallow life due to lack of
faith in himself, found happiness in life with his wife and lost
everything again when she was taken from him, being reduced to a much
maligned drunkard. Apparently even a drunkard can find his way
through the Dark Forest, so after predictably having switched
allegiance, him and Snow White set out in search of the rebel
fortress ruled over by an old friend of Snow White's father, whose
son, Prince William (Sam Claflin as the less robust looking hunk of
the film, for those girls in the audience who like their men less
hairy and muddy) once fell in love with the princess but, along with
the rest of the outside world has considered her to be dead since
Ravenna took control. Apparently, where ever Kristen Stewart goes,
love triangles follow, as she has romantic interludes with both the
Huntsman and William the moment the latter joins up with her again.
Anyone who wants her to hook up with either guy gets cheated in the
end as the plot doesn't resolve the issue of which man will be hers,
but leaves it open for the sequel. (A sequel already has been
announced, despite the fact this movie has an otherwise closed ending
that covers most of the original fairy tale. As was the case with
Clash of the Titans, when the promise of money is involved,
Hollywood will itself decide when a story is done, going so far as to make
more of it up if needs be.)
On the
way to the rebel stronghold the movie trades in a dark Gothic horror
atmosphere for a more typical fantasy feel as Snow White and her
friends encounter ever more diverse creatures of various shapes and
sizes, including a giant troll, fairies and a forest god, indicating
Snow White's power to inspire life and natural growth, as opposed to
Ravenna who only deals in death and decay. The generally overtly
digital characters only make Stewart's performance more inadequate,
but fortunately eight (!) new characters soon enter the story to add
some much need acting talent (mostly British) and some humour (since
the film has so far taken itself overly serious), and few things in
life are a funny as dwarves. These are not your average little people
though: in fact, they're not little people at all, but normal sized
actors having undergone digital alterations to make them appear
smaller. Already an uproar has been created within the little people community over the absence of actual
dwarves in favour of talented British actors of normal stature. It's
an understandable reaction considering the already limited number of
possible movie roles for little people, but the fact remains these
eight dwarves add some much needed levity and heart to the film,
mostly because of the talent assembled here, which includes Ian
McShane, Ray Winstone, Bob Hoskins and Nick Frost. Lamenting the
decline of the Dwarves (as a fantasy race, not as a medical
condition) since Ravenna seized power, they willingly pledge their
lives to Snow White's cause, but don't fret, they also sing and
dance.
After
having arrived at her allies' base and rallying the noble men to her
cause by use of a rather uninspiring and unconvincing battle speech,
the company of heroes set out to vanquish Ravenna in her dark tower,
which leads to an not all that epic battle, and the pay-off between
the two women, one pure, one evil, the movie has spent the last two
hours to set up. Snow White dukes it out with Ravenna and her
insidious sorcery over the dominion of the realm and the right to be
called 'the fairest of them all'. Of course, the movie takes the
meaning of the word 'fair' to include mental and spiritual beauty
instead of solely referring to physical attractiveness, which is what
Ravenna is all about. Though few men (and/or women) would seriously
pick Stewart over Theron when it comes to physical looks (or acting
skills), Theron's Ravenna obviously is a mean bitch and you wouldn't
want her “ruling your country”. However, the movie defeminizes
Snow White in the climax, having her confront Ravenna fully battle
clad in shining armour and equipped with a particularly sticky sword,
and as such completely masculine instead of fighting the queen on
feminine terms, thus making her cheat. Even though Ravenna uses men
to fight for her while Snow White gets men to love her (mostly in a platonic
sense), in the end she feels more like a brother-in-arms to the
Huntsman, the Prince and the Dwarves, a feeling which is reinforced
at the end of the movie when Snow White refuses to pick one potential
love interest over another, having reconquered her throne on their
terms by vicious bloodshed in battle. The alternative of course would
have been to let either the Huntsman or the Prince save the day and
fighting her battle for her, as was the case in the classic Disney
movie. But such stereotypical male gallantry is not desired in this
day and age, especially when the movie needs to appeal to the modern
teenage girls for who Stewart undoubtedly is the main draw of the
piece. As for keeping it open who she ends up with, it took her four
Twilight films to decide to finally have sex with that
vampire instead of the werewolf, so she's just catering to her
fanbase's expectations.
So the
final score is:
-acting:
Theron 1, Stewart 0
-physical
appearance: Theron 1, Stewart 0 (too much mud)
-playing
a nice girl: Theron 0, Stewart 1
Theron
is fairest! Besides, many guys generally prefer bad girls anyway.
Overall,
Snow White proves to her own weakest link in Snow White and the
Huntsman, as she is outperformed by the evil queen, outcharmed by
the Dwarves, outmuddied by the Huntsman and outed as a tomboy by
wearing battle armour to kill the witch. In short, Stewart's Snow White has no heart,
which makes it hard to compellingly win those of her fellow freedom
fighters, and impossible for the queen to rip out of her chest,
forcing the latter to steal the audience's hearts instead by doing a
better acting job by far. The movie at least delivers great visuals
and decent action scenes, plus the most fun Dwarves and grimiest
Huntsman so far. A good look, excellent cast of supporting
characters, cool evil queen and teen heroine in shining armour:
basically the producer of Alice in Wonderland gives us more of
the same with Snow White and the Huntsman. There's many other
fairy tales left to apply the same tactics too, so maybe we'll see
the Little Mermaid or Sleeping Beauty in a similar fashion too in the
not too distant future.
And
watch the trailer here:
