Review: 'Snow White And The Huntsman'

Film: Snow White and The Huntsman
Cast: Charlize Theron,  Kristen Stewart, Chris Hemsworth,  
Director: Rupert Sanders
Rating: **1/2

 

Fairy tales are told simply for the benefit of children but are hardly ever so. In this Universal production, Snow White has stepped out of Disneyland and into a creepy little world where creatures crawl and hiss and her prince… well he isn’t a prince at all.

 

The basic outline remains the same. Snow White, tormented by the death of her parents, is locked away in a tower by her evil witch of a step mother who wants her dead eventually so that she alone can be the fairest of all. Snow White runs into the seven dwarfs who protect her from the witch’s repeated attempts to kill her.

 

Universal keeps this structure and turns everything else upside down.  The step mother is no ordinary witch. Her powers are unmatched and a bit dementor-like, just instead of feeding on happiness she feeds on the beauty of young women (as in literally opens her mouth and sucks the beauty out of them) leaving them old and shriveled.

 

Snow White (Kristen Stewart) is good and pure-hearted but she doesn’t wear a pretty gown and sing to birds or cook and clean for a bunch of dwarfs. Director Rupert Sanders’ Snow White wears leather pants and boots, does kickass skids and can hold her own in a combat. Neat.

 

The whole angle with the prince/knight in shining armour is not so straight forward either. Snow White has a choice here, between the huntsman (Chris Hemsworth) and the prince (Sam Claflin).

The dwarfs aren’t happy, sleepy, dopey, grumpy or cute anything. They are dirty and there is nothing fairytale about them.

 

Sanders has tried, in his depiction of the classic tale, to create a dark atmosphere and in doing so has created a film that seems to be an amalgamation of Lord Of The Rings, Harry Potter, Narnia and Shrek. The witch’s kingdom is a cross betweenLOTR’ Mordor and the White Witch’s Narnia where hope and happiness go to die. The forest is not a place where birds chirp, rivers flow and flowers bloom. It is full of trolls, snakes, swamps and reminiscent of the dark forest from Harry Potter; and the fact that the man sent out to capture the princess turns potential suitor is straight out of Shrek.

 

Despite everything Snow White and the Huntsman could have worked if it wasn’t for Kristen Stewart’s bland depiction of Snow White. Stewart seems to be in love with just one expression and refuses to give any other a try. She is a princess not worth saving. Her performance can only be described as flat and her facial nerves as dead. There is absolutely no chemistry between her and either Hemsworth or Claflin. Why everyone is randomly falling in love with her is beyond me. She makes you want to click your tongue impatiently and ask “what is that expression? Sad? Happy? Angry? Stupid?”

 

Hemsworth does very well as the rogue handsome charmer but is wasted and has hardly been given enough of a role. Claflin is a bit of a nobody, but that’s his character and not his fault. It is Theron who really makes the film worth watching. She outshines everybody as the evil witch with a tormented past, and there are scenes where she can send a chill down your spine with just a plain old dangerous smile. If you plan to watch Snow White And The Huntsman, it should be for her.

 

What Sanders tries to do with the children’s classic can be appreciated, the end result however, not so much.