So 2012, what will you remember? The Olympics? The Queen’s Jubilee or which Snow White based film you saw and preferred? To be fair, unless you’re suffering the early onset of Alzheimer’s, you’ll probably remember all that and more.
OK, so let’s talk fairytales! Earlier in the year, Julia Roberts et al brought us ‘Mirror, Mirror’, a decidedly fluffy, family orientated affair which I thought was best avoided. I’m not the fluffy sort. However, an altogether more interesting take on the subject began to trail at around the time of it’s release. ‘Snow White and the Huntsman’. This was definitely not one for the family and featured one of my favourite actresses, Charlize Theron as the apple brandishing Queen. As well as Theron, it features Twilight’s Kristen Stewart as the titular Snow White and Thor’s Chris Hemsworth as the Huntsman.
We all know the plot of Snow White, don’t we? Unfortunately for the viewer, the writers decided that because we know it, we shouldn’t be told again. Surely, if you’re going to tell a story, you should actually tell it, regardless of how many times it has been told before?! That’s the main problem with this film, it lacks story. Elements such as where the queen got her power from and how she maintains it are rather glossed over. The dwarves are criminally underused, despite being brilliantly played a gaggle of Brit actors including, Nick Frost, Ray Winstone and Bob Hoskins.
Instead, this film chooses to concentrate on visuals and thrills, which is fine but a more accomplished director would have been able to have done both. The effects are superb, from the milk baths to the oil slicks right through to the dark forest and the mirror on the wall, the film looks fabulous! The thrills are plentiful with convincing battles and there is also an all too brief scene of what the world would be like in a world ruled by Snow White.
Charlize Theron delivers, somewhat predictably, the best of all the performances with Stewart seemingly unable to play anything other than a petulant boyish teen. It’s also disconcerting that we are meant to believe that Stewart is more attractive than Theron. Please! Hemsworth basically plays Thor with a rather inexplicable Scottish accent.
First time director Rupert Sanders makes a decent stab of his first feature film but his admiration for the work of directors’ Peter Jackson and Guillermo Del Toro’s is far too evident and almost borders on pilfering! It also screams ‘sequel’ at you with the subtlety of Jordan giving an interview to a lads’ mag.
I’d like to end by saying that despite its’ flaws, I found this film immensely enjoyable and I’d definitely see it again.
See this on my blog http://thescottkingshow.blog.com/
