Snow White and the Huntsman (2012)

Snow White and the Huntsman is a retelling of the traditional fairy tale Snow White. After the death of her father, the King, at the hands of the evil witch Ravenna, Snow White is imprisoned. Upon becoming an adult, Snow White escapes imprisonment and Ravenna sends Eric the Huntsman after her. However, in a bizarre twist of fate, the Huntsman becomes Snow White’s protector and together they undertake a quest to vanquish the evil Queen and retake the kingdom.

Overall Review Score

2 out of 10

Review

Snow White and the Huntsman is a 2012, 122-minute, dark fantasy action adventure loosely based on the fairytale Snow White (Schneewittchen) by the Brothers Grimm. While the film features an all-star cast, including Kristen Stewart, Chris Hemsworth, and Charlize Theron, and an ambitious script that could have offered a unique and refreshing retelling of a beloved fairytale, it stumbles and falls before really getting started. Its noticeable departure from the source material coupled with a confusing script that attempts to combine multiple elements together in a rush, haphazard and unintelligible manner causes the film to lose momentum around the twenty-minute mark. While it could have recovered, poor acting from the main cast and a severe lack of emotion, depth, or even intelligence from the supporting cast results in the film becoming more bizarre and equally more ridiculous as it progresses. To the point, that if the evil witch Ravenna (Charlize Theron) asked: “mirror, mirror on the wall – do you find this film entertaining at all?” it would respond with: “No, not at all.” Overall, Snow White and the Huntsman is a film that is nearly as frightening and gloomy as the original Brothers Grimm story...but for all for the wrong reasons. It is an overtly long film that features poor acting from start to finish and suffers from multiple inexcusable issues. While parts of Snow White, mainly in the CGI department, will offer a rest bite from the films many issues they are not spectacular enough to rescue this film and make it the fairest in the land.

Reviewer 1's score & comments:

Score: 1 out of 10

Comments:

Where to start? Snow White and the Huntsman tries to cater to so many audiences with its dark fantasy, action, adventure orientated drama that is based very very loosely around the popular fairy tale of Snow White. This lack of clear direction comes across rather blatantly in the films persona and results in the film becoming a perverted mix of the fantasy displayed in the Chronicles of Narnia, the female leadership of Joan of Arc and the story of Pan’s Labyrinth. Further to this, the bland acting displayed by the main cast, Kristen Stewart and Chris Hemsworth, will ensure that the audience never really connects with the film on any level.

Reviewer 2's score & comments:

Score: 3 out of 10

Comments:

Snow White and the Huntsman is a film with some fundamental problems. Apart from the cast delivering their lines in a very deadpan and emotionless manner, it does not have enough momentum to entertain the audience for its 122-minute run time and quickly alienates the audience with its uninteresting, unenjoyable and equally unjustifiable retelling of Snow White. It is a film that goes from dark fantasy to airy-fairy, brightly coloured, cartoonish cinematics back to dark fantasy so often and so fast the audience risks having ‘whiplash’ if they try to keep up. Overall, while Snow White does have some good CGI shots and occasional, inadvertent, one liners it is a film that falls flat on its face (nearly as spectacularly as Snow White’s magical horse in the dark forest). As the film renamed all the seven dwarves, I would like to outline to the director, Rupert Sanders, my version of the seven dwarves that I believe sums up this film: sleepy, sleazy, queasy, cheesy, wheezy, hazy and unjustly ghastly.

#action #adventure #drama #chrishemsworth #kristenstewart