'Snow White and the Huntsman' is a 2012 British/American action, fantasy film based on the fairy tale 'Snow White' by the Brothers Grimm. The film is directed by British director Rupert Sanders and written by Evan Daugherty. The films stars Kristen Stewart, Charlize Theron, Chris Hemsworth and Sam Chaflin. This is another one of those film that I was really excited for when I saw the trailer, the idea of a live-action Snow White movie had so much potential! It's a shame they didn't make it everything it could be. It's still really good though. Warning, this review contains mild spoilers. This film is a prime example of why you should bring kids younger than 12 to a 12A, all they do is ask questions and complain about being scared. It was really annoying.
I'll start off with the positives. The world that they've created for this film has a very 'Alice in Wonderland' feel about it (which is good), and everything looks great, the CGI is spotless. One thing I really liked as well is how everyone in the film (except from the Queen) is grubby, the whole film is dark and filthy, so it works well when we don't see all the characters walking around like they've just had a bath like in most movies. The action is also really really good, it's like a cross between 'Lord of the Rings' and 'The Chronicles of Narnia', in fact there's one seen, where Snow White, the Huntsman, the Prince and the Dwarves are travelling over a mountain and it literally looks like they've taken a scene from the trailer for 'The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey'. With it being a 12A, obviously there isn't a lot of blood, and no gore, but the action is still fast paced and there's lots of swords being swung and arrows being shot, so you can't complain.
Another thing that is good (for the most part) is the casting and acting, I'm not a fan of Kristen Stewart, but she's quite good in this, she portrays the character well (there are some parts when you just think 'meh'). Chaplin is also really good as the Prince, although he doesn't get as much screen time as he should have. Hemsworth is as brilliant as he always, he manages to pull off a very good Irish accent, and we see him as an action hero without superpowers for once. He successfully pulls off the complicated character. The Dwarves are a collection of great actors like Ian McShane, Brian Gleeson, Ray Winstone and Nick Frost, who all pull off their characters well. A smart movie by the writers was not to use the Dwarves original names (Sleepy, Grumpy, ect) and are given names like Duir, Coll and Gus, makes it a much more mature movie. I think the only poor casting choice was Charlize Theron as the Queen, she's a good actress, but she just doesn't pull off the character for me, many will probably disagree with me but that's just my opinion.
Moving onto the parts of this film that aren't so good, like I mention before, the casting of the Queen, the other parts that in my opinion, aren't very good, are very petty things. Like how at the beginning there is a massive gap of about ten years or so (give or take about two years either side) where nothing seems to happen, when the story continues after the prologue there's loads of talk about resistance to the Queens rule, but they haven't done anything for years, and the Queen hasn't attempted to crush them, she conquered a Kingdom in a day but wasted years not foiling a rebellion? Seem stupid to me. Also I know it's based on a fairy tale, but some of the actually fairy tale related scenes, are a bit silly, and boring (the scenes with the fairies and all that sort of stuff). I know it was necessary, but I didn't like it. One last minor complaint, and that's that the war for the entire Kingdom is settled in one battled, and the Queen doesn't put up much of a fight, it seems lazy.
I've complained a bit about this film, but overall it is really good, the action keeps the audience entertained. Hemsworth and Stewart are great on screen together, the effects are great, the music is amazing in parts, no matter how much I've complained about it, I still enjoyed it, and I think they did a really good job turning a fairy tale into an action film. It makes me more excited for 'Jack The Giant Killer', I think we'll be seeing more serious adaptations of fairy tales int he future. There's already talks about a sequel, revolving more around the Huntsman character, which I like because he is such an interesting character.
I'm going to give 'Snow White and the Huntsman' a 7.5/10.
No comments:
Post a Comment