Review - Snow White and the Huntsman

Grade: B-

Comic book fans of a certain age--as if there are that many fans that aren’t of a certain age--will remember the late 80s to early 00s as era where “grim and gritty” trappings became de rigueur for comics. It was a time when Superman died, Batman was paralyzed, and big guns replaced big hearts. Comic scholars claim this “dark age” was as much a response to the cheerful superheroics that marked the 60s and 70s as it was an attempt to grab a more “adult” audience. 

Like the comics industry, this year’s two Snow White movies have faced a similar identity crisis in trying to escape the fairy tales kid-friendly image and reach the 18-35 demo. Back in March, Tarsem Singh delivered a whimsical, snarky re-imagining of Grimm’s classic tale; now, Rupert Sanders offers a grimmer, grittier Snow White with style points lifted wholesale from Lord of the Rings and Game of Thrones. How timely.

Sanders’ Snow White and the Huntsman (SWATH) focuses mostly on the evil queen, Ravenna, played with ridiculous over-the-top aplomb by Charlize “I like getting ugly and naked on camera because it shows I’m serious” Theron. Ravenna is a post-feminist evil queen who believes she is striking back at men for discarding women once they pass an “expiration date”. Ravenna comes across one such man, a king no less, who has just lost his wife and remains the sole comfort for his daughter, who will grow into the informed beauty Snow White, played with the drowsy red-eyed awkwardness that is to be expected of Kristen Stewart. Ravenna proceeds to kill the king and take the kingdom while the sheer toxicity of her reign brings only decay. During such time, Ravenna, who has a taste for milk bathes and draining the youth from nubile peasant girls, wisely locks Snow White away, on the word of the liquid metal Mirror-Mirror-2000, for fear of the cursed/blessed by birth Snow’s ability to destroy her.

When Snow escapes, thanks to the horniness of Ravenna’s creepy wannabe pedophile brother with a dopey squire cut (Sam Spruell), Ravenna dispatches a drunken Asgardian...er...Huntsman, Chris Hemsworth playing up the Han Solo angle, to retrieve Snow from the mystical, hypnotic Black Forest. Meanwhile, the remnants of the old kingdom--including seven grumbly, battle hardened dwarves (played by such genre vets Ian McShane, Bob Hoskins, Toby Jones, and Nick Frost) and  Snow’s childhood friend and second coming of Will Turner/Legolas, charming “Prince” William (Sam Claflin)--are mobilizing against Ravenna. As Snow journeys to side with the resistance and witnesses the damage of Ravenna’s grip, she must embrace her destiny as “the one” and garner the love of her people, especially that of her two hunky would-be suitors.

The love triangle that surfaces by the tail end of Sanders SWATH is only one of many curious spins on the Snow White tale that make SWATH such an interesting exercise. Visually, it is fairly stunning, despite being bogged down with a cloudy gray palette. The whole Game of Thrones aesthetic at play grounds this fairy tale and allows for some adequate fight scenes that recall the smaller battles from Peter Jackson’s LOTR trilogy, but it also makes the proceedings dishearteningly dour in the midst of some high fantasy ridiculousness. Sure, the dwarves bring a little comic relief, as does Hemsworth with his Harrison Ford impression and Theron’s unintentionally comic scenery chewing, and there’s fairies and trolls and the like, but generally, this is a pretty joyless affair. Even the performances do little to relieve the seriousness of the proceedings. Stewart seems ill-equipped to lead anyone into a battle that doesn’t involve pouting, and Theron prefers to be a preening cartoon rather than a three-dimensional character. Thankfully, Hemsworth brings some of his Thunder God presence to bear to balance Stewart’s languor and Theron’s melodramatics. 

From Stewart’s conflicted Bruce Wayne-esque arc to Theron’s Joker-esque megalomania to the Game of Thrones militarism, Sanders was clearly aiming for the crossover audience by melding the classic princess narrative with the amped-up fantasy and action elements, but in doing so he lost the core of the tale. In SWATH, the Snow white tale is no longer solely about the fear of aging and society’s obsession with youth; it is a feminist spin on the Hero’s Journey with a dash of Twilight--albeit with much more worthy suitors--and a smattering of the style and storytelling from everything from Star Wars to the latest Alice in Wonderland adaptation. That said, SWATH isn’t terrible, and in fact, has a number of solid moments that will make audiences recall their first time seeing Star Wars or LOTR, but it does so in such an alternatively melancholy and melodramatic manner that it is hard to view this as a worthy successor to those film’s legacies.

The Yin and Yang of it

Yin: Dour re-imagining that rips off some of the most popular epic fantasy films of the past thirty years to mold Snow White into a post-feminist hero’s journey. Stewart plays to type while Theron goes beyond over the top.

Yang: Decent action and a some solid visuals help to spread the appeal of a tale unfairly tagged “girls only”. Occasionally recalls the best qualities of Star Wars, LOTR, and Game of Thrones all wrapped into a gloomy package.

In-Between: Chris Hemsworth’s Huntsman sports a silly Scottish accent. In one scene, the accent drops and his native accent, the one he uses for Thor, surfaces, and I could not help but think how he would crush every villain if he called for Mjolnir.

Review - Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides

Grade: A (for Pirates fans) B (for everyone else)

The Good: Capt. Jack and his wily antics (as always); intriguingly complex plotting with some relatively challenging issues at heart; Expands Pirate-verse with trademark charm and intrigue.

The Bad: Complex to the point of complication; Cruz and McShane are a tad overhyped and nowhere near as interesting as original cast members. Murky pallete+3D glasses make some action tough to see

The Ugly: The price of a ticket to see this in IMAX 3D (no matter how much it’s worth it).

There’s one consistent truth to Disney’s Pirates of the Caribbean movies. Johnny Depp’s Jack Sparrow—excuse me, Captain—is unquestionably the star, but the stories never truly belong to him. Capt. Jack is a scene-stealer, for sure, and the character generations will remember when they think of Pirates of the Caribbean, but even relieved of the Turner-Swan saga, Jack still hasn’t completely taken center stage.

That’s not a bad thing. Captain Jack prancing through the proceedings as a devil-may-care, sharper-than-he-looks trickster may keep him from being the chief protagonist of the Pirates films, but it allows these blockbusters to engage in complex—some may say complicated—storytelling with charismatic characters whose conflicting motivations reveal more depth than most movies like this ever dare to.

On Stranger Tides, based on Tim Powers 1987 novel of the same name, follows Capt. Jack as he is forced by a piggish King George (a goofy cameo by occasional Depp costar Richard Griffiths) to lead perennial rival, and newly minted privateer, Barbossa (Geoffrey Rush) to Ponce de Leon’s legendary fountain of youth, which our wily anti-hero had his sights set on at the end of the first trilogy. Along the way, Jack runs afoul of old friends—including steadfast first mate Joshamee Gibbs (Kevin McNally)—and new frenemies like the duplicitous Angelica (Penelope Cruz), daughter of a fairly unknown pirate, Edward Teach, who goes by the nickname Blackbeard (Ian McShane). Cajoled into serving on Blackbeard’s living ship, the Queen Anne’s Revenge, Capt. Jack must outwit all sides to reach the fountain before his multiple enemies allies do. Also charting a course to fountain of youth are agents of Spain’s King Ferdinand VI, who have their own agenda for the source of the mystical aqua de vida.

Johnny Depp brings Capt. Jack alive as only he can after a few years away from the character. This time, Jack is a bit more subdued, but no less crafty. The Pirates movies have gotten less and less lighthearted and humorous as they increase in complexity and ambition, but Capt. Jack continues to make audiences snicker with his sly subversive digs and observations. The good captain may not be as riotous as he was in the initial installment, but audiences can still count on Depp to deliver a winking performance that’s rife with mischievous charm. Geoffrey Rush continues to prove himself Depp’s perfect foil. Ever eloquent and consistently cunning, Rush’s Barbossa nurses some new wounds that make him even more dangerous. Rush rises to the challenge—as if there was any doubt—by balancing Barbossa’s trademark civility with a simmering anger.

New to the Pirates-verse are Penelope Cruz’s Angelica and Ian McShane’s Blackbeard, who are truly the engines of this story. Their quest for the fountain is driven as much by their connection to each other as it is by deeper issues of fate and redemption (yes, these concerns really do surface in Pirates movie, again). Cruz plays Angelica as a slightly feistier version of most female characters who cross paths with Capt. Jack. She’d be in love with him if she didn’t want to smack and/or kill him. As such, she barely registers as significantly different from Kiera Knightley’s Elizabeth Swan and Angelica’s journey is not likely to endear her with fans of Mr. Sparrow. McShane’s Blackbeard brings his silver-tongued menace to the table as the merciless pirate, who may or may not be particularly interested in redeeming his soul before a prophesy that will claim his life comes to pass. Essentially, he’s just playing Al Swearengen in the Age of Discovery. The fact that Blackbeard is so detached from characters who aren’t Angelica makes him a cold, but not a particularly engaged threat on the level of Barbossa or even Davy Jones, who both had a personal stake in challenging Capt. Jack.

Director Rob Marshall does a fine job of aping the visual template Gore Verbinski laid forth in the first trilogy. The world of Stranger Tides is visually on par with the later films, particularly Dead Man’s Chest, albeit darker and earthier. The darker palette makes a few of the elaborate action scenes a bit murky, but this is as much a visual issue as a problem with watching the flick through 3D glasses. Marshall also shows a deft hand at Pirates’ kitchen sink approach to the supernatural. In Stranger Tides, Jack and his compatriots encounter more than a few “beasties”, from zombified pirate slaves—again—to mermaids and magical ships. As usual, the supernatural aspect is never obnoxious or overplayed. Thanks to some exceptional work by ILM and the practical makeup teams, the creatures, especially the mermaids, don’t look as cartoonish as Davy Jones’ barnacled crewmen. But, the most impressive thing Marshall does—and I believe a lion’s share of the credit here goes to Pirates’ screenwriters Ted Elliott and Terry Russo—is graft some significant layering to the story.

Essentially, Stranger Tides is a fetch quest, as most fantasy/action/sci-fi flicks are these days. However, the character’s reasons for pursuing the fountain are rooted in some fairly challenging issues. Questions of faith are raised by the presence of not only the Spanish Catholics, but by missionary Phillip (Sam Claflin), a prisoner of Blackbeard and another would-be successor to the Will Turner spot. Phillip may seem to only be around as an extra piece of eye candy and half of a romantic subplot, but he, much like the Spanish, represents the presence of organized religion and monotheistic faith in a world of magic and superstition. The conflict between the two worlds is something that, with more time, could prove very intriguing for this film series. Questions of redemption and family responsibility, present in Dead Man’s Chest and World’s End, resurface and form the crux of the Angelica-Blackbeard arc, in a sinister twist on the William-Bootstrap plotline. All in all, Stranger Tides continues the trend of the last two Pirates movie by daring to be complex at the risk of losing its audience.

Folks who were exasperated by the intrigue and dueling machinations of World’s End and Dead Man’s Chest may be miffed at the maneuvering in Stranger Tides, which is significantly lesser than in other Pirates movies. Thankfully, the pacing is smooth—moving from action packed set-piece to exposition with ample balance—and should retain most viewers’ attention for the length of its two and a half hour runtime (fans should of course hang back at the end for the after-the–credits stinger). For those who weren’t fans of the last two, Stranger Tides won’t change any minds, but it does offer a more streamlined approach with less mythology and characters to follow. For those who love Pirates or want to see a fantasy that delivers a great balance of action, character and slightly complex storytelling, Pirates is as perfect as it ever was. So, go ahead…follow that horizon. It’s worth it...mostly.