Snow White and the Huntsman is the second film released this year to present an update to the familiar tale of the raven-haired, ruby-lipped maiden. Mirror Mirror flickered in and out of multiplexes less than two months ago, and that film at least boasted director Tarsem’s self-assurance and distinctive, audacious style. Snow White and the Huntsman is not so fortunate, saddled as it is with first-time British director Rupert Sanders, who relies on rote action sequences and absurd plotting to hold his efforts together. The principal promise of Sanders’ film is the sight of Charlize Theron chewing the scenery as the Evil Queen (here named Ravenna), but even on this count, Snow White falls short. Theron goggles and shrieks well enough, but she is ultimately failed by the surrounding proceedings, which are as so uninteresting and confused that her campy efforts smell of desperation.
Where to begin? Perhaps with the fact that the princess who supposedly surpasses Ravenna in loveliness is played by Kristen Stewart, a fetching young lady who nonetheless resembles a dirty dishtowel with an overbite when she stands alongside Ms. Theron. Credulity is further strained by Stewart’s limp performance, which in no way suggests the gleaming, virginal magnetism that the script's Snow White allegedly possesses. There is no Handsome Prince, but the woodsman (Chris Hemsworth) sent to claim Snow's heart is ruggedly handsome and in need of redemption. (Naturally, he speaks in a wobbly Scottish brogue, because that is how English-language fantasy films suggest toughness.) There is also a Duke’s son, William, (Sam Claflin), who is apparently intended as a more viable romantic interest for the heroine, but makes no impression whatsoever.
The film’s fatal flaws, however, do not concern casting, but more fundamental missteps in tone and coherence. Sanders and scripters Evan Daugherty and John Lee Hancock attempt to split the difference between mud-spattered medieval grittiness and lush, fantastical wonder, and ultimately achieve neither. There are a few unexpected aesthetic jolts: the Dark Forest of Disney’s animated classic re-imagined as a bad acid trip; an enormous white stag formed from butterflies, and a shot of Ravenna’s naked form rendered jaundiced and skeletal by sorcery. In the main, however, Snow White relies so heavily on wearisome and uninspired fantasy conventions that it positively suffocates beneath them. Moreover, the narrative is rife with logical holes and nonsensical, oh-so-convenient developments, to the point that that even Theron’s sumptuous costumes no longer distract. Snow White and the Huntsman, then, is what one can expect when filmmakers can spend $170 million on admittedly fine production design and only express a fleeting care for storytelling.
