Tuesday 26 June 2012

Snow White and the Huntsman Commentary

"Serving Dish, Serving Dish, on the wall.  Who's the fairest of them all?"  That pretty much sums up the movie.  They take a really good idea and just fail miserably with it.  The idea of having a romantic fairy tale turned into a dark action movie was one I could really get on board with.  But the writing and acting are so bad in this one that nothing could really save it.  There are numerous decisions that were made that are very baffling.  For example, why is the mirror a large brass serving dish?  Why are all of the dwarves cockney?  Why does the dark forest cause you to trip balls?  Why is Ravenna's brother an unholy DNA cross between Paul Bettany from the Da Vinci Code and an early 90s Emo Phillips?  Why involve the clergy at any level in a magical land?  Why keep Snow White alive in the first place?  Why is the apple a mammal?  Why?  Why?  Why?

Did I mention that the acting is really bad?  I long for the days when Charlize Theron just acted and didn't try too hard.  That's when she was actually believable.  Now, between this and Prometheus, she thinks every scene is a potential Oscar clip and she goes too far over the top.  And it isn't just her.  Everybody seems to have taken their cues from her and tried way too hard.  When you combine that with some very, very bad writing (did we really need another "Bill Pullman from Independence Day" inspirational speech?) you get something that's actually painful to watch in spots.

OK, I've got that out of my system.  There are two good things about this movie.  The effects are excellent.  Everything looked real right down to the computer generated fairies.  It's difficult to get that much makeup and CGI to look good consistently.  And the aged makeup effects were very lifelike (unlike Prometheus).  Second, Chris Hemsworth did a decent job.  I never expect too much from the latest comic book action beefcake but he's actually a decent actor.  Lets hope Theron didn't wear off on him.

Don't see it.

No comments:

Post a Comment