Snow White and the Huntsman (2012)

(aka Legend 2)
Release Date: In Theaters now.
Country: USA
Written by: Evan Daugherty.
Directed by: Rupert Sanders.
Starring: Charlize Theron, Kristen Stewart, Chris Hemsworth, Ian McShane, Bob Hoskins and Ray Winstone.

Not as bad as you'd think, but not as perfect as you'd hope, Snow White and the Huntsman is a pretty entertaining little Dark Fantasy flick.

For the Record, this is not a movie that even remotely resembles Twilight (as some had feared), so if you have that misconception in your mind, get rid of it.

Snow White and the Huntsman is a dark retelling of the classic Disney tale, which of course is the retelling of the classic Brother's Grimm tale, which of course is a version of the classic German fairytale; it's a story that's been told over and over again, and in many different forms. This time, it's being told to us in a more dark and menacing way. Remember, fairy tales used to be told to scare children, not make them feel all warm and fuzzy.

Not warm and fuzzy.

This movie doesn't have some clueless young girl skipping through the forest and whistling to birds. Instead we get a menacing and rather insanely evil Queen Ravenna trying to kill Snow White, so that she can suck her soul through her mouth and remain forever beautiful. The fairest of them all, even. Snow White is no easy victim here though; she's kind of portrayed as a tough, Joan of Arc type of character, who is willing to fight for the greater good. Also, she probably wants to keep her soul.

She ain't scared of no troll.

Thor even shows up and runs around trying to keep Snow White alive, all the while drinking ale and brooding over his lost love. Of course there are also Dwarves, though their "group love" scene with Snow White was conspicuously absent from the finished film. Divine Stag's, trolls, and turtles alike; all of them seem to love Snow White. Everyone that is except the evil Queen Ravenna and her creepy brother... and a mysterious Archer that could just be The Avenger's Hawkeye in disguise... or maybe Legolas.

"...and my axe!"

So while Queen Ravenna takes nougat baths and mouth-sucks pretty girls to death, sweet and innocent Snow White fights for her life in dark and murky swamps, trying to make sense of it all. Make sense of what, we aren't completely sure, but it was fun to watch her do it. Make sense of stuff, that is.

I'm just going to assume that this is some sort of milky nougat bath... which sounds dirty enough without me even alluding to it being sperm.

This movie reminded us of the 80's Ridley Scott classic, Legend; It had the same kind of dark yet lush feel about it, and felt similar in tone. Of course we've seen Legend about a hundred times since its release, so maybe we were subconsciously looking for similarities. Of course SW&TH doesn't quite measure up to Legend as far as world-building, score, or overall depth of quality goes, but it had the same enjoyable vibe.

Visually, this movie is stunning. It's been a while since a Fantasy movie has created such a captivating world full of equal amounts of beauty and blight, but SW&TH does this almost impeccably. From living-liquid mirror men to massive trolls, this movie does not spare on the visual splendor. The world on display here is definitely immersive, to say the least.

We want a movie starring just the liquid gold dude. Seriously, we'd pay to see that.

If there's anything else here that's as good as the visuals, it's definitely Charlize Theron's Dark Queen Ravenna. She's a bit over the top and over-stated, but that's the point; the woman is insane, and Theron captures that essence perfectly. It really was fun to watch her chew the scenery around her, and she's one of the better screen villains in recent memory.

The rest of the cast brings it too, mostly, and especially Hemsworth. That guy just can not miss, can he?

This thing killed 41 people in this movie. Maybe 42.

No big shock here, but Kristen Stewart can't really act. Shitty Twilight aside, she's pretty decent and entertaining in some of her other roles, but she's just so very wooden... To us, she's like the female Channing Tatum; she has one, maybe two modes of emotion that she can convincingly portray on screen. For Kristen Stewart, it's usually somewhere in the bewildered and angsty range. For Channing Tatum, well, he just has dead eyes that make him come across as... "special."  For an actor, being able to convincingly emote is all in the eyes. If the eyes are dead and can't convey emotion without words, then it usually doesn't come off as genuine. Kristen Stewart tries her ass off in her films, and like I said, she is decent and likable in some of her roles, but she just can't convey anything that feels very real. She tries to act, she doesn't ever really just do it naturally.

Come on, she's either not all there or she's high.

Just imagine a Breakfast Club remake with Channing Tatum, Kristen Stewart, and a few other young acting train-wrecks like Lindsay Lohan, Jaden Smith or Miley Cyrus; They sit around and talk, for two hours, and there are no action or sex scenes to distract from their lack of acting ability, an none of them are allowed to stare vacantly ffor long periods of time... they all have to act and convey a wide array of emotions with only words and their abilities to properly emote. Just think about that.

The accents used by the actors in this movie were awful. Hemsworth's Scottish (it was Scottish, right?) was good, but was that Ye Olde English that Theron and Stewart were supposed to be spouting? Several times during the movie, Charlize Theron made us jump right out of the plot for a second or two with her over annunciation. "Find hah, and kill hah!" We cringed on a few occasions.

Kristen Stewart did the same thing. "Burns" became "Bahns," "All" became "Awl," and so on and so forth. It seemed as if the vowels were the culprit here. Why not just let American actors just avoid British accents for the most part? Most tend to overcompensate when trying to sound British or Aussie, so let's just knock it off now, mmmkay?

"Do not Distahb me while I am in my Nougat bahth."

While flawed in some ways, Snow White and the Huntsman is a truly enjoyable big budget flick. It's gorgeous, interesting and dark, all of which are qualities we crave in a movie of this measure. We don't get enough Dark Fantasy these days, and when we do it tends to be some schlock-filled Syfy movie. Avengers still stands as the best movie of the Summer (so far), but SW&TH can definitely take pride in the fact that it stands just below it as runner-up. Good luck holding on to that spot once Spideman and The Dark Knight  hit theaters, but when all is said and done, it will still be one of the Summer winners of 2012.

B+

That's a really hot picture of Kristen Stewart. Oh yeah, and Charlize looks alright too.