In a movie season populated by superheroes Universal Studios has seen fit to unleash Snow White and the Huntsman on the seething summer masses.  Whether the film turned out good or bad, I first want to commend all the people that worked on this feature and give it the best compliment I can: the cinematography was good.  Now on with my review.

Snow White and the Huntsman is a somewhat drastic and most certainly unnecessary retelling of the classic fairy tale, Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs.  The heart of the original story is here, as we have the Evil Queen (Charlize Theron) trying to kill Snow White (Kristen Stewart) but beyond that and the appearance of the Seven Dwarfs (Bob Hoskins, Ian McShane, Ray Winstone, Nick Frost, Eddie Marsan, Toby Jones, Johnny Harris and Brian Gleeson) not much else transfers over.

This new version centers on a narrative concerning a prophecy that states that the Queen‘s evil can only be undone by fairest blood.  Guess who has fairest blood?  If you guessed Snow White, you now know the real reason she must die.  And don’t worry, if you don’t catch that the first time it gets repeated so that the viewer can fully understand that Snow White is (and yes they do refer to her as) the one.

From a visual standpoint what director Rupert Sanders has accomplished with his first feature film is a solid effort.  But good visuals don’t excuse poor acting,  or the missteps the screenplay takes.  I don’t know why the screenwriters saw fit to make the climax of this movie an epic battle scene, but they did.  And it was just one example of a plethora of unnecessary tangents that litter the film.

The movie does an alright job representing these classic characters, but the performances from the stars that inhabit them leave much to be desired.  Kristen Stewart delivers a performance that weakens the movie while Chris Hemsmorth and the supporting cast do what they can to try and save the film.  But undercutting them is the lifeless performance by Charlize Theron.

Charlize Theron is at first glance a good pick for the villainous queen.  There are even times that her performance almost reaches the point of being believable and even emotional, but sadly those moments rarely happen.  Her accent fluctuates between British and American as the leading lady doesn’t seem to know what she or the director intended to get out of her character beyond her being a one-note villain.

Snow White and the Huntsman in the end comes off as a visually appealing mess.  So if you are going to the movies, please avoid this one and see something that’s worth your hard-earned money… like Moonrise Kingdom, perhaps?

2/5