- Mirror Mirror. Directed by Tarsem Singh. Starring Lily Collins, Armie Hammer and Julia Roberts.
Rating: 6 (out of 10)
ONCE upon a time there was a fairy tale for children and grown-ups alike, where naked actors and bad words were banished, and neither talking donkeys nor Scottish ogres were to be found.
Now that Shrek has burped his last, the time is ripe for a cheeky Brothers Grimm story or two. The re-imagining of a classic tale was attempted last year, when Amanda Seyfried donned the red cloak in Red Riding Hood, with underwhelming results.
Mirror Mirror is the first of two Snow White adaptations headed for cinemas this year.
Directed by Tarsem Singh (The Cell), and unlike both the Grimm and Disney versions, this Snow White masters the pretty princess hand gestures but is pretty bad-ass with a sword, too.
The Queen (Julia Roberts) provides the opening narration for the film, claiming the story as her own. Her kingdom has fallen into poverty and misery thanks to profligate spending on gowns and amusement; the Queen has been ruling solo since the mysterious disappearance of the King (Sean Bean) in the woods years before, though she doesn't seem too cut up about it.
The King left behind a daughter, Snow White (Lily Collins), who has been more or less a prisoner in the palace under the Queen's watch. But Snow White is 18 years old, longs to know what goes on outside the palace walls, and her beauty is a serious threat to the Queen's vanity.
The Queen doesn't bother with the "who's the fairest of them all?" line: she already suspects that she's past her prime. She does consult her mirror - set in an isolated twig hut in the middle of a magical lake - to perform bad deeds on her behalf. She is warned by her ghostly reflection that it will all catch up with her, but since the arrival of a rich prince in the kingdom (Armie Hammer), the Queen is desperate.
The Prince and Snow have already met in passing, in the woods. But the Prince pushes on for the palace and the Queen claims him as her own. "He is rich, he's built like an ox," and she plans to wed him, post haste, even if it means using a spell or two.
Snow, meanwhile, has been spared death by the Queen's foolish henchman (Nathan Lane) and runs into seven giants who are actually seven dwarfs. No, there's no Doc or Sleepy, and they don't work in a diamond mine. These guys were caught up in the Queen's campaign to "banish all the uglies" and resent the townspeople who never spoke up on their behalf. They train Snow to fight and to be one of them (cue the Rocky-esque training montage in the woods).
The next time Snow and the Prince meet, her first thought is of war, not love.
Thanks to Singh and his crew, the film is a banquet of colour, costume outrageousness, and clever (if occasionally unnecessary) set pieces. If only the writers had followed suit: the lines are more mundane than magical, and even Roberts' meaty performance is hammered flat under such dialogue. As a result, the dwarfs share more chemistry than Snow and the Prince.
Mirror Mirror tries too hard for modern flourishes, when it should be sticking to pantomime punch: the stage is certainly set for a far more enchanting tale.
Contributing Writer
