The Huntsman: Winter’s War – Film Review by Emily Elphinstone

Director: Cedric Nicolas-Troyan
Writers: Evan Spiliotopoulos, Craig Mazin
Stars: Sam Claflin, Chris Hemsworth, Emily Blunt

The idea of a Snow White sequel without Snow White is a peculiar one, but this is just the dynamic of The Huntsman: Winter’s War; the follow up to the 2012 film Snow White and the Huntsman.

Both prequel and sequel, the film begins with a young Ravenna (Charlize Theron reprising her role as the evil queen), and her apparently non-magical sister Freya (Emily Blunt). When Freya’s baby daughter dies in suspicious circumstances, apparently killed by its father the Duke of Blackwood (Colin Morgan); she is utterly heartbroken. Suddenly her dormant powers are unleashed, and Freya transforms into the Ice Queen, (a character more traditionally connected to Hans Christian Anderson or ‘Frozen’ than the Grimm fairytale’s Snow White). Moving to a kingdom in the North, Freya bans love, and ‘rescues’ all the children from surrounding areas, raising them to become her elite army of ‘huntsmen’. When two of her most skilled huntsmen Eric (Chris Hemsworth) and Sara (Jessica Chastain) fall in love, Freya is horrified, and orders their deaths.

Cut suddenly to 7 years later (sidestepping the entirety of the previous film) and an unseen Snow White is on the throne having defeated Ravenna. Discovering that Ravenna’s magic mirror has been stolen and is in danger of falling into Freya’s hands, Eric begins a valiant quest, assisted by a comic band of dwarves including Nick Frost, and Sheridan Smith.

Directed by Cedric Nicolas-Troyan, (Visual Effects Supervisor on Snow White and the Huntsmen, for which he was nominated for an Oscar) it is unsurprising that The Huntsman is visually stunning. In fact, the film could be watched for the incredible costumes alone, and Theron and Blunt’s wardrobes in particular look like they’re straight off an Alexander McQueen catwalk. However, unfortunately both the aesthetics and the script seem to have been crammed with everything that a Hollywood boardroom could think of; with a confused and overcomplicated story that draws heavily on The Lord of the Rings, The Chronicles of Narnia, and a variety of different fairytales and Disney films.

The impressive cast work hard to deliver relatively solid performances; but let down by the writing, they struggle to become much more than archetypes. Theron and Blunt are convincing as the evil queens; but Hemsworth, Chastain, and their wandering accents don’t have enough to work with. The supporting cast, meanwhile, is spectacularly underused: Sam Claflin is little more than a featured extra, and sadly the dwarves are never given more than comedic cameos.

For all the spectacle involved, emotional engagement is sadly lacking. The various romantic sub-plots lack chemistry, and there’s not enough heart to draw the audience in to the action. Ultimately it’s difficult to get away from a sense that this is a ‘written by committee’ attempt at crowd-pleasing; and there’s no denying that style won out over substance.