I had high hopes for this film, but could not help but feel rather disappointed having seen it for the first time...
I was expecting to see a gothic-horror version of the traditional kiddies story tale, but instead this film seems to be more of an attempt to re-tell the tale in a more realistic and believable way by filling it with lots of (more) historically accurate details. For example -: the 'drawfs' are now a cross between outlaws from Sherwood Forest and the Dirty Dozen. One of them even pounces upon the unsuspecting Snow White at the first chance he gets !
The (unfamiliar) actress playing 'Snow White' struck me as being very pretty, but she seemed rather wooden in most of her scenes.
Sigorney Weaver was surprising good as the 'wicked witch', however.
This was not one of Sam Neill's better films. He usually strikes me as having quite a strong screen presence, but in this film he just seems to be just 'going through the motions' of acting.
Visually and atmospherically speaking - this film is pretty good. But the background/incidental music was very lackluster. A gothic-sounding orchestral musical score would have improved this film considerably.
Probably due to a limited budget and an unadventurous director, the 'special effects' aren't particularly special either, though they can best be described as 'adequate'.
If you have a passion for traditional fantasy films though (as opposed to gothic horror) then this film could be for you. But for someone with a fondness of horror and gothic horror (such as myself), then I'd give this one a miss.
Overall, I give this movie 6/10. It could have been much better - and a lot more scary !
I was expecting to see a gothic-horror version of the traditional kiddies story tale, but instead this film seems to be more of an attempt to re-tell the tale in a more realistic and believable way by filling it with lots of (more) historically accurate details. For example -: the 'drawfs' are now a cross between outlaws from Sherwood Forest and the Dirty Dozen. One of them even pounces upon the unsuspecting Snow White at the first chance he gets !
The (unfamiliar) actress playing 'Snow White' struck me as being very pretty, but she seemed rather wooden in most of her scenes.
Sigorney Weaver was surprising good as the 'wicked witch', however.
This was not one of Sam Neill's better films. He usually strikes me as having quite a strong screen presence, but in this film he just seems to be just 'going through the motions' of acting.
Visually and atmospherically speaking - this film is pretty good. But the background/incidental music was very lackluster. A gothic-sounding orchestral musical score would have improved this film considerably.
Probably due to a limited budget and an unadventurous director, the 'special effects' aren't particularly special either, though they can best be described as 'adequate'.
If you have a passion for traditional fantasy films though (as opposed to gothic horror) then this film could be for you. But for someone with a fondness of horror and gothic horror (such as myself), then I'd give this one a miss.
Overall, I give this movie 6/10. It could have been much better - and a lot more scary !