SNOW WHITE AND THE HUNTSMAN Review

Kristen Stewart is painfully miscast in this dark new vision of the Snow White fairy tale. There's a lot going wrong with our leading lady. In "Snow White and the Huntsman," she plays the title heroine all heavy sighs and mouth breathing. It's described that not only is Snow White the fairest of them all, she is also full of heart, energy and spirit -- all things Stewart's performance is not. She flat-out doesn't fit the role, and one must wonder if the actress ever will be able to escape "Twilight" mode.

This marks the first feature film from British commercial director Rupert Sanders, and he does deliver on his promise of taking the Snow White legend to its most sinister and harshest extreme. This is a brave re-imagining of the fairy tale, and the exact opposite of earlier this year's "Mirror Mirror." Visually speaking, the movie is a stunner with sceneries that are both bleak and gorgeous. Take the Dark Forest for example full of haunting creatures and deep fog, all which contrasts perfectly with an enchanting fairyland Snow White is later led to. This locale is full of lush greens and woodland creatures no doubt in tribute to Disney's 1937 classic animated film.

The film kicks off with a background story about the Evil Queen Ravenna (Charlize Theron) who married Snow White's father only to murder him and gain rights to the throne. This left young Snow White locked in a tower for years with her evil stepmother ruling as a ruthless and maniacal queen hated by all in the land. And now that Snow White is mature, she poses the only threat to Queen Ravenna's rule and requires her dead. All very intriguing, but it's once Snow White makes her escape when the storyline slams into a standstill. What the screenplay suffers from is a distinct slog in pacing.

The queen sends out the Huntsman (Chris Hemsworth) to seek out Snow White in the Dark Woods, apprehend her and bring her back to the castle. The strong, mead-guzzling hero swings an ax like nobody's business and upon finding Snow White, he realizes whose side he should be on and decides to help her defeat the queen. There's another man in the tale, as well; Snow White's childhood love named Prince William (Sam Claflin). The love triangle becomes apparent, and yet nothing comes of it. The relationship between any of these pivotal characters is left frustratingly ambiguous to the point of being completely moot.

Charlize Theron's snarling, vicious queen is by far the movie's biggest selling point. With a tall, spiked iron crown and ominous gowns, she brings a violent charge to even silent, simmering moments. And while she mostly triumphs, her yelling fits do tend to feel strained. When she asks her precious mirror on the wall -- a cloaked golden figure -- who's the fairest of them all, and it's Stewart over Theron, you can't help but wonder who paid him to say that. This is also a Snow White who's meant to rouse a kingdom to action, donning a suit of armor upon a white steed to lead a charge to the castle. This Joan of Arc replica is all the more unconvincing played by Stewart.

And we can't forget our dwarves, eight of them in this version. These aren't the kind of dwarves you'll be expecting, especially once you notice they're played by notable actors including the likes of Nick Frost, Eddie Marsan, Ian McShane, Bob Hoskins, Toby Jones and Ray Winstone. Through the magic of CGI, they are shrunken down to size and put into character. Yet I couldn't help but think how casting these gentleman rid real life acting dwarfs potential work. Isn't that discrimination?

If you could take the visual spectacle of "Snow White and the Huntsman" on its own accord, the film would act wonderfully as a breathtaking, fantasy epic poem. But at just over two hours, there has to be some acting and characterization accounted for. It's a harsh lesson both the evil queen and the movie should've took to heart: looks aren't everything.

The Best Time Of Their Lives?

Adventureland:
4 out of 4

"Aventureland" may not be the follow-up to "Superbad" fans were waiting for, but nonetheless, it's just as amazing and even more sincere and insightful. This latest feature from writer-director Greg Mottola is less funny and less of a raunchy teen comedy than some may be at first expecting. It's a coming-of-age romance that's not laugh-out-loud funny but rather funny in terms of its wit, subtleties, and observations. Here, the humor grows organically. It appears Mottola has been given more directorial freedom here without the name Judd Apatow slapped somewhere under production. The movie pays great attention to detail in recreating the feel and aura of the 80s, and in that respect, the movie is also lovingly nostalgic.

It's 1987 in Pittsburgh, and James Brennan (Jesse Eisenberg) is fresh out of college and doesn't have enough money to attend Columbia graduate school like he planned. And so, to fill up the months over the summer, the only job he can land himself is one at a run-down amusement park called Adventureland. James comes across other twenty-somethings who are in a similar predicament as him, including Joel (Martin Starr) who majored in something obscure and literary, basically uselessness, just like James. Their majors technically qualify each of them to have a legitimate career, but the bitter reality is that there are no quick jobs involving writing travelogues like Charles Dickens or analyzing Russian literature. Joel could be considered a straight-up nerd, but he cleverly negates that by announcing his own lack of coolness by smoking a pipe.

There's also the hottie of the park, a rides worker named Lisa P. (Margarita Levieva) whose style is a replica of an 80s Madonna, and she is wanted by every guy working at Adventureland as if they're all genetically required to picture her naked. Bill Hader and Kristen Wiig play the park's married managers who hire James on the spot. They make a hilarious comedic turn, especially Hader, whose character is dimwitted but doesn't have any problem scolding somebody for not depositing trash in the clown's mouth or scaring off a crazed guest with a baseball bat. He supplies James with one keyword of advice for when he runs the games: "Nobody ever wins a big ass panda." For the most part, James finds himself sitting back doing absolutely nothing at various game booths listening to "Rock Me, Amadeus" a nauseating number of times on repeat. A visit from the park's mechanic, Connell (Ryan Reynolds), acts as a breath of fresh air even if his cool guy, rock star attitude is hiding not only his wedding ring but some unseen vulnerability, as well.

Em (Kristen Stewart) captures the attention of James and they start to get to know each other and begin dating, kind of. The movie primarily focuses on this developing relationship between the two of them, and, as conventional as that may sound, Mottola captures this essence of teenage love in the most fresh and honest way possible. The way their relationship unfolds is wonderfully intelligent as these two characters turn out to be a whole lot smarter than people may give them credit. They're both flawed and are good at hiding what bothers them most. Em has a whole slew of family issues back home along with another secret she's hiding, and James is a little too sincere and has an overreaching desperation that is both a flaw and a winning feature. What makes their connection all the better is the top notch acting from Kristen Stewart and Jesse Eisenberg. Last seen in "Twilight," Stewart has a sharp-edged, pale beauty to her look. She does much deeper work here than her previous outings and proves to be a promising young actress. Eisenberg proved himself in "The Squid and the Whale," and plays James with a fittingly slumped and awkward demeanor.

This is a surprisingly quiet movie, one that is more charming and touching as it goes along. It's also full of beautiful compositions with the orange glaze of lights from the amusement park rides drifting in and out of the scenes. There are details in not only recapturing the 80s but also in capturing the feelings and moods of being stuck in the strange limbo between school and the real world. The amusement park Adventureland not only works as the movie's title but also as a greater irony. There is zero adventure to be had at this Adventureland as most of the workers are rarely ever seen genuinely happy to be there, and similarly, what's meant to be the most adventurous part of life just coming out of college turns out to be just the opposite for these characters. The movie presents not only the absurdity of frying up stale corn dogs for resale but also the absurdity in all of its characters' situations through realistic dialogue that is clever but not too clever (à la "Juno"). These carnival workers hold a common ground in a collective stash of joints and in simply passing the time by hanging around waiting for something to happen. And likewise, there's an uncertainty between Em and James in figuring out whether they're a summer fling or something more. "Adventureland" brilliantly presents insolubility through a summer of longing and desire.