'Snow White' fails to cast a spell

Photo by Universal Pictures

Universal Pictures The princess (Kristen Stewart) leads an army against her evil stepmother, Queen Ravenna, in "Snow White and the Huntsman," new on DVD.

In "Snow White and the Huntsman," Charlize Theron is the fairest of them all as a deliciously evil, suck-the-youth-right-out-of-you queen. And couldn't all stories be made better with a deliciously evil, suck-the-youth-right out-of-you queen?

She's one of the only redeeming things about this slick, action-adventure version of the timeless fairy tale. The film also touts artistic panache, including visuals of castles on craggy islands, magical fairies, dwarves, enchanting mossy forests and chain mail. And wouldn't all stories also be made better with chain mail?

But for all its slickness, and for all those yummy visuals that steal you away, this "Lord of the Rings"-meets Brothers Grimm-meets Joan of Arc triumvirate is, unfortunately, an overly long, two-plus hour bore that gets hopelessly lost in the Dark Forest.

While the idea was tempting to update the Snow White fairy tale into something much darker for contemporary audiences so enamored with shadowy tales like "The Dark Knight," the execution failed miserably.

Perhaps it was because writers Evan Daugherty, John Lee Hancock and Hossein Amini broke some basic rules about fairy tale-telling involving princesses that the love story with the handsome prince or the equivalent is a must.

Alas, for our poor Snow White in this go-round, the handsome prince, or the equivalent, is brushed aside, and a love story is nixed for weightier kingdom-takeover concerns, leaving fans ! of the story unsatisfied.

In this version, King Magnus (Noah Huntley), so distraught after the death of his wife, marries a prisoner of great beauty he saves from an enemy army, after just one day.

Alas, the king is deceived and Ravenna (Theron) kills him and usurps his kingdom right out from under him while imprisoning the king's kindhearted daughter, Snow White (Kristen Stewart).

There the princess remains for years, until the queen asks the Mirror on the Wall who's the fairest of them all. For the first time, the mirror, which takes shape as a golden humanoid form, tells her there is one fairer than she who has come of age Snow White.

It is because of the princess that Ravenna is starting to age faster and must suck the youth, literally, out of a bevy of young maidens.

But it's also Snow White that will be her savior, says the Mirror. If the queen takes her heart, she will gain immortality and no longer will need to do much more youth-stealing.

This is when Snow White escapes to the Dark Forest and Ravenna and her brother (a creepy looking Sam Spruell, with bangs) employ the widowed Huntsman (Chris Hemsworth) to find her.

But the Huntsman cannot give up this innocent young girl and helps her escape. Snow White seeks out Duke Hammond (Vincent Regan), once loyal to her father, and his son, William (Sam Claflin), her childhood friend.

The seven dwarves do show up (in the form of Bob Hoskins, Nick Frost, Toby Jones and others), a poisoned apple makes an appearance, and the battle is on to defeat the evil queen.

"Snow White and the Huntsman" never lives up to its promise of an epic high action adventure. It suffers from a painfully slow pace without much humor, without interesting characters and with little inspiring dialogue.

Emotionally, the film also fails, partly because Snow White's love interest is so vague. Does she love William? Does she love The Huntsman? Did the writers want to depict her more as a strong Virgin Queen who will never ma! rry? Who ! knows? Director Rupert Sanders and the writers certainly didn't.

Stewart, unfortunately, hasn't been able in any of her films to successfully convey emotion. She's acting and the audience knows it. Hemsworth fits as the bulky Huntsman, but try as he might, the banter between his character and Stewart's Snow White fizzles. And Claflin as William could have been written out of this whole deal altogether.

Thank goodness for Theron, wild eyed and psychopathic as she is here. She's having fun being the evil queen, and we're having fun watching her.

"Snow White and the Huntsman" certainly will get more video rentals than it deserves since its reputation precedes it as the film that broke up Hollywood's young it couple. See it for Theron's wicked queen, see it for the visuals, but beware. With its eternally long running time and slow pace, you may feel the life, if not the youth, sucked right out of you.