Advertisement

Cinders still hot in same old way

Holliday Grainger, Cate Blanchett and Sophie McShera in Cinderella.

Cinderella (G) 3.5 stars

Lily James, Cate Blanchett

DIRECTOR:KENNETH BRANAGH

REVIEW:MARK NAGLAZAS

The great English drama critic Michael Billington once quipped that the most radical way of doing William Shakespeare in this era of the postmodern makeover was to play it straight, like it would have been done at the time of the Bard.

The same could be said of this “update” of Cinderella by Kenneth Branagh, which is so wilfully old-fashioned it’s as if Helena Bonham Carter’s fairy godmother popped out of the screen, packed us all into a mouse- drawn pumpkin and sent us back to Hollywood’s golden age.

Some have complained that it is too square in the same way they whined that Branagh’s Hamlet was too antiquated for modern cinema audiences.

But there’s something pleasing about a filmmaker who doesn’t feel compelled to goose up his material to suit contemporary tastes. Cinderella has been around for a long time so there is something to be said for deepening rather than deconstructing this most cherished of fairytales.

Actually, Branagh’s Cinderella is not quite as square as it seems. While he and his writer Chris Weitz (About a Boy, The Golden Compass) stick closely to the storyline we know from the many versions we’ve read or seen they give us one of the more interesting stepmothers, an impeccably groomed social climber who conspires with one of the king’s Machiavellian cronies (Stellan Skarsgard) to secure herself a title and husband.

Indeed, Blanchett’s Lady Tremaine is in a long line of Hollywood strivers and schemers, the kind of silver- screen iron ladies played by the likes of Bette Davis, Joan Crawford and Barbara Stanwyck. And Blanchett astutely doesn’t overplay her hand, reminding us that Lady Tremaine is also a single mother fighting to secure the future of her children.

While Blanchett provides something for the parents there is plenty of fairytale stuff for younger audience members, with the mice in the home of Ella (as she is called before waking up beside the fireplace covered in cinders) cute little sidekicks.

And teens will delight in the bitchy stepsisters (Sophie McShera and Holliday Grainger), storybook versions of the Kardashians who treat Cinderella as a servant and scoff at her meagre wardrobe, especially when it comes to dressing up for the ball that will see them married off to the prince.

But the heart of the movie is the relationship between Cinderella (Lily James) and the prince (Richard Madden), which doesn’t undermine the traditional model of the impoverished girl being rescued by a prince.

These adjustments are very subtle, however, and won’t be noticed by the new generation of princess- obsessed girls who will be beside themselves after the Frozen short playing beforehand. I feel sorry for mums having to order their own little princesses to clean up their rooms.


FILM

Cinderella (G)

Lily James,

Cate Blanchett

DIRECTOR''''''

KENNETH BRANAGH

REVIEW''''''

MARK NAGLAZAS