Modern Day Fairy Tales

By demands, the huntsman took Snow White into the woods to kill her, but was deceived by her beautiful nature. In order to fulfill the queen’s orders, he must bring back the lungs and liver of Snow White but instead satisfied her needs with those of a boar. This projects a firm hierarchy as although originally dictated by a noble, the huntsman could not fulfill the queen’s duty as he – of a lower class, could not face dong harm to another noble –Snow

The dwarves are amazed by the girl’s beauty and allow her to stay with them forever as long as she handles all the household chores. Snow White happily obliges and begins to take care of the dwarves. Unfortunately, the evil step-mother gets word of Snow White’s death being a fraud and makes three attempts to trick and fool the princess. On the third attempt, the old hag is successful and upon biting in to a deliciously plump red apple sends Snow White tumbling to the ground. The seven dwarves decide Snow White is to captivating to be buried underground so they decided to encase her in glass and take turns guarding her remains. One day a handsome prince happens to come across the beautiful dead princess and begs the dwarves to let him purchase her. Reluctantly, the dwarves give the prince Snow White and a bump on the transport home causes the poisonous apple to fall out of her mouth and the princess magically comes back to life. The prince marries Snow White, and the evil step mother is forced to dance in hot-iron boots until she dies.

Everyone knows that when the queen discovers that Snow White’s beauty is greater than hers, she asks the huntsman to kill her. Finally, we all know that the dwarves take care of her until her death, at which point the prince comes to the rescue and awakens her with a kiss. These are all elements of the story that we come to expect when we hear the name Snow White.

Once the Queen arrived back to her castle, she went to her magic mirror and said “Mirror, mirror, on the wall, Who in this land is fairest of all? It then replied with “You, my queen, are fair; it is true. But Snow-White, beyond the mountains with the Seven Dwarfs, Is still a thousand times fairer than you” Her jealousy and anger got even worse than before, she was furious. The Queen then made a poisoned apple and went beyond the mountains back to the cottage gave it to Snow White. As soon as she took that first bite she fell over dead.

The film “Snow White and the Huntsman” depicts the journey between the two main characters Snow White and Ravenna the evil Queen. Snow White, who is played by Kristen Stewart for majority of the film, has been locked in her slain father's castle for years. The character is imprisoned by her father’s evil second wife played by Charlize Theron, whose now queen. The Queen also lives in fear of losing of her young appearance and uses the blood of virgins to restore it. She tests the success of this with the well-known mirror on the wall. When the magic mirror reveals that Snow White is the source of her immortality, the queen seeks to kill Snow White. In “Snow White and the Huntsman” many patterns are used like the camera shots of the film, lighting and color. The pattern of camera shots is seen throughout the movie using close ups shots and wide range shots. For example, when Snow White fled from the castle and is chased by the Queen’s horsemen into the Dark Forest, there are close up shots of medieval like armor enforcing the idea that the film is not in modern day and the action of the film will be done with weapons like swords and axes. Close up shots of Snow White and Ravenna dictates who is in power and who is not. The shots show Snow White wearing peasant’s clothing, whereas the Queen wears jewelry, expensive clothes and a crown. Wide range shots are shown in film with vast plains, castles and battles’ giving a sense of realism to the setting. Lighting is another pattern

When Snow White reaches the age of seven, she becomes as beautiful as the day and even more beautiful than the Queen and when the Queen asks her mirror, it responds: "My Queen, you are the fairest here so true. But Snow White is a thousand times more beautiful

The story begins with the concept of women being compared to nature, when a mother wishes to have a child, “who was as white as snow, as red as blood, and as black as ebony wood”. Her child, Snow-White, is given nature characteristics that show she is nurturing. These characteristics are objects, which to some extent give the effect that women are seen as objects. Furthermore, the backbone of the story takes place through female competition for beauty, when the Queen learns that she has lost her first place ranking to Snow-White in the beauty category. She then orders a huntsman to kill Snow-White for the reason that the Queen strives to be the most beautiful in her land. Her actions represent that the only thing women care about is being the best female and that they will compete in extreme orders just to win. Afterwards, during the huntsman’s quest to kill Snow-White, she begs him not to do so and he respects her wishes. The is solely because, as the Grimm brother wrote, “she was so beautiful the huntsman took pity on her”1. Later on in the story, male gaze appears again when the prince stats that he, “… cannot live without being able to see Snow-White”1. This clearly demonstrates that Snow-White is an

However, as those who are familiar with the story know, this was not the end of Snow White. When the Queen finds out Snow White escapes death from the huntsman and ends up living with seven dwarfs, she still considered Snow White a

Snow White starts off with a lonely queen who sat sewing by her window one mid-winter night. She pricked her finger and seeing the blood so red made her wish for a child who has cheeks as red as blood, her

Snow White is a naive person and is willing to trust people immediately. This can often put her in very dangerous situations. This comes to light when the Queen disguises herself as an old woman and Snow White accepts her gifts which ends up causing her demise. However her naivety also allowed her to trust the huntsman and the prince when she first meets them. And if it was not for the dwarfs, she would not have had a place to live. Snow White’s naivety allowed her to not fear the people who helped her but also costed her life.

One luminous day the prince was wandering about in the woods when he came across a hideous castle. The castle was dark and there was plants growing alongside the walls. You could hear the occasional crows croak. He was so determined to find out more he went inside. When he stepped through the door, he let out a gasp. He was astonished at how clean and organized everything was compared to the outside. That was when he saw the reflection of an animal, but it wasn’t an animal it was a monstrous beast! When he caught up with the beast he went into immediate shock. Belle said “Please don’t hurt me, I am an innocent person who was put under a spell by a cruel woman. I need your help to reverse the spell.” Realizing now what the townspeople were talking about he decided that he needed to stay here and keep Belle safe.

In the time the men were gone, Snow White had apparently just gotten into another fight with her “evil stepmom”. I really don’t know what’s so evil about this woman, but Snow really can’t complain until she’s taken a walk in my shoes. Being the whiny little brat that she is, Snow was running through the woods crying her eyes out just hoping someone would find her and give her just an ounce of attention. Poor girl. By the way things looked it was apparent she had no intentions of returning home, and with no one in sight she propped up against a large tree stump in defeat. When she leaned up against the wood though, it caved in and she fell into the middle of what she had thought to believe was a normal every day stump. Shocked and amazed at what she found inside, Snow decided to just make herself at home, because that’s princess etiquette.

“And they lived happily ever after.” This line is repeated time after time in every fairy tale and princess story, including Snow White, but when you take a deeper look into what this “happy life” we find a demeaning, patriarchal, misogynistic world full of feminist stereotypes. The characters in this movie are confined to certain gender roles despite their efforts to escape them. The story tells the life a young girl with the clearest skin and ebony hair and the name Snow White.

In the beginning, Orlando, a 16-year-old boy, daydreams of slicing the heads of his enemies like his father and ancestors before them. He yearns to go on adventures to France and Africa with the men but he is too young and vows that he will have an adventure someday. Orlando comes from a long line of nobles and has been that way since the start of his family. Orlando loves literature; he writes tragedies, dramas, and poetry for fun. One day he decides to relax out in nature away from everyone else. When he climbs to the top of the hill, he gazed upon the endless properties of his family. He then lies down and dreams of himself as one with nature. He wakes up to the sound of a trumpet and discovers Queen Elizabeth I has come to visit. Orlando rushes back to look presentable to the Queen. The Queen immediately becomes very fond of Orlando because he represents innocence and simplicity. Two years later, the Queen calls Orlando to see her. She thinks Orlando is the perfect image of a noble gentleman. She then picked a ring from her finger and gave it to Orlando and named him treasurer and steward. After that, Orlando could travel anywhere with the Queen. One winter day, the Queen caught Orlando kissing a young girl. The Queen becomes so enraged that she breaks her mirror with her sword. After the Queen dies, King James I becomes the new ruler of Britain and the Great Frost approaches. Many people are dying from the cold but the King decides to use the frost to make a carnival.

Fairy tales such as Snow White, have been rewritten and interpreted in many different stories throughout a vast amount of years. Two stories that retold the tale of Snow White were “Little Snow White”, Written by Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm and Snow White and The Huntsman, directed by Rupert Sandors. The brothers Grimm wrote the “Little Snow White” in 1812 and explained the story of Snow White as a young child who was targeted to be killed by a jealous queen and hide away in a house of 7 dwarfs. In their home, Snow White was constantly tricked by the evil queen and killed then brought back to life by the 7 dwarfs. The story of Snow White and the Huntsman was directed in a much darker direction than the brother’s Grimm version where survival was sought for both the huntsman and Snow White. Similarities arose in both versions where Snow White had to survive a terrible ordeal that she is being placed in from being vulnerable to tricks from the queen in the brothers grimm version to surviving from her stepmother but also from the environment she encounters conflict in the Snow White and the Huntsman movie. The themes of both versions contrast each other since Snow White beauty is able to save her from different situations in ‘Little Snow White”, however, the queens obsession on being young and beautiful ultimately led to her downfall in Snow White and the Huntsman.