Movie Reaction: The Huntsman: Winter's War

Formula: (Snow White and the Huntsman * Frozen) - Kristen Stewart

I'm not sure why The Huntsman: Winter's War exists. I'm not sure that many people do know. Snow White and the Huntsman was a moderate success, with a great deal of the success owed to Kristen Stewart's residual Twilight star power. Snow White tied itself off well to be a standalone. Queen Ravenna was dead. Hemsworth hasn't successfully opened a non-Thor movie in the time in between.The only thing that necessitates this movie exist is Hollywood's fear of making expensive movies that aren't tied into other properties or stories.

That doesn't mean that Winter's War has to be bad though. On paper, the movie looks like an improvement. Chris Hemsworth is still around. While he can't open a movie by himself, he gets good results in an ensemble. Charlize Theron was by far the best thing about Snow White, so bringing her back by any mean necessary is a smart move. I like Kristen Stewart, but I'll take the combo of Emily Blunt and Jessica Chastain over her in a heartbeat. The trailers promised an epic throw down between Theron's evil queen and Blunt's heartbroken ice queen. I went into this movie figuring there would be about five minutes of bad exposition to connect Winter's War back to Snow White, but after that there was no reason this couldn't be great. Or at least a type of great that fully embraced the craziness.

That's not quite what I got. The movie begins with the two sister queens. It establishes that Blunt becomes the ice queen, Freya, after a betrayal by her lover leaves her infant child dead. She then builds an army from the children of the villages she attacks, which is where she finds and young Sara and Eric who grow up to become Chastain and Hemsworth. Those two fall in love and, because of a fake-out, end up separated. Then, skip 7 years for Snow White and the Huntsman to happen, get a body double for Kristen Stewart, and cue the five minutes of painful exposition to connect the two movies. The majority of the movie follows Hemsworth and the SAG minimum number of dwarves required for a movie in the Snow White universe. They are on a mission from Snow White to retrieve or destroy queen Ravenna's evil mirror, which apparently is exactly like the Ring of Power. Along the way, they pick up some lady dwarves and Sara. A couple more fake-outs happen, then, mercilessly late in the movie, it finally becomes about Ravenna vs. Freya for the minimum amount of time possible.

I've identified three major issues I had with the story. (This will move into spoiler territory, though I'm probably doing you a favor)

1. There are too many fake-outs and almost none of them are earned. There's Ravenna having caused Freya's child to be killed, which is sort of explained. There's Eric thinking Sara has been killed (It's never explained why Freya did that. If she's leaving Eric for dead, why not actually kill him?). There's Sara thinking Eric was killed by the goblin explosion. There's Sara being a double agent for Freya. There's the under-developed minority character randomly changing sides. It got on my nerves how much the movie wasn't trusting the audience with any information.
2. They advertised a much different movie in trailers and TV spots. There wasn't nearly enough Theron, who again, I'll remind you was by far the best thing about Snow White. And there was even less of Freya vs. Ravenna.
3. The issue that most people had with The Hobbit movies was that to fill the time for a trilogy, Peter Jackson and co. had to included every footnote and side story they could find about Middle Earth as filler. The way that Winter's War works around Snow White and the Huntsman makes this whole movie feel like filler. Maybe the better comparison in 300: Rise of an Empire, which also took place before and after a self-contained movie that had no interest in a sequel.

That's not to say there aren't things to like about Winter's War. Chastain and Hemsworth have good chemistry. I'd've liked to see a movie about them as a team rather than tacking on a lot of contrivances about their relationship. They work well when they get along. The dwarves were good comic relief. A more developed version of Freya alone and her relationship with her wicked sister could've added a lot to the movie, because those two actresses are too good to be used so little.

Universal had an opportunity to swing big with The Huntsman: Winter's War and make something really interesting. The first movie wasn't beloved, so they could pick and choose which elements to bring back or leave behind. They were smart enough to not attempt this without Charlize Theron. Opting to continue trying to be a not-quite-Lord of the Rings results in another forgettable albeit watchable fantasy epic. The waste of on screen talent (Thor and a trio of Oscar nominated actresses) is just plain wrong.

Verdict (?): Weakly Don't Recommend