Snow White & The Huntsman
★★

What’s missing from this movie?

Snow White & The Huntsman has visual spectacle, which was obvious in the preview. It looks great on the big screen.

It has a good cast, which was not so obvious from the previews. Kristen Bell and Chris Hemsworth are very watchable as the two leads of the title. Charlize Theron, with the help of some superb make-up and opulent costumes, is usually convincing as the evil queen Ravena.

What’s missing?

Love.

When you think about fairy tales as told the last few decades, one of the important elements is true love’s kiss. But this film is much more interested in power plays and storming the castle than relationships. I don’t think the word “love” is uttered once by any character in this movie.

The soft writing extends to other points in the story, too. Some things simply happen for no reason besides plot convenience, like a horse standing around in an improbable location just for a character to make good an escape.

When I saw the previews for this film, I thought, “This will either be great or it will be wretched, no in-between.” Well… It certainly isn’t wretched, I’ll give it that. But it’s too bad that the script doesn’t get as much attention as the visuals.