Technical assessment: 4
Moral assessment: 4
CINEMA rating: GP
Ella
(Lily James) enjoys a short-lived childhood in a comfortable home in an estate,
with loving, devoted parents. As a
very young girl, Ella is introduced by her mother to a magical world that makes
the impossible possible, for instance, conversing with mice, geese and lizards
in the family estate. Everything
seems endless perfection until illness strikes Ella’s mother suddenly, then
death follows. Before the fateful
moment, however, her mother leaves Ella not jewels, not wealth, but two golden
nuggets of advice: “Have courage, be kind.” As Ella blooms into womanhood, her father remarries
and takes Lady Tremaine (Cate Blanchett) for his wife. The wicked stepmother moves in along
with her two daughters Drisella (Sophie McShera) and Anastasia (Holliday
Grainger), whose cruelty Ella repays with kindness, even to animals and
strangers. Magic becomes reality when the apprentice Kit
(Richard Madden) and Ella’s Fairy Godmother (Helena Bon Carter) come into her
life.
The Cinderella motif has had a long history that reportedly begins
with a tale from Egypt in the first century BC. Indeed, even older than Christ, the Cinderella theme has
undergone various adaptations, forms, and interpretations, the “modern” one
being the fairy tale by French writer Charles Perrault, published in 1697. Since then Cinderellas have come and
gone—on film, in plays, operas, and ballets, inspiring pop music, children’s
bedtime stories and even coloring books.
Thus it was with a sigh of weariness that CINEMA met this 2015 version:
“What? Another Cinderella?” No—it
is not “another” Cinderella. Even
in casting and CGI alone, this version tops it all.
The
power of fairy tales lies in how well they sweep the audience off their feet—to
believe in magic and in never-never lands that promise happy ever-afters, to
offer escape from ordinary life and hope for better times. This Cinderella accomplishes all
that—but does so without taking advantage of the viewer’s gullibility or
justifying their romantic notions.
This Cinderella extols virtues from beginning to end—justice,
forgiveness, patience, faith in man’s goodness, love, purity, and yes, courage
and kindness. “Have courage, be
kind” is mentioned no less than five times on separate occasions, by different
characters, nailing in a lesson with a velvet-covered hammer. It makes clear distinctions between
right and wrong, good and evil, vice and virtue. The good guys are admirable and lovable; the bad guys are
pathetic and must be forgiven. In
the end, it’s not just Cinderella and her prince who live happily ever after,
but the citizens of their kingdom. Can a movie get any more Christian than that?
