A Critique of Mirror Mirror Safiye N. GÜVELİ, TR111.03 All around the world, generations after generations grew up reading and listening to the story of Snow White. The tale of the “fairest of them all” has been retold countless times, the oldest one dating back to 1812. The Brothers Grimm published it for the first time in their collection Grimms’ Fairy Tales. In the three centuries that have passed since, there have been numerous adaptations. All of these adaptations depict the story in different lights and make it possible for us to discover a brand new side of Snow White’s story each time around. Among those adaptations is Mirror Mirror, a 2012 movie directed by Tarsem Singh. Mirror Mirror turns the story completely on its head and creates a brilliant adaptation with the way it gives depth to the characters, redefines the relationship between Snow White and the prince, and most importantly, redefines Snow White herself. Mirror Mirror takes liberties with the adaptation at …show more content…
The relationship evolves through an interesting course of events. This is in great contrast to the hypotext, where the very first time Snow White and the prince meet is when the prince loads her on the backs of his servants in a glass coffin. Throughout the movie, the pair meets several times, resulting in an instant spark and the gradual built-up towards love. There is conflict, tension, and flirting that makes it believable when the pair declares their love for each other. Furthermore, gender roles are remarkably less prominent in this adaptation compared to the hypotext, evident in the way Snow White and the prince even get into a sword fight, as well as several verbal disputes. The best part of the movie’s take on this relationship is the role reversal, wherein it is Snow White who uses True Love’s Kiss to break the spell cast on the prince by the evil