Ok, so what is she basically? A vain woman who wants to make sure that no one--especially her stepdaughter--surpasses her in beauty, and will go to literally any lengths to ensure that her title is kept. It is both her design and her actions throughout the film that make her evil rather than her specific personality or motivation. Unlike the usual Disney characters, villains have to be judged in an entirely different way because they're not meant to be lovable, they're not meant to be too relatable, because the movie is just supposed to make us want to hate them.
So, what do I think of the Evil Queen? Well, as a child she ruined the movie for me because in her Hag form, she was literally my only fear, so I could never watch Disney's masterpiece properly. As I got older--and slightly more used to her appearance--though, I began to see her for what she was.
Her motivation isn't great at all, in that she can actually reflect the vanity of many women who just want to stay on top. In this sense, there's nothing noticeable about her. But in her actions however, they are nothing but evil and intimidating! Take a look at the scene when she commands the Huntsman to take Snow White to the forest and kill her, you can just tell that she's serious and that she hopes that he'll succeed. In some ways Disney didn't make it as gruesome as the original story when the Queen actually wanted to eat Snow White's heart, but just the fact that she wants it to be "doubly sure" is scary enough.
Her turning into the Old Hag and then coming up with the poisoned apple idea is more scary in the way it is presented to us through her design. What gets really creepy is when she talks to herself and actually visualizes what will happen if she succeeds: Snow White getting buried alive and whatnot. The fact that she relishes in some thoughts is enough to make anyone quiver.
So, why is she so great as a villain? Her design, as some argue, makes up the majority of what makes her bad, but I disagree against this. Her design is one of her biggest assets, but as more and more of her evil personality comes out, it also proves her to be evil. So while her motivation is her weakest point, it does show just how much of an extremist she can be. All in all, scary stuff to deal with and a great villain for Disney's first movie.
Evil Queen Villain Scores
Design: 10/10 professionally done and enough to scare anyone
Motivation: 3/10 one of the worst ones and somewhat controversial considering she makes herself ugly in order to obtain the title of being the most beautiful
Actions: 9/10 sinister and goosebumps worthy. The only problem I find in her actions is that she didn't choose to kill Snow White in a more gruesome way than with a poison apple
Success-Rate: 10/10 because she did actually manage to kill Snow White before she herself died, so technically she realized her goal
Realistic-ness: 8.5/10 not the most realistic in what she does, but realistic in that a lot of women deal with vanity and jealousy on a daily basis (the media doesn't help much)
Overall Score (/10): 8.1
No comments:
Post a Comment