TIME TAKES A LOOK AT THE UNFAIR CRITICISM OF SWATH

There are voices of reason in the world who actually understand what Rupert Sanders, Kristen Stewart and Charlize Theron have done to bring an old story into modern times.  Sanders made the women strong but not in a manly way and both Stewart and Theron did the same.  Using their minds is apparently something the critics just do not understand. 


Time points out that critics view the Snow White story still in an elementary way: She's not pretty enough, she's wearing armor and not fighting [like a man] etc...  These overtones are clearly there and in a vicious manner too and writing in such a manner that the overtones promoted failure at the box office.


Unfortunately for them, it just did not work out that way.
Time writes:


"Rupert Sanders didn’t turn the two women leads into men: “That happens sometimes when films turn women into action heroes. But I made a decision not to have Kristen do anything that she wouldn’t realistically be able to do. The men follow her into battle because of the spirit within her."


"Snow, as she’s called, brings her uniquely feminine power to almost every scene. She tames a ferocious giant troll and calms not one, but two, skittish white steeds. She makes dolls, comforts frightened girls, and generally has a magical effect on everything around her. “I feel lovely; it’s her doing,” one of the wizened dwarves declares admiringly. Another observes that she is “life itself” and will “heal the land.” But she’s not a Jason Bourne; her bravery comes from her quiet charisma and earth-mother compassion, not from physical strength."


"And yet there has been an unfair drumbeat of negativity, even rudeness, about Kristen Stewart’s portrayal:


“Hollywood’s reigning princess of dour.” “A bit of a galumpher.” ‘Can’t Kristen be a little more up?’ “Stewart fails to impress,” one critic declared, calling her “closed down,’ an “awkward fit,” and blank-looking” and faulting her “slouchy bearing” and “sulky passivity.” Some critics wondered aloud if she was pretty enough to compete with Theron’s golden, Bondgirl hotness. Lou Lumenick of the New York Post was even blunter, asking, “This is Snow White?’ and calling Stewart “nobody’s idea of ‘the fairest in the land,’ and “bruised-looking, disaffected, and scowling.” Even Mr. Lumenick might scowl if he were locked in a dungeon for a decade and forced to swim through raw sewage, not to mention starved, poisoned, and pressed into military service. But, in any event, these claims are misdirected: It’s the men who are gruff and glowering. Stewart has never been more radiant or affecting. Here is an action hero who dances and laughs and cries."


Read more here.