The Terrible Three: Modern Fairy Tale Adaptations in Film

As every child knows, the "wicked stepmother" has been codified in three iconic fairy tales: Hansel and Gretel, Cinderella and Snow White. Considering the abundance of fairy tale adaptations in films and TV shows, for this post, I will only focus on the live action adaptations that have been released in the past 30 years. During this time, I have observed a trend to modernize these fairy tales. Millennials can look back at these versions of Hansel and Gretel, Cinderella and Snow White and consider the ways that these stories have evolved in our time and what elements have stayed consistent in each version. I will point out that while the titular characters have been developed in different ways, the stepmother is just as vile and malicious in every version of these stories. As for the father, that character is usually dead, absent or cursed so that the audience can see why he cannot protect his children from his new wife's tyranny.

This selection will feature the movie’s title, the year of release and the name of the actress that portrays the “wicked stepmother” of each story. Some of these movies are family movies and some are adult movies. Check each title carefully so that you can pick the right one for personal viewing.

SNOW WHITE
• Snow White: A Tale of Terror (1997) Sigourney Weaver
• Snow White: The Fairest of Them All (2001) Miranda Richardson
• Sydney White* (2001)
• Mirror Mirror (2012) Julia Roberts
• Snow White and the Huntsman (2012) Charlize Theron
• Disney’s Snow White (2025) Gal Gadot

In the latest adaptions of Snow White, the main character has been changed from a helpless damsel to a diplomat and a warrior woman prepared for battle against a tyrannical queen, much like Xena (Xena: Warrior Princess) and Princess Leia (Star Wars). These changes allow Snow White to have greater agency and a purpose beyond being the victim to be killed by the queen, protected by the dwarves and saved by the prince. The only drawback is that this development follows the age-old fallacy that a woman can only be "empowered" if she is a strong female character in combat. Future writers need to find other ways to empower women in fiction besides making them into battle mavens.

CINDERELLA
• Rodgers & Hammerstein’s Cinderella (1997) Bernadette Peters
• Ever After (1998) Anjelica Huston
• A Cinderella Story (2004) Jennifer Coolidge
• Disney’s Cinderella (2015) Cate Blanchett
• A Cinderella Story: If The Shoe Fits (2016) Jennifer Tilly
• A Cinderella Story: Christmas Wish (2019) Johannah Newmarch
• Cinderella (2021) Idina Menzel

For the past several years, I noticed that the Cinderella fairy tale is often adapted as a high school romance with the unpopular girl yearning for the handsome jock. The resolution of each version may have the Cinderella character striving to achieve a scholarship or a contract to achieve her entrepreneurial goals of starting her own business, thus keeping her in charge of her own destiny so that she does not need to rely on the prince and his royal status to fix all her problems. Cinderella and the prince also get more opportunities to meet during the story before they dance at the ball so that their relationship can be more developed beyond that "one night" which was usually love at first sight. In every version, the wicked stepmother and stepsisters get the boot when our heroine triumphs. The story is most frequently produced because it speaks to every person's desire to rise above their humble circumstances and achieve glory. It contains a universal message of transformation for young women.

HANSEL AND GRETEL
• Hansel and Gretel (2002) Delta Burke
• Hansel and Gretel: Witch Hunters* (2013)
• Hansel and Gretel Get Baked* (2013)
• Gretel and Hansel* (2021)

To be honest, I haven't seen many adaptations of Hansel and Gretel for family movies recently. Being trapped alone with a monster is a common motif in many horror movies. Most of the titles listed here emphasize the horror elements and play up the role of the witch as the primary villain. Some versions of the movie omit the stepmother and focus on the siblings in their fight for survival in the witch's house. The main characters must then rely on their wits to overcome the threat. Disney has yet to produce an animated version of this story, but they would need to make extensive changes to the source material. Maybe people feel uncomfortable with sharing a story where two innocent children get abandoned by their biological parents and then get threatened by a cannibal witch. That could also be the reason why the two siblings are frequently portrayed as teens or adults in these versions. Nobody likes to see bad things happen to children. Also, the story introduces the idea that some children cannot rely on their parents for protection and that they might abandon them for selfish reasons. The story does emphasize the power of bonds between siblings. It is important to remember that the original version of the tale portrayed the biological mother as the one who abandons the children, and the role was changed to a wicked stepmother in later versions. Nobody wanted to create stories that criticized the "saintly" mother in fiction.

*Minor disclaimer. These film versions do not include a stepmother.