CINDERELLA

 

Hold on to your butts because it's not just Disney doing more live action versions of popular fairy tale characters to ruin your childhood. Amazon Studios have joined the party with their take on Cinderella, touted as a bold and ambitious new take on the classic tale however, this film couldn't have taken me further away from happily ever after if it tried.

Cinderella is a musically-driven bold new take on the traditional story you grew up with. Cinderella (Camila Cabello) is an ambitious young woman, whose dreams are bigger than the world will allow, but with the help of her Fab G (Billy Porter), she is able to persevere and make her dreams come true.

There's no other way for me to say this than Cinderella is an absolute mess from start to finish. Opening with their take on Rhythm Nation, it gets off to a lively start but it soon becomes clear that this is going to be a bit of a slog to sit through. First things first, this is an incredibly immature film that tries to shoe-in a message about Cinderella being her own boss and not bowing down to the conventions of the surrounding lifestyle. It just doesn't work in the slightest, the message being incredibly flimsy and underbaked amidst the screenplay.

If you're going to do a musical, you have to make sure your musical numbers are the showpieces of the film. It's what the success of such a film depends on really. Cinderella features a number of mash-ups and familiar hits, the Whatta Man/Seven Nation Army number on the dancefloor being one of the only moments that had me tapping my foot, but for the most part they are very lacklustre. It fits the rest of the film as there is a rather cheap look to it all, from the production design through to the costume designs that do nothing to make this an enjoyable film.

Coming to the performances, this proves that Camila Cabello should not have a future in acting because she is awful here. It's not just the acting that has to be questioned because even the singing sounds all over the place and autotuned to death. There's a handful of performances that raised a smile; Billy Porter, Idina Menzel and Pierce Brosnan springing to mind as they are very aware of the film they are in. Even the appearance of James Corden as a mouse didn't put me off as much as Cabello's performance, even if he does try and drag James Acaster and Romesh Ranganathan down with him.

When it comes down to it, this adaptation of Cinderella just isn't for me. Alongside Annette, it's a musical that brought me barely any joy which is almost scandalous for a genre that has been such a place of comfort over the years.

Verdict: ★