The Huntsman: Winter's War (2016)

Strong and Moving!

The film never slows down or bores, plunging from one harrowing sequence to the next.

It is encouraging that the film ends so strongly.Otherwise, it wouldn't have been a particularly memorable film

Through painfully honest and emotional moments, the movie becomes irresistibly relatable

So, it's been a while since I've seen this movie so this might not be all that accurate, but who cares? I watched this movie when it first came out because while the first one wasn't all that brilliant Charlize Theron was a treasure and it seemed like she'd be in it a lot. And she did return. For the last ten minutes. Maybe twenty. It seemed as though the focus would be on the Ice Queen and Ravenna a lot more than it was at the end, most of the story was about the Huntsman and his wife, a story arc that was completely uninteresting. The wife had no real character to speak of and was relatively two-dimensional. You couldn't have completely taken out of the story, I'll admit that, because she did have to be there for at least a few plot points, but there were a lot of scenes where they just walked around and nothing really seemed to happen. It worked in LOTR. It didn't work in this movie. The Ice Queen was also pretty boring, with barely anything to do. The only thing interesting about this movie was every scene with Charlize Theron, which were preciously rare. The relationship between the Ice Queen and Ravenna, the twisted sisterhood would have been interesting to see developed, as well as Ravenna's transformation from a strange but human witch to a strange human/witch/mirror hybrid. The final action scene did have some interesting things but it was sad to see this powerful Ice Queen be defeated by her sister so quickly, only for a human to defeat her. He's a badass but you'd still think the other woman with powers would do more. It seemed wrong to have one of the most powerful characters suddenly take a back seat, espescially since I doubt this would've happened had it been an Ice King.Sadly, I'm probably still gonna watch it if there's ever another movie with Charlize Theron in this franchise.

I don't know why there was no connection between the huntsman and the baby in this. He coulda been the father, or even been the baby, himself. I guess the fewer connections the better these days, right. I'm not sure what a wood monger, name of Eric is doing being called a huntsman, or what anyone is doing being a huntsman in the first place. What is this Camelot, the Sherwood forest, I thought movies were supposed to reflect our circumstances not create a different, albeit realistic, reality. And wasn't it the beautiful love interest that was carrying the bow. Shades of Hunger Games, starlet Jennifer L. But given the out of step development of this plot of origin, this movie came after the first, but is set in a time before the time frame of the first - just press one if you are French, two if you're Spanish, or three if you're English - Eric, I mean, if we're English, don't the adjectives come before the nouns, it would make more sense in a foreign language where the adjectives come after the subject. But in a society without any royalty to speak of, who cares. I think I counted two flashbacks of the same incident, the baby of the ice cream, I mean queen - one from the POV of the ice queen, and one from the POV of the other ice queen, I guess I'll call them Ice Queen's, one and two. And several other miscellaneous flashbacks from the supporting cast. Yeah, Liam or was it Chris Hemsworth was in a supporting role. And what does an axe do but chop wood, how much wood, could a wood chuck, chuck if a wood chuck could chop wood. Well, now wood chucks or racoons here, dames and dudes. It's a buck or two, an arrow or two, and some weird dynamic around the mirror, that's just a shiny piece of metal. This didn't really test my meddle, but it did kind of make me crazy and a little angry watching this movie, but such is life. Thanks Chris, (not Hemsworth, BTW)

I am Scottish born and bred but I had difficulty understanding what Chris Hemsworth and some of the other players were saying. A French-Armenian director has no idea of the nuances of regional accents and should have steered clear of them. Just have everyone use standard English and not mangle the sounds of Scotland.Another obvious problem with this film is how much is derived from Game of Thrones, in look, content and concept. Little girls practicing archery is such a cliché these days. African warriors on horseback are another anachronism that third rate movies like to insert for some reason, perhaps to defend against accusations of racism? But not for historical accuracy even in a fantasy set in pre-renaissance Europe.

Although this movie did not do well in the box office, I thought it was great. It was cool to see how the Evil Queen uses evil to give her sister some power, but it takes heartbreak in order for it to occur. The Winter Queen does not allow anyone in her kingdom to fall in love, because of this heartbreak, and in the end she finds out the truth and is devastated. I thought it was a great sequel, good cast, good plot, just overall good.