Ella (Eloise Webb) lives with her wealthy parents in a beautiful estate in a peaceful kingdom. From a young age, she is taught by her mother (Hayley Atwell) to believe in the existence and presence of magic, allowing her to befriend the many animals on the estate, particularly the mice. Everything is perfect until her mother contracts a fatal illness. On her deathbed, she makes Ella promise that she'll always have courage and show kindness to others.
Years later, Ella's (Lily James) father (Ben Chaplin) reveals that an old acquaintance, Lord Tremaine, has passed and he has chosen Tremaine's widow (Cate Blanchett), who has two daughters, Drizella (Sophie McShera) and Anastasia (Holliday Grainger), as his second wife. Ella welcomes her step family warmly, despite the stepsisters' less than pleasant attitudes and her needing to protect her friends from her stepmother's cat, Lucifer.
Soon after, Ella's father goes abroad on business. Sadly, he becomes ill and passes. This new loss results in Lady Tremaine's true cold, wicked nature coming out. Desperate for money, she dismisses the servants and forces Ella to do all the work. Even worse, she gives Ella's room to the stepsisters, makes her sleep in the attic, and won't even let her eat with the family. One morning, after Ella, not wanting to sleep in the cold attic, sleeps by the fireplace, her soot covered face leads her stepsisters to dub her Cinderella, which Lady Tremaine and even Ella herself call her.
Crushed by their cruelty, Cinderella goes for a ride in the woods, where she encounters a hunting party. She meets one of the hunters (Richard Madden), who claims to be an apprentice named Kit who lives in the palace. Unknown to her, he's actually the only son of the land's dying king (Derek Jacobi). Despite never learning her name, Kit (a nickname given to him by his father) is enchanted by Cinderella's charm, kindness, and unique outlook on life and becomes obsessed with her. Upon learning that he has little time left, the King insists that Kit find a bride at an upcoming ball. Despite the law saying that he must marry a princess, Kit can't get over the mystery girl and talks his father into letting every eligible maiden in the land attend.
When the ball is announced, the Tremaine family is ecstatic at the prospect of marrying into royalty. However, when Lady Tremaine refuses to buy Cinderella a new dress, she fashions one herself from an old dress of her mother's with help from the mice. The night of the ball, Cinderella tries to join her step family on the way out, but Lady Tremaine, claiming that her mere presence will disgrace them, leads her daughters in ripping up the dress before leaving without her. Cinderella runs into the garden in tears and encounters an old beggar woman, who reveals herself to be Cinderella's Fairy Godmother (Helena Bonham Carter). She uses her magic to turn a pumpkin into a magnificent carriage, four mice into horses, two lizards into footmen and a goose into a coachman, as well as turning Cinderella's dress into a gorgeous blue gown complete with glass shoes before sending her on her way with the warning that the spell only lasts until midnight.
At the ball, Cinderella wins the coveted first dance with Kit, whose true identity she's pleasantly surprised to learn. This irritates the Grand Duke (Stellan Skarsgård), who's secretly promised Kit to a princess, which Lady Tremaine overhears. After dancing, Cinderella and Kit tour the palace and grounds together, slowly falling in love, but before he can learn her name, the clock strikes 11:59, forcing her to flee, dropping one of her glass shoes in the process. She manages to get away before the stroke of midnight and hides the other shoe in her room as a memento.
Soon after, the King dies, but not before giving his son permission to find his love. Once it's announced that every maiden in the kingdom is to try on the shoe, Cinderella goes to her room for the shoe, only to find Lady Tremaine waiting with the shoe in hand, having figured out her identity from her attitude after the ball. Lady Tremaine demands that Cinderella make her head of the royal family and give her daughters proper husbands when she becomes queen and when she refuses, Lady Tremaine smashes the shoe and locks Cinderella in her room. She then brings the shoe and identity of the mystery girl to the Grand Duke and talks him into rewarding her with title of countess and worthy husbands for her daughters. He takes the shattered shoe to Kit, hoping to convince him to forget the mystery girl, but this makes him more determined than ever to find his love.
The Grand Duke and the captain of the guards (Nonso Anozie) lead a garrison to try the remaining shoe on all the maidens in the land, all of whom are rejected by the magic of the shoe, before arriving at the Tremaine estate. When the shoe rejects both stepsisters, they turn to leave, only to hear Cinderella singing thanks to the mice opening her bedroom window. The Grand Duke tries to leave anyway but is stopped by one of the men, who reveals himself to be Kit in disguise and demands that the captain investigate the sound. Once Cinderella is found, Lady Tremaine tries to forbid her from trying on the shoe, but is overruled by the captain. Sure enough, the shoe fits and Cinderella leaves with Kit after forgiving her stepmother, who later leaves the kingdom with her daughters and the Grand Duke, never to return.
Kit and Cinderella are married and crowned king and queen. The Fairy Godmother narrates that they become the land's most beloved monarchs, ruling with the courage and kindness she promised her mother.

Well, that sums up the whole story.

Two days ago, I went out with my mom and sisters for a girls' day out, and we decided to go watch the new Cinderella currently showing in the cinema. I had a really high expectation for this movie, because lately, Disney had been showing a lot of movies about strong and brave girls; like in Frozen, Maleficent and Brave. I wondered how they would show the self-strength in Cinderella.

Alas, I left the cinema completely disappointed and utterly full of disbelief. There was not a single part where Cinderella showed she can also fight back to save herself. True, she did say she forgave her stepmother in the end, all because of her mother's last words for her to be kind and have courage. But that's just it. Nothing more than that.

I grew up watching and reading a lot of fairy tales and fantasy stories. But never had I been this disappointed over a fairy tale. Don't get me wrong, Cinderella has always been my favorite out of any other fairy tales (mostly because of the gorgeous ball gown and I certainly have a soft spot for blonde people). This is the biggest reason why I want Cinderella to stand up for herself and fight back against the evil stepmother and stepsisters. If I need to watch Cinderella again, I'd definitely choose the animation version by Disney rather than this new one. The animation version of Cinderella seems stronger than the Cinderella played by Lily James.

The only few things that I enjoyed in this movie were the adorable mice (nope, I don't like real life mice), Gus Gus and Jacqueline; the golden carriage made from the pumpkin, Mr. Goose; the stepmother's cat, Lucifer and Cinderella's ball gown (the skirt only though, I hate that everyone seemed to wear push-up bras in the movie). That's all, and those things were only showed so little in the movie. Which was the reason why I feel disappointed after watching this movie.

The worst part would probably be when the stepmother locked Cinderella inside her room. Instead of trying to scream or yell, or even find a way to escape, she resulted in singing a song. As if she's a strong person that was okay to be treated that way. That is not strong, that's weak. A strong person fights back what's right for them, not sing the pain away. If not helped by the lovely and kind mice, Ella would still be stuck inside her room, singing until the end of her life. And that's sick.

I don't know what went wrong with Disney, but I really hope they won't repeat this same mistake. They need to realize that a lady doesn't always need a man to save them, like a damsel in distress, but they can also stand up on their own and lead a good life.


My rating: 2.5 out of 5


Till next time ♡ Love, Humaira