Movie Night: In ‘Cinderella,’ Disney polishes its glass slippers into boxoffice gold

THE NEW YORK TIMES
By Manohla Dargis

Cate Blanchett, left, and Lily James in “Cinderella,” a fairy tale about mothers — dead, cruel and magical — who loom over a quintessential dutiful daughter far more than any man or prince.

HOLLYWOOD---Why Cinderella, why now? If you’re the Walt Disney Company the answer can only be: Why not? She may not be a princess (yet!) and the story may have been told innumerable times, but there’s gold in those glass slippers no matter how many miles they have on them. In traditional iteration after iteration, the story of Cinderella is also that of mothers — dead, cruel and magical — who loom over this quintessential dutiful daughter far more than any man. Try as the filmmakers might to obscure her victimization, there’s no getting around that this Cinderella has to do time as the classic persecuted woman even if the Disney imperative means that she must also dust herself off, go to the ball and waltz into a happy ending. As tabloids, reality television, countless novels and sometimes the movies suggest, you cannot keep a good woman down, even if it’s fun trying. [link]