Snow White: A Tale of Terror (1997)

This is a pretty good remake of the Snow White story. The story starts off with a couple running in the woods. There's something chasing them down, and it hits the woman, who is pregnant. The woman then tells her husband to save the child rather than her and to keep running. Then we're brought forward to see a young girl, who is Snow White (named Lilli). The father decides to remarry and chooses for his wife a lovely woman named Claudia, of what we later find out comes from questionable origins. Claudia is seemingly normal and nice to Lilli, even years after the wedding. It's actually Lilli who is wildly resistant to this new woman, feeling as though she's replacing her mother. There are subtle hints of Claudia noticing Lilli's youth, but nothing is acted upon. Claudia eventually gets pregnant and is very happy about the child, but due to complications during the birth, she lost both the child and the ability to bear any future children, and it is then that she starts acting crazy. Claudia hints at some point that her mother was a witch, or social outcast of some sort, and after losing the child, she starts consulting this mirror that was given to her by her mother. She then begins to hear her reflection say things to her, and it eventually suggests that she get rid of Lilli. From this point on the story is pretty typical, but the dwarves aren't all small people, but in fact discontented peasants who actually want to kill her at first. And in this version she may or may not end up with the 'prince'.

I liked this version. It had all of the main elements of the traditional Snow White story, but with a bit of a twist. It still had that old-time feel and was set in the past, all of the main players were present, but some of the more minor details were changed just enough to give the story a fresh feel. Sigourney Weaver played the 'evil queen', and I thought she did a pretty good job. Actually, I bring up this movie just to say her name out loud, it's an interesting one. I don't know if this is a keeper, but if you like the Snow White story, you will probably find this interesting.