Mirror Mirror - 4 stars out of 10

Mirror Mirror - 4 stars out of 10

"Mirror Mirror" is entertaining in spite of Julia Roberts.  This adaptation of Snow White has its high and low points but makes for a good family film.  Even though their names have been dropped from the title, the seven dwarves are by far the highlight of this film.  They certainly aren't HappyGrumpySleepyDopeySneezyBashfulDoc, but many of the dwarves receive deeper character development than mere personality traits.  The stand-outs are Mark Povinelli as Half-Pint (the dwarf with the constant crush on Snow White) and Danny Woodburn (from Seinfeld) as Grimm, the leader of the bandits.  Every moment that these dwarves were on screen, it felt charming and funny.  I cannot say the same for Julia Roberts.  From her opening voice-over, she came off as annoying to me (and I'm generally a fan of hers).  She didn't seem evil - just mean.  It just didn't seem like she was acting; unfortunately, her typical character does not fit well into a fantasy film.  Maybe I had too high of an expectation because she was on the movie poster, but I don't think that is an unfair expectation of an Oscar winner.  Unlike Julia who did not fit into the plot, Lily Collins made a perfect Snow White, kind and innocent but able to handle a sword.  Though the acting was sometimes a bit over-the-top, I think that it was intentional as she played this fantasy princess.  Her chemistry was good with Armie Hammer (the prince) and I simply wanted more Snow and less Queen the entire time.  I didn't like the Baker character - she was just too overly cheesy, but Nathan Lane was incredibly funny as the Queen's whipping boy, Brighton.  A film like this either needs to be way over-the-top to feel like a live-action cartoon (like "Enchanted") or transfer the fantasy story into a more realistic feel.  "Mirror Mirror" gets caught in the middle.  It will never become one of the classic fantasy films but I will look forward to watching it with my children some day.