Princess Tales Beyond Disney 👸🏻🏰

  Not every princess wears a crown—some wear a red hood and walk through the woods, holding their fear like a secret. Fair warning: if you're looking for a straightforward plot, you won't find it here. This is art-house horror that prioritizes atmosphere, metaphor, and psychological terror over linear storytelling. It's as far from Disney as you can possibly get without leaving the planet. Picture from Pinterest The Company of Wolves is a 1984 film by Irish director Neil Jordan, an adaptation of Angela Carter's dark fairy tales, notably a fever dream of a version of Little Red Riding Hood dripping with both desire and danger, along with the raw pulse of transformation. This is a film intentionally baffling, deeply disturbing, and entirely not for children It begins in the modern world; a young girl, Rosaleen, falls asleep in her bedroom. From that moment on, everything turns strange—because what we see next isn’t reality but her dream. Inside that dream, she lives in a ...

"Once upon a time..." Wait. Stop right there. The wicked Queen interrupts with a smirk: "Let me tell you the real story. This is MY story." Picture from Pinterest We have heard the story of Snow White far too many times: innocent girl, evil stepmother, magic mirror, poisoned apple, handsome prince. However, Mirror Mirror (2012) has thrown everything on its head in a beguiling and satirical twist. Directed by Tarsem Singh, the film depicts a fairytale world like a painting—beautiful, exaggerated, but also dangerous. Beneath the glitter of gowns and feasts, there lies a story of power, beauty, and also of a woman coming into her own as the heroine of her story. Forget the Snow White you think you know, the cleaning and bird-singing and waiting-to-be-rescued damsel—this one's been shut in the castle by her stepmother, the Queen, bleeding the kingdom dry with ceaseless taxes, its subjects in a bitter state, its treasury without a coin, and herself desperate to hol...

What if the magic that made you "beautiful" was actually a curse? Red Shoes and the Seven Dwarfs takes the classic Snow White story, throws it in a blender with modern body image issues, and asks the question nobody wanted to hear: Are we only worth loving when we look "perfect"? Picture from Pinterest This 2019 South Korean animation may appear as bright, family-friendly fare on the surface, but scratch deeper and you'll find a surprisingly sharp critique of beauty standards—even if it doesn't always stick the landing. Enter the Fearless Seven: a group of heroic princes that protect their kingdom from harm. They are bold, proficient, and extremely superficial. They base their judgment on the looks of everyone and give them a hard time if they do not meet their expectations. Their comeuppance arrives when they accidentally kill someone whom they mistake for a witch; her dying curse turns them into short, green, chubby dwarfs. The only way to break the curse...

What if the evil fairy who cursed Sleeping Beauty wasn't evil at all? What if she was actually the hero of her own story—and maybe even the real hero of Aurora's? Picture from Pinterest This is not a tale about a princess who has slept for a thousand years, but one of how a woman finally awakens from the wounds, betrayals, and images of evil placed upon her. Maleficent takes us back, in 2014, to the world of Sleeping Beauty, not from the tower of a princess, but from beneath the black wings of the fairy that was once loved and betrayed. It opens in a world we never saw in Sleeping Beauty—Maleficent's backstory. She wasn't born a villain; she was a powerful young fairy, protector of the Moors (a magical realm), with magnificent wings and pure of heart. She believed in people's goodness, in trusting them, and in love. Then she met Stefan, a human boy from the neighboring kingdom. They formed a real connection, possibly even love. For years, their friendship was the br...

  This isn't a story about true love's kiss saving the day—it's a brutal medieval epic about survival, war, and a young woman forging herself into a warrior queen. Picture from Pinterest The film begins when Snow White's father, the king, discovers a strange woman pretending to be a slave. He succumbs to her beauty and marries her, unaware that she is the immortal Queen Ravenna, an evil sorceress who keeps young by siphoning off the life force of others, particularly young women. On their wedding night, Ravenna shows her true colors: she kills the King, takes over the throne, and eventually plunges the kingdom into darkness and ruin. The young Snow White, locked in her tower and imprisoned for a long time, sees Ravenna bleed the land dry. What once was a thriving kingdom withers into desert waste because of her tyrannical rule, and people actually suffer. But at this moment, Ravenna's magic mirror warns her that Snow White has grown into the only one who can destr...

Recommended soundtrack while reading: “Mrs. Potato Head” by Melanie Martinez—trust me, it hits differently. We all know the classic Cinderella story: a kind girl bullied by two cruel stepsisters and an evil stepmother finally finding happiness thanks to a glass slipper and a handsome prince. But what if that story were reversed? What if the “ugly” stepsisters weren’t monsters but real people with real wounds, envy, and longing? Picture from Pinterest The movie or adaptation of The Ugly Stepsister is highly inspired by the novel Confessions of an Ugly Stepsister by Gregory Maguire, 2002. The movie takes us into the same world, but from a different perspective—no fairy godmother, no magic glass slipper, just fragile humans with their own versions of the truth. The story focuses on Elvira, a young woman in 19th-century Europe who has never been considered beautiful according to the unforgiving standards of society. Elvira lives in 19th-century Europe with her cynical, social-climbing m...