Ready for a gnarly fairytale, full of body horror, dark humor, and sibling rivalry? The Ugly Stepsister will give you all that and more. And the video above gives you a bone-crunching preview.
Written and directed by Emilie Blichfeldt, this critically heralded horror movie takes the Cinderella story you thought you knew, and gives it a bloody fresh spin by focusing on the maligned ugly stepsister. Sure, Elvira (Lea Myren) dreams of being swept up in the arms of the kingdom’s handsome prince. But to catch the eye of this eligible bachelor, her ruthless mother (Ane Dahl Torp) believes she needs the help of Dr. Esthétique (Adam Lundgren), a medieval cosmetic surgeon whose methods are, well, the stuff of nightmares.
The clip above offers some of the horrid lengths poor Elvira will go to achieve her happily-ever-after. But the cheeky tone of this faux commercial for Dr. Esthétique gives a sense of the wicked sense of humor at play in The Ugly Stepsister.
As I cheered in my review out of the film’s Sundance premiere, “The Ugly Stepsister is a deranged and dizzying achievement, folding in a classic story with a bitingly modern satire and bold body horror. Blichfeldt weaves these elements together to make a film that feels both of this moment and aesthetically nostalgic.”
See for yourself when The Ugly Stepsister opens in theaters on April 18.
