--- title: 'Cinderella': Alas, Ella Is No Elsa From 'Frozen' description: Don't be fooled by Ella's new look, this fairy tale is full of disappointing stereotypes canonical: https://time.com/3742164/cinderella-disney-ella-frozen/ author: Jaclyn Friedman article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2015-03-13T15:27:45.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-08-04T07:44:27.715Z og:title: Why Disney's New 'Cinderella' Is the Anti-'Frozen' og:description: Don't be fooled by Ella's new look, this fairy tale is full of disappointing stereotypes og:url: https://time.com/3742164/cinderella-disney-ella-frozen/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltf3919a85747425e7/698783888e06019f9345ac56/cinderella1.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 5616 og:image:height: 3159 og:image:alt: CINDERELLA og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Why Disney's New 'Cinderella' Is the Anti-'Frozen' twitter:description: Don't be fooled by Ella's new look, this fairy tale is full of disappointing stereotypes twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltf3919a85747425e7/698783888e06019f9345ac56/cinderella1.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Why Disney's New _Cinderella_ Is the Anti-_Frozen_ > Sponsored content. 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Terms and conditions apply. * Savings buckets are a feature of Ally Bank's Savings Account. * No ATM fees from Ally Bank at Allpoint and Moneypass ATMs plus we reimburse for fees charged by other ATM owners nationwide up to $10 per statement cycle. * Early direct deposit offers eligible direct deposits up to two days sooner. * Spending buckets are a feature of Ally Bank's Spending Account. ## Video: Behind the Scenes of 'Frozen' [Watch (HLS stream): Behind the Scenes of 'Frozen'](https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/6r4nuWBx.m3u8) (9:58)  _Published 2013-12-30. Behind the Scenes of 'Frozen'_ by [Jaclyn Friedman](https://time.com/author/jaclyn-friedman/) ## Jaclyn Friedman Mar 13, 2015 3:27 PM UTC  Lily James as Cinderella in Disney's 2015 live-action feature inspired by the classic fairy tale, Cinderella Lily James as Cinderella in Disney's 2015 live-action feature inspired by the classic fairy tale, Cinderella Disney by [Jaclyn Friedman](https://time.com/author/jaclyn-friedman/) ## Jaclyn Friedman Mar 13, 2015 3:27 PM UTC Ever since the cast was announced, I’ve been wishing hard on Disney’s new live-action adaptation of _Cinderella_. This was, after all, a product of the new Disney, whose last princess-based effort resulted in the girl-power juggernaut we know and love as _Frozen_. And now Cate Blanchett, Helena Bonham Carter and even _Agent Carter’s_ “[butt-kicking bombshell](http://www.ew.com/article/2015/01/02/agent-carter-abc-set-spoilers)” Hayley Atwell were on board. Surely this band of power women would have signed on only to a more modern _Cinderella_, one that finds a way to luxuriate in the lush beauty of the tale while also giving it a much-needed jolt of female agency. How I wish I didn’t have to deliver bad news. I was a bullied girl who grew up on Disney’s classic animated version, dreaming that a fairy godmother might also reveal me as the radiant woman I knew I could be. I fervently wanted this reboot to be big enough to marry my childhood dreams with my adult belief that women aren’t ennobled by suffering or diminished by ambition. But I guess I forgot to wish upon a star. The new _Cinderella_ is as retro as they come. The film certainly is lavish. Everything is more beautiful than you thought it could be, from the hyper-real fairy-tale farmhouse to the ornately gilded pumpkin coach to the massive ball scenes at the palace to (of course!) the dresses. Oh, the dresses! Every frame is lovingly, sumptuously composed, and the performances live up to their setting. Aesthetically, Cinderella is an unqualified triumph. If only the film’s heart were as good as its heroine’s. This _Cinderella_ shares less DNA with _Frozen_ and more with _Snow White_’s Evil Queen. On the surface it’s the fairest of the fair. But underneath it’s rotten. You can tell that someone, somewhere had good intentions. There are multiple people of color in this film, and they’re not just playing servants. Lady Tremaine, Cinderella’s stepmother, is given a backstory clearly meant to humanize her — a beloved dead husband and a real fear that she and her girls will be left to starve without a man to provide for them. But what the film suffers from is a profound failure of nerve. Sure, the people of color are there, but the only two who speak at all are tertiary characters at best. It’s 2015\. Does the Prince really have to be white for the story to work? Does Cinderella? As for Tremaine’s motivations, for a moment they gave me hope that the story would go in a Jane Austen direction, exploring the limited and sometimes desperate life choices facing women who are forced to depend on marriage for income and class status. Instead it’s just a way to demonstrate how ambitious Tremaine has become, and how that unseemly ambition is the driver of her evil treatment of our heroine, who in contrast has no ambitions and is therefore purely good. More submissive than Anastasia Steele, Cinderella responds to every insult and oppression forced on her by suffering it prettily and with a song in her heart. That’s no exaggeration: even when locked in the attic by her stepmother, literally held prisoner in her own home, she doesn’t try to escape or even yell to the king’s men just below her in the yard. Instead she just floats about dreamily and sings. If it weren’t for some preternaturally clever mice, she’d still probably still be up there. What’s truly galling is that we know Disney can do better. In recent years it’s reimagined classic fairy tales in groundbreaking (and lucrative) outings like _Brave_, _Maleficent_ and, of course, _Frozen_. And it’s not like it didn’t intend to update the story. Kenneth Branagh, who directed this mess, is featured [in a video on Disney’s site](http://video.disney.com/watch/legacy-featurette-cinderella-50b60d49df9bc9f6e4e00199) bragging, “There’s no damsels in distress here. Cinderella’s not a pushover. She sticks up for herself.” I couldn’t possibly say what he means by that, because all the viewer sees is her parroting her mother’s dying words — “have courage and be kind” — while accepting without protest every abuse Tremaine and her daughters conceive of. Agent Carter would be very disappointed. And _Agent Carter_ is part of the point. Atwell’s other recent project is but one of a whole constellation of television series currently featuring complex, fully formed female leads, including _Orange Is the New Black_, _Jane the Virgin_, _Empire_, _The Good Wife_, _The Mindy Project_, everything Shonda Rhimes touches, and the just-released _Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt_, to name just a few. One glance at a TV (or streaming) schedule is all it takes to see how infinite the possibilities can be when it comes to women onscreen. But somehow the film-studio bosses keep losing the memo. In 2014, [only 12% of top-grossing films featured women in lead roles](http://variety.com/2015/film/news/women-lead-roles-in-movies-study-hunger-games-gone-girl-1201429016/). Only slightly more than half of all films released since 2010 [have even passed the Bechdel test](http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/the-dollar-and-cents-case-against-hollywoods-exclusion-of-women/), a pathetically low bar requiring only that a film feature two women who talk with each other at some point about something other than a man. This erasure of women isn’t even mercenary: films that do pass the Bechdel test are [repeatedly shown to produce more profit for studios](http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/the-dollar-and-cents-case-against-hollywoods-exclusion-of-women/) than films that don’t. And many of the films that do manage to feature a woman suffer from a profound lack of imagination about who women can be. If I wanted to go see a film from last weekend’s top 10 earners with anything resembling a female lead, I would be choosing between watching a [dim-witted blond protégé](http://www.npr.org/blogs/monkeysee/2015/03/02/390162376/of-con-men-and-dames-how-margot-robbie-gets-robbed-in-focus), a [retired British lady on an adventure](http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/the%5Fsecond%5Fbest%5Fexotic%5Fmarigold%5Fhotel/), [a naive virgin seduced by an abusive billionaire](http://health.usnews.com/health-news/health-wellness/articles/2013/08/12/whats-wrong-with-50-shades-of-grey-and-what-you-should-know-about-bdsm), [a literal monster](http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/the%5Flazarus%5Feffect/) or an “[ugly fat friend](http://bitchmagazine.org/post/we-can-already-declare-the-duff-to-be-the-worst-movie-of-2015).” Meanwhile the male leads in those 10 films are [a soldier, a scientist](http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/chappie/), [a con man](http://www.npr.org/blogs/monkeysee/2015/03/02/390162376/of-con-men-and-dames-how-margot-robbie-gets-robbed-in-focus), [a middle-aged superspy](http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/kingsman%5Fthe%5Fsecret%5Fservice/), [an abusive billionaire](http://health.usnews.com/health-news/health-wellness/articles/2013/08/12/whats-wrong-with-50-shades-of-grey-and-what-you-should-know-about-bdsm), [a sports coach](http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/mcfarland%5Fusa/), [a businessman](http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/unfinished%5Fbusiness%5F2015/) and [a sentient sea sponge](http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/the%5Fspongebob%5Fmovie%5Fsponge%5Fout%5Fof%5Fwater/). The theater in which I saw _Cinderella_ was filled with dreamers much younger than I am. No doubt some of them, as I did when I was their age, identified powerfully with that abused young woman, just waiting for someone to see that she could be so much more than her circumstances. Too bad they’ve been let down yet again by movie execs who can’t seem to see past the end of their wands. ### See Cinderella Through the Years  Silent film star Mary Pickford in Cinderella, 1914 Paramount  Ilene Woods as the voice of Disney's iconic Cinderella, 1950 Disney  Julie Andrews in a TV special of Rodgers & Hammerstein's Cinderella, 1957 Everett  Lesley Ann Warren in another TV special of Rodgers & Hammerstein's Cinderella, 1965 Everett  Brandy Norwood in yet another TV version of Rodgers & Hammerstein's Cinderella, 1997 ABC  Drew Barrymore in Ever After: A Cinderella Story, based loosely on the fairy tale, 1998 20th Century Fox  Anne Hathaway in Ella Enchanted, inspired by the fairy tale, 2004 Buena Vista  Amy Sedaris (second from left) as Cinderella in Shrek the Third, 2007 DreamWorks  Jessy Schram as Cinderella in ABC's Once Upon a Time, 2011 Sergei Bachlakov—ABC/Getty Images  Anna Kendrick as Cinderella in Into the Woods, 2014 Peter Mountain—Disney  Lily James as our modern Cinderella, 2015 Jonathan Olley—Disney ## Transcript [00:13] >>I've never been better. This is so nice. Oh, I wish I could [00:15] be like this all the time. Me too, me too, me too. But it can't, [00:21] but it can't, [00:31] but it can't. [00:32] >>Why not? If we-- because it's just-- it can't. Because [00:38] it just can't. [00:39] >>Nice. [00:43] >>No. I know we can figure this out together. [00:46] >>How? What power do you have to stop this winter, [00:50] to stop me? [00:51] >>I think we should go. [00:54] >>I'm not leaving without her. [00:58] >>No. I'm not leaving without you Elsa. [01:00] >>Yes you are. [01:03] >>No. I know we can figure this out together Elsa. [01:06] >>How? What power do you have to stop this winter to [01:11] stop me? [01:14] >>Well, he was spritely especially for man [01:18] in heels. [01:20] >>Wait, we live here? [01:24] >>Here, absolutely. [01:25] >>What? [01:25] >>No. No, no, no. We could invite all 12 of your brothers to [01:29] stay with us. Of course we have the room. I [01:34] don't know some of them must have wives-- [01:34] >>Wait, slow down. [01:34] >>and if they have kids that would be so much fun. [01:35] >>No one's brothers stay here. No one is getting married. [01:36] >>It would be so much to have children-- [01:37] >>So? [01:37] >>And you're alive? [01:41] >>I think so. [01:43] >>He's like the one we built as kids. [01:44] >>Yeah. [01:47] Your powers really are beautiful Elsa. [01:51] >>Queen Elsa of Arendelle, Princess [01:55] Ana of Arendelle. [01:57] >>They're here? Are [02:02] you sure, 'cause I don't think I'm supposed-- okay. Hi. Me? [02:16] Oh, hi. [02:17] >>You look beautiful. [02:18] >>Thank you. I mean, you look beautifuler or more [02:20] beautiful. [02:24] >>What is that amazing [02:30] smell? Is it chocolates? [02:33] >>Yes. No backup. I'll deal [02:37] with this crook here. [02:38] >>What was happening on the north [02:43] mountain? Does it seem magical? [02:45] >>I'm sorry. Really? [02:48] >>I'm guessing you don't have much experience with heat. [02:50] >>Terrific. [02:50] >>Perfect. [02:51] >>Oh, yeah. [02:53] >>Wow. Okay. So how exactly you planning to stop this [02:59] weather? [03:03] >>Great. [03:05] >>Now it's too steep. I've only got one rope and you [03:09] don't know how to climb mountains. [03:10] >>It's great. [03:12] >>Great. [03:13] >>And then [ unk ] at the door says, " Why don't you [03:17] wait outside last time I brought a guy home she furled [03:19] everything. So she's like saying-- [03:22] >>Did she say that? [03:22] >>Yeah. [03:23] >>So the last time I introduced her to a guy, she froze [03:24] everything. Why don't you stay outside? [03:26] >>But-- oh, come [03:31] on. It's a palace made of ice. Ice [03:35] is my life. Terrific. [03:37] >>It's great. [03:39] >>Hi. I'm Olaf and I like warm hugs and for an extra [03:43] flower if I'm also a love expert. Yeah. [03:51] That's so funny. I don't have a skull or bones. [03:56] Not sure what else was going for when she built me. For [03:59] love, oh it's good in this world. Where are we going? I'm [04:02] sorry if I got a little rambunctious back there. I'm just [04:06] excited. Hey, guys. That was the [ unk ]. Three, two, one-- [04:10] hi. I'm Olaf [04:16] and I like warm hugs. You built me, you remember that. [04:20] >>And you're alive. [04:21] >>Am I? [04:31] >>Great. Let's-- going back to the just you. [04:36] It's-- you're looking at it and you're kinda like, gosh I can't [04:38] believe this princess of this entire kingdom just called [04:42] herself a just. [04:43] >>Sure. [04:46] >>Just you? Just you? Just [04:52] you? [04:53] >>This is the moment in the ballroom where you-- where, [04:55] you know, she [ unk ] you come to her rescue. [05:03] >>We're dancing. Okay. Glad I caught you. Glad [05:09] I caught you. I would never shut you out. [05:14] I would never shut you out. [05:16] >>She is ready to go off and go chase after her sister. [05:20] >>Okay. [05:21] >>And you really, you really wanna stop, stop her from [05:23] going. [05:26] >>Anna, no. It's too dangerous. Anna, no. [05:30] It's too dangerous. Anna, no. It's too dangerous. [05:36] >>But you are very open. You've got the castle open. [05:40] You're walking at-- you're very accessible for Royal. [05:43] >>Yeah, right. [05:44] >>And you're handing out cloaks and you're very much [05:48] the sort of doing- everything- right guy. [05:50] >>Right. [05:53] >>Cloak. Does anyone need a cloak? Cloak. Does anyone [05:58] need a cloak? Cloak. 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