Sjokk, spy og rave reviews – her er de første Sundance-reaksjonene fra nattens premiere på Den stygge stesøsteren

I natt hadde Emilie Blichfeldts spillefilmdebut Den stygge stesøsteren sin verdenspremiere på Sundance-festivalen, og nedenfor byr vi på en gjennomgang av den umiddelbare mottagelsen. De første reaksjonene fra publikum og kritikere bærer bud om stor entusiasme.

Eller, tolk denne X-meldingen fra Matt Neglia som dere vil: «Someone literally threw up in the aisle during the premiere screening of THE UGLY STEPSISTER at #Sundance. If that’s not a ringing endorsement, I don’t know what is.»

Med invitasjoner til både Sundance og Berlinalen, var det allerede før jul klart at Blichfeldts lenge etterlengtede beauty horror skulle få en prestisjetung internasjonal festivallansering. Nattens visning i Midnight-seksjonen på Sundance er den aller første med et publikum, og samtidig som reaksjonene fra visningen strømmet ut på X/Bluesky/Letterboxd, har de første amerikanske kritikere kommet med sine anmeldelser.

Ryan Lattanzio hos IndieWire skriver blant annet:

Female genre directors have been responding to impossible, often body-contorting standards of beauty for decades. Enter Norwegian filmmaker Emilie Blichfeldt, who makes her gruesome entrée into that movement with her playfully grotesque feature debut “The Ugly Stepsister.” One character’s name being Sophie von Kronenberg in this stylized gothic retelling of the Grimm Brothers’ spin on Cinderella should offer enough portent for where the film is heading in all its nose-breaking, flesh-eating, tapeworm-infested grandeur.

Bilge Ebiri hos Vulture setter blant annet ord på hvilken effekt det gir at Blichfeldt snur sjangerkonvensjoner på hodet:

«It seems our patience has run out for simple narratives of good vs. evil — maybe because we know there’s usually more to such stories, or maybe because the villains were always a lot more fun. All this is to say that what makes Norwegian director Emilie Blichfeldt’s The Ugly Stepsister so powerful isn’t that it turns the tables on a classic fairy tale, […] but rather the way it does so, by placing us in a world of bleak, magically-inflected terror that underlines the base grotesquerie of the original. The Ugly Stepsister reveals a dark truth we’ve probably secretly known all along: Cinderella was always a body horror story.»

Det tradisjonsrike bransjebladet Variety er like imponert, og kritiker Peter Debruge går nøye til verks for å identifisere Blichfeldts mange referanser:

“The Ugly Stepsister” boasts the same mix of lush visuals and irreverent sensibility that art-house audiences once found in the work of fairy-tale revisionists Walerian Borowczyk (“The Beast”) and Juraj Herz (“Beauty and the Beast”), minus the perverse misogynist subtext. Here, characters treat “beauty is pain” as a kind of mantra, but it’s clear that Blichfeldt feels for the girls subjected to sadistic surgeries — like the one where Dr. Esthétique sews a pair of false lashes onto Elvira’s eyelids, his needle jousting directly toward the camera lens.

The director fully intends for audiences to cringe, although some of the film’s grislier moments are so excessive, we can’t help laughing. Blichfeldt withholds judgment on Elvira (although one could read the before and after shots of her naked torso as a form of humiliation), attacking instead the punishing “work” she has done. As the film goes on, we find ourselves rooting for Elvira’s success even as we half-want all those efforts to blow up in her face — a reasonable likelihood, considering the appalling way clumps of hair fall out where dainty ringlets once bounced.

Også hos Variety er også Blichfeldt profilert i et intervju, hvor hun blant annet forteller om motivasjonen for å lage en kroppshorrorfilm: «Being a woman is a very bodily experience. Although we are emancipated for the most part in the Western world, the cultural expectations are still rooted in the thousand-years-long story of being the object. I think that’s why we are so attracted to body horror. It’s great for metaphors or just showing what it can feel like to live the female bodily experience.»

Hos Screen Daily er kritiker Tim Grierson mer moderat i sin mottagelse, men finner mye å skryte av, selv om han mener filmen er ujevn: «This twisted fable suggests a filmmaker who gleefully goes to extremes, but the story’s shocks and stomach-churning gags prove more memorable than the underlying observations about the way in which women are pitted against one another in a patriarchal society.»

Sjangerfilmentusiastene hos Dread Central har også levert en anmeldelse fra Sundance, og kritiker Josh Korngut er full av lovord:

«What makes The Ugly Stepsister stand apart from its less ambitious fairytale-horror peers is its ability to weave this carnage into a more considerable feminist commentary. Like Coralie Fargeat’s The Substance from last year, The Ugly Stepsister uses viscerally disturbing gore to critique the unnatural bargains made in pursuit of beauty. Both films ask hard questions about the lengths women are pushed to in pursuing acceptance, power, and societal worth. Yet, where The Substance could lean into grim seriousness, The Ugly Stepsister usually opts for an even more comedic tone, making its bite feel accessible while also subversive.»

Det er for øvrig ironisk at nesten alle de første omtalene og reaksjonene på Den stygge stesøsteren kommer fra menn – både blant kritikerne og publikum, men det har kanskje vel så mye med Sundance og Midnight-seksjonen å gjøre – på Berlinalen kan det fort hende at reaksjonene inspirerer til helt andre takes. Uansett, så har Mashable en anmeldelse av kritiker Kristy Puchko, og hun er ikke noe mindre entusiastisk:

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 but aesthetically nostalgic. With everything from gowns to banquet tables to castles and would-be kings caked in rot, blood, and bile, this horror gem feels like a lost B-movie from the ’80s, so willfully repugnant you can practically smell the stench.

Flere anmeldelser vil garantert bli publisert i dagene fremover, men inntil da tar vi også med noen korte X- og BlueSky-meldinger nedenfor. For den veldig nysgjerrige er det også kommet flere brukeranmeldelser på Letterboxd («bleak and sickening in the most profound way possible»), men vær på vakt for spoilere.

Den stygge stesøsteren har norsk kinopremiere 7. mars.

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Proof of vomit at @shudder’s The Ugly Stepsister #Sundance2025

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— Peter Kuplowsky (@peterkapow.bsky.social) January 24, 2025 at 7:06 AM