Film review: Cinderella

With the lush production design and stunning costumes and there’s little doubt this is one film sprinkled with fairy dust.

Lily James as Cinderella.

Cinderella

Director: Kenneth Branagh

Starring: Lily James, Cate Blanchett, Richard Madden, Helena Bonham Carter

Four stars

After Maleficent, Disney's hugely successful live-action spin on Sleeping Beauty, comes a more traditional stab at rebooting an animated classic. Directed by Kenneth Branagh, Cinderella is a balmy but beautiful take on both the 1950 cartoon and the ori­ginal Charles Perrault fairy tale about the orphaned girl who meets her Prince Charming. Playing Cinderella is the lovely Lily James (Downton Abbey), who brings the requisite goodness to the character, even when she's faced with her wicked stepmother Lady Tremaine (Cate Blanchett) and her two vile daughters (Holliday Grainger and Sophie McShera).

With Helena Bonham Carter's dippy Fairy Godmother popping up to ensure Cinderella will go to the ball, Branagh doesn't deviate much from the original story. Yet the script by American Pie director Chris Weitz is laced with surreal touches – not least when our heroine's carriage transforms back into a pumpkin at the stroke of midnight, giving us a glimpse of what it's like to be inside a vegetable that's travelling at high speed.

Richard Madden is a bit bland as the Prince, but his insipid histrionics are hardly noticeable with Blanchett in imperious form. Factor in the lush production design and stunning costumes and there’s little doubt this is one film sprinkled with fairy dust.

• Cinderella is out in cinemas on Thursday, March 12