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Anne Fontaine’s present-day female-sexual-empowerment fable “White as Snow” is not a Snow White story per se, although it’s fun to think of Isabelle Huppert’s character — an aging health-spa diva who becomes diabolically envious of her stepdaughter — as the wicked queen. This, one might argue, was a campy role the icy French star was born to play, and Huppert sinks her teeth into it, much as her scheming villainess hopes the pale-skinned Claire (Lou de Laâge) might a poisoned apple. But the differences between Fontaine’s stunt and the actual Brothers Grimm fairy tale distractingly outweigh the film’s semi-forced similarities, ultimately leaving audiences to wonder how this coy provocation wound up getting confused with Snow White in the first place.

The answer: Fontaine began with a situation more than a story, wherein a “pure” young woman (so perceived by multiple characters) discovers the nubile effect her beauty has over men.

Prepare to be corrupted and depraved once more as Nucleus Films releases the sequel to the definitive guide to the Video Nasties phenomenon – the most extraordinary and scandalous era in the history of British film. Video Nasties: The Definitive Guide Part 2, a three-disc collector’s edition box set, is being released on DVD on July 14th 2014, to tie in with the 30th Anniversary of the Video Recordings Act 1984.

For the first time ever on DVD, all 82 films that fell foul of the Director of Public Prosecutions “Section 3” list are trailer-featured with specially filmed intros for each title, alongside a brand new documentary – Video Nasties: Draconian Days (review), directed by Jake West.

And to celebrate the release, Film4 FrightFest is hosting a special event – the world exclusive London Premiere of the finalised unseen extended 97 minute cut of Video Nasties: Draconian Days at The Prince Charles Cinema on Thurs 3 July, 8.30pm. The...

Above: Gustav Mezey three-sheet poster for Le Rosier de Madame Husson (Bernard Deschamps, France, 1932).

This stunning Austrian deco poster, which I came across on a Berlin antiquarian site, stands a magnificent 9 foot tall (110" x 49" to be precise) and comes in three sections. The poster is for a 1932 French film, whose German title, Der Tugendkönig, translates as “The Virtue King.” In the Us the film was titled He (or He - the Virgin Man), but the original title is Le Rosier de Madame Husson. Based on an 1887 Maupassant novella of the same name, the story concerns the titular Mme. Husson who seeks to promote chastity in her village by crowning a rosière, or a Rose Queen: a girl of unimpeachable virtue. But when none of the young women in town are equal to the title she selects the village idiot (played in the film by Fernandel) as her rosier.

Above: Roger...