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Most fairy tales were told and retold countless times before Walt Disney ever got his hands on them, and yet, the sensibility behind such animated classics as “Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs” and “Sleeping Beauty” has proven so popular on such an international scale that few know these stories’ darker origins. The family-friendly studio’s more-wholesome-than-horrifying approach gives Norwegian writer-director Emilie Blichfeldt plenty of room to push back with “The Ugly Stepsister,” a deliciously extreme take on the beloved “Cinderella” legend, complete with broken noses, severed toes and other gory details befitting the Grimm bros.

Premiering in the Midnight section of the Sundance Film Festival, the graphic update swipes a different page from the Disney playbook: Instead of focusing on the familiar wench-in-waiting, Blichfeldt recenters her version on one of the tale’s iconic antagonists, finding empathy for the pig-nosed, slightly plump stepsister (played by Lea Myren) who’s...

Noomi Rapace, Beyond Pernilla August-Noomi Rapace Drama Beyond Tops Guldbagge Nominations Best Film Simple Simon Sebbe Beyond Best Foreign Language Film Fish Tank, dir Andrea Arnold Lourdes, dir Jessica Hausner The Social Network, dir David Fincher Best Director Pernilla August, Beyond Lisa Langseth, Pure Babak Najafi, Sebbe Best actress in a leading role Pernilla August, Miss Kicki Noomi Rapace, Beyond Alicia Vikander, Pure Best actor in a leading role Sebastian Hiort af Ornäs, Sebbe Joel Kinnaman, Easy Money Bill Skarsgård, Simple Simon Best actress in a supporting role Tehilla Blad, Beyond Cecilia Forss, Simple Simon Outi Mäenpää, Beyond Best actor in a supporting role Peter Dalle, Behind Blue Skies David Dencik, Cornelis  Ville Virtanen, Beyond Best screenplay Pernilla August and Lolita Ray, Beyond Lisa Langseth, Pure Jonathan Sjöberg and Andreas Öhman, Simple Simon Best cinematography Göran Hallberg, Behind Blue Skies Erik Molberg Hansen, Beyond Aril Wretblad, Easy Money Best documentary Familia,...

Bill Skarsgård, Cecilia Forss in Andreas Öhman's Simple Simon (top); Heikki Färm and Jani Kumpulainen's Steam of Life (bottom) Tirza, Simple Simon, Steam of Life, and Angel are four potential 2011 Academy Award contenders in the Best Foreign Language Film category. Those are, respectively, the submissions from The Netherlands, Sweden, Finland, and Norway. Directed by Rudolf van den Berg after an eight-year hiatus, Tirza is a complex psychological drama in which a middle-aged Dutchman (Gijs Scholten van Aschat) comes unglued while attempting to find his missing daughter in Namibia. During his search he's befriended by a nine-year-old local girl who also happens to be a sex worker. Based on a novel by Arnon Grunberg, Tirza has received highly favorable reviews in the Dutch media. Whether the generally conservative Best Foreign Language Film-voting Academy members will go for the graphic dialogue and situations, the fragmented narrative (adapted by van den...