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In a climate thick with public domain horror adaptations, please trust me when I say, The Ugly Stepsister is not what you think it is. Emilie Blichfeldt’s feature directorial debut is a gorgeously grotesque take on the fairytale, returning it to its dark roots before pushing it firmly into epic body horror territory.
Dare I say, it’s classy? Because it is. But don’t be deterred by that. There’s also a hefty amount of worms going in (and coming out of) places worms have no business in. Blechfield’s satirical takedown of the “appearance industry” delves into the factual history of cosmetic surgery and infuses it with fantastical elements, which only serve to enhance the whole experience.
Blichfeldt’s previous short films deal with the concept and theme of simply… existing as a woman in a society hyper-focused on appearance. With The Ugly Stepsister, Blechfield cranks it to eleven with a larger platform to spotlight that throughline.
The fantasy sequences contain echoes of art that emerged from the Czech New Wave movement, and the beauty found within the grotesque is enhanced by Marcel Zyskind’s cinematography, vacillating between dreamy and nightmarish, and costume design by Manon Rasmussen.
Most of us can relate to Elvira (the titular character) in one way or another, and Stepsister feels like a personal love letter from Blichfeldt to all of us others. A love letter Blichfeldt created while clearly having a blast making us squirm.
For more Ugly Stepsister check out our review.
Read more from our interview (and watch the full video) with Emilie Blichfeldt below.
At the Overlook Film Festival, you made a really cool distinction between body horror and straight-up gore. Can you get into that a little bit?
For me, body horror is gore with meaning. It always carries meaning or images or thought, and it doesn’t mean it can’t be splattering gore and all of that. That’s super cool, but for me, body horror, not always, but sometimes is also quite stylized. It’s not to have a shock effect, like splatter in your face and then it’s gone. It’s actually there to make you contemplate somehow, the character or the story, what’s beneath the story. Often, I feel like it’s really an aesthetic study of the body and especially what’s inside or what can happen to it. It often lingers longer and for me, invites me to look somehow.
It’s interesting that you phrase it that way, because you do some really disgusting things in here, but you torture us because you drag it out and it’s almost like you’re daring us to look at it.
Yeah, exactly. I think every filmmaker is their own first audience somehow and I go for what I think is fun. The whole kind of anticipation with this retelling of a story we already knew would be, “How far will this woman take it?” How will I twist it? What will my version of the ball be? When she cuts off the toes, how? When will it stop? So for that scene in particular, there were a few times I was like, okay, they will think this is the last frame. But it’s not.
You did really extensive research into early forms of cosmetic surgery, but you ultimately blended your research with reality and these fantastical elements. What was the most surprising thing you learned during the research process? Was there anything particularly torturous that you couldn’t believe that people were doing?
Oh, that’s a hard question. I think I can’t really believe what people today are doing.
What’s a common one right now that makes you feel that?
I’m just thinking about these BBLs risking death. That’s no laughing matter. It’s insane. But also just the whole concept. I think also now, maybe more than before, it’s all about being image-ready. It’s all about being ready for that selfie. A lot of these influencers that look, “good on the internet,” they look crazy in real life. That, for me, is just so weird.
Is there any world in which we get an influencer body horror from you?
Oh, that would be too on the nose though. And people already say this movie is too on the nose, but then I’m like, but come on, it’s a fairy tale. I’m not making a psychological drama here. It’s not like Cinderella is a subtle story. I’m not here to be subtle.
Is there anything you wanted to include here that you didn’t for whatever reason?
Oh, often that’s like, loss of memory is like-
A blessing?
A gift, a blessing, yes. And now the movie is just the movie. But if I try to think back, yes, I saw one for the first fantasy of Elvira and the Prince. When the arrow hits her, I wanted him to pull it out and for her to go, “Oh,” to start to softly introduce the gore to the audience.
Also, when she was puking up the worms at the ball, I wanted them to start hatching so that small baby worms would come out. We didn’t have money for those two.
Does anything make you squeamish? Are these things that make you feel gross, and that’s why you put them in there, or are you not bothered by any of it?
No, I think it’s gross. But I guess not in my own movie because I’m so in control of those images. I know what’s coming, but I am grossed out by body horror. I’m very intrigued. I’ve been alone or felt alone for a long time with a lot of harsh feelings towards my body and also harsh actions towards my body. There’s this cathartic reveal when something is portrayed as vulnerable, not perfect. When I’m reminded of the vulnerable reality of my body, I take better care of it after seeing a body horror somehow.
Body horror is self-care.
Yeah, somehow. And also, just this insane feeling that I’m a very, or I’ve been told — it’s a very highbrow thing to say of yourself, but that I’m a very empathic person. So I can almost know what people are thinking because I read them. I have a very strong visceral response to body horror. A lot of people do. A lot of people are empathic. That’s not just me, it’s not what I’m saying.
But when I see it, I’m connected to the character’s bodies. It’s just an insane way to share a moment on screen with a character when you can feel their pain almost in your own body and have the same reaction. That makes me feel connected. I’m not lonely. That’s my thing. I don’t want to be lonely. I’ve been lonely too much in my life.
You have two short films that you’ve directed, How Do You Like My Hair and Sara’s Intimate Confessions, that also heavily deal with this theme of just kind of, existing as a woman in this world with society’s various beauty standards. With Ugly Stepsister, you’re obviously tackling that theme, but you have an even larger platform to do that. Do you think this theme will be this prevalent in your work moving forward? Or do you feel like this was your ultimate, and it’ll maybe have a backseat in your future work?
I think as long as I make movies about women… I think all women have to deal with that somehow. Queer women have to deal with it, having that male gaze on them whether they want it or not, or redefining themselves. Whatever kind of woman you make, she has to deal with that. At least for my characters, because I can’t identify with the women who just walk into the world like they were born that way or with that kind of, just one-to-one thing. They might exist, but that’s not true to me. But I don’t think it’s going to be the one big theme.
Right, but it’ll be present maybe in the way that it’s part of the conversation always just because we exist in a world where whether or not we want it to be part of the conversation, it is part of the conversation.
Exactly. And kind of acknowledge that. Also, I think it says a lot about a character in how they choose to tackle that. I am also very conscious about representation in film, and of different bodies, and different ways of being a woman on film. As long as film has been made mostly by men, we’ve had this kind of very bland one type of woman that has been represented. She’s always beautiful. She’s always in makeup. If she’s not, it’s just because she’s beautiful without.
And also, what is beautiful? What is ugly? And who defines it? Because what is ugly? What person can you really call ugly? You can do ugly stuff, but I don’t think there is an ugly person out there. You have the beauty standards that are ever-evolving, ever-changing. We found this beautiful statue of the “fat“ woman, the first statue of a woman. Now, we would call her “obese.“ But she’s a goddess, right?
It’s so different. The beauty is in the eye of the beholder or in the eye of the culture of the beholder, maybe even more. We have to try to hack that and try to get out of that and see beauty as a much broader definition than the beauty industry. I want to call them the appearance industry. They shouldn’t own that word, how they define it.
Absolutely. And work like this is really important because it’s very fun and it’s disgusting, and we’re screaming and clapping in the theater, but also, I feel like this is putting your stamp on it and saying, “Fuck it. We’re reclaiming this and we’re defining it for ourselves,“ which I think is so powerful, so thank you.
Thank you. I really want to hack the Cinderella story. No one’s going to see that Disney movie again and feel the same.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity. Watch our full video interview below, and watch The Ugly Stepsister now in theaters.
