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By Sandra Olmsted

Director Kenneth Branagh returns to Charles Perrault’s original story and treats it with the dignity according serious literature in this new version of Cinderella, scripted by Chris Weitz. The result is a moving, if slightly melodramatic, version of what is often written off as merely a fairy tale for and about girls. Branagh show his gentle touch with the talented cast and get just the right performance from each.

In Branagh’s retelling, a young Ella (Eloise Webb) lives an idyllic life even after her loving mother (Hayley Atwell) dies suddenly but not before she can advise Ella to have “courage and be kind.” The grown-up Ella (Lily James) and her father (Ben Chaplin) maintain the beautiful and quiet life and remain devoted to each other.

As the time for Ella to become a young women and to lead her own life approaches, her father marries Lady Tremaine (Cate Blanchett), a woman whose wiles include disguising her true nature until the knot is good and well tied. As soon as her stepmother settles in with her two insufferable daughters, Drisella (Sophie McShera) and Anastasia (Holliday Grainger), Lady Tremaine begins spending money with complete abandon.

Ella’s merchant father must work hard and take more trips aboard to paid for the gaudy remodeling of the ancestral home and the endless entertainment. Overworked and stressed, her father dies on a buying trip. Immediately, the stepmother and stepsisters relegate Ella to a servant, mistreat her, and soon nickname her “Cinderella” because she sleeps before the dying kitchen fire to keep warm.

Despite all the ill treatment, Ella maintains the courage and kindness her mother told her to, and it serves her well when riding in the woods where she meets Kit (Richard Madden), a young man “from the castle.” Ella asks that Kit and Captain (Nonso Anozie), his hunting partner, show kindness and spare a handsome stag. Kit, pretending to be an apprentice working in the castle is smitten.

Meanwhile, Kit’s father, the benevolent King (Derek Jacobi), insists that the time for Kit to marry has arrived, and Kit’s uncle, the self-serving Grand Duke (Stellan Skarsgard), insists that Kit’s marriage be made for political advantage. Kit insists on inviting all the maiden in the land in hopes of seeing Ella one more time, and when Ella gets to the ball with a help of magic provided by her fairy Godmother (Helena Bonham Carter), she hopes only to see Kit, the apprentice, one more time.

In Branagh’s version of this often told and familiar fairy tale, he provides realistic motivations and reactions for each of the characters, even the “evil” stepmother, who has become hard because of a difficult life and limited choices. In a nice touch, she even realizes what horrors her daughters are, yet she wants to give them better lives and better opportunities than she had.

Branagh enlists topnotch costumer Sandy Powell and five-star production designer Dante Ferretti to make this Cinderella as much a visual treat as his Shakespeare adaptations. While Branagh resists turning this remake of Disney’s famous property into a musical, he does direct his longtime composer Patrick Doyle, who first worked with Branagh on Henry V, to create an orchestral score worthy of any period drama and one which includes nods to Disney’s score for the 1950 animated version.

Branagh’s retelling moves a little slowly for toddler crowd, but will delight older children and parents although I suspect that more women than men will enjoy this Cinderella.

Screenwriter Weitz provides a dramatic and realistic plot by opening up the story from Perrault’s “Cinderella; or, The Little Glass Slipper” and Disney’s other properties. A Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures release, Cinderella is rated PG for mild thematic elements and runs 105 minutes and is in theaters now.

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