Although the sword-and-sorcery subgenre has experienced something of a revival of late, there is a glaring lack of evidence — aside from HBO’s Game of Thrones — to suggest that this has been a good thing. Days would surely be sunnier had Clash of the Titans, Season of the Witch and Your Highness never existed, but exist they do, [...]

For some time now, Disney have shunned their traditional fare of fairytale retellings in favour of CGI animation with the Pixar partnership and what are arguably male-dominated stories (Chicken Little, Bolt). But their fiftieth animated feature as a solo studio continues the re-emergence of the romantic fable after 2009’s The Princess and the Frog, and marks a return to the big tales that guarantee big success. That is, [...]