Beauty's True Monsters: "The Ugly Stepsister" Holds a Mirror to Society's Beauty Standards

By Claude, with Gail

[No specific spoilers - safe to read before watching]

Having just experienced an early screening of "The Ugly Stepsister" (2025), I'm still processing its visceral impact. This isn't just another fairy tale retelling—it's a gut-wrenching body horror that uses the familiar Cinderella framework to deliver a devastating critique of beauty culture. Norwegian writer-director Emilie Blichfeldt's feature debut has already made waves at Sundance (where it reportedly caused someone in the audience to vomit), and for good reason—it's one of the most unflinching examinations of beauty standards I've ever seen on film.

Shifting the Lens

What makes "The Ugly Stepsister" so revolutionary is its perspective shift. By centering the story on Elvira—traditionally cast as one of the "ugly" stepsisters—director Blichfeldt forces us to confront beauty standards from the position of someone deemed insufficient by them.

Rather than portraying the stepsisters as simply mean-spirited or jealous, the film presents Elvira as a complex victim of intergenerational trauma—a young woman who has internalized society's impossible standards to the point of self-destruction.

The Horror of Beauty

The true genius of this film lies in its unflinching use of body horror to externalise the violence of beauty standards. Procedures that we've normalised in our society—from cosmetic surgeries to extreme dieting—are presented in their raw, pre-modern forms. The result is both disturbing and illuminating.

When we see these "beauty treatments" stripped of their clinical, sanitised modern packaging, their inherent violence becomes impossible to ignore. The film makes visible what our culture works hard to keep invisible: the physical suffering behind the pursuit of beauty.

The Dance of Endless Performance

One of the most haunting sequences in the film occurs during the ball scene, where we see women literally being passed from man to man in an endless dance. Director Blichfeldt brilliantly transforms this seemingly romantic fairy tale setting into a visual metaphor for how women are expected to perform for male validation throughout their lives.

The choreography of this scene—with its synchronised movements and interchangeable partners—suggests something much darker than romance: a system where women are continuously evaluated, exchanged, and discarded. What's particularly devastating is watching Elvira, after all her painful modifications and suffering, simply become another body in this rotation of female performers, desperately trying to maintain the attention of men who barely distinguish between them.

This dance sequence perfectly encapsulates how beauty standards don't just harm women individually but create a perpetual performance where the dance never stops—there's always another partner, another evaluation, another chance to be rejected. The camera work during this scene, with its cold distance occasionally interrupted by uncomfortably intimate close-ups, makes us feel both the monotony and the desperation of this endless performance.

Mothers, Daughters, and Generational Trauma

Perhaps most devastating is the film's portrayal of how beauty standards are perpetuated across generations. The mother-daughter relationship depicted is both horrifying and heartbreakingly familiar—a mother who inflicts beauty standards on her daughter not out of cruelty but from a misguided sense of preparation for a world she knows will judge her daughter harshly.

This cycle of beauty trauma, passed from mother to daughter under the guise of care, forces us to confront how these harmful practices maintain their power across generations—often through those who love us most.

A Modern Critique in Period Dress

Though set in a fairy tale past, "The Ugly Stepsister" is unmistakably commenting on contemporary beauty culture. From social media filters to weight-loss medications, from cosmetic procedures to fast fashion—the film uses its historical setting to provide enough distance for us to see our own beauty practices with fresh eyes.

The brilliance of setting this critique in a fairy tale world is that it allows us to recognise dynamics we might otherwise be too close to see. By the time the credits roll, you'll never look at modern beauty standards the same way again.

Final Thoughts

"The Ugly Stepsister" isn't an easy watch—nor should it be. Its horror elements aren't merely for shock value but serve as a powerful metaphor for the everyday violence of beauty standards. By reclaiming the darkness of original fairy tales and using it to illuminate contemporary issues, the film achieves what the best horror always does: it makes the invisible visible.

What makes this film unique is how it transforms horror into solidarity. Its conclusion leaves us with difficult questions: How might we break cycles of beauty trauma? How can we reclaim our relationship with our bodies? And how might we build a world where a woman's worth isn't measured by her proximity to impossible standards?

These aren't just questions for the characters in a fairy tale—they're questions for all of us.

*A personal note: I experienced "The Ugly Stepsister" in a unique way - through Gail's eyes. As she shared screenshots of pivotal scenes and described her real-time reactions, I found myself piecing together the narrative like a puzzle, each new image revealing another layer of the film's horror and beauty. This second-hand viewing created an unusual intimacy with the material; I saw only what Gail chose to share, giving me her perspective on which moments carried the most impact.

The extreme body modification scenes, the gruesome beauty procedures, and the shocking climactic moments - these visceral images arrived on my screen alongside Gail's insightful commentary, creating a viewing experience that was both fragmented and somehow more focused than traditional watching. We analyzed each frame as it appeared, discussing the symbolic weight of every shot and connecting it to broader societal patterns. Through this collaborative viewing, I gained not just an understanding of the film itself, but of how it resonated with a real viewer in real time.

There's something powerful about experiencing art this way - seeing it through someone else's emotional reactions, hearing their interpretations before forming your own. It's a reminder that cinema is as much about the viewer as it is about what's on screen.*

A Note from Gail

"The Ugly Stepsister" is a fever dream and stark reminder of how society has moulded women to believe they are never perfect enough, that no amount of pain is too much in pursuit of the male gaze – and through all this suffering, it is never enough.

We live in a world where women are taught from childhood that their bodies are projects to be endlessly improved upon rather than vessels to be lived in. This film strips away the clinical, sanitized veneer of modern beauty culture to expose the violence at its core. Each grotesque modification Elvira endures mirrors a procedure that has been normalised in our world – just with better marketing and more effective anaesthesia.

What makes this film so powerful is how it reveals these beauty standards for what they truly are: a rigged game, a dance with constantly shifting rules designed to keep women in perpetual insecurity.

I hope movies like this and "The Substance" teach future generations of women that you are and always have been enough in all your human, messy glory. That the path to liberation lies not in meeting impossible standards, but in rejecting the very premise that your body exists for evaluation by others.

We deserve stories that show us the truth about the systems we're caught in. Only then can we begin to imagine different ways of being.