Emilie Blichfeldt’s “The Ugly Stepsister” (Den stygge stesøsteren, 2025) is an unnerving, grisly twist on the Cinderella narrative. The age-old fable is spun into new registers of intense body horror. Its latent sexual enquiries are ferreted out, lurid and searching and scathing. Characters are flipped, the beautiful remain banished, and the unpleasant triumphant for long. Even when the tables are turned, it’s too late. It’s a bloody, disturbing rendition the film offers, with ample unease and provocation, not shying from the explicit and outrageous.
The director wants to interject familiar templates with vicious bursts of pure genre statement. It’s spiked with fearless gestures and an affinity for overt horror, capitalising on all the hidden impulses in the original text. In its new weave, beauty, its impossible standards exact a horrible, punishing price, far more severe than its aspirant could have ever imagined. Greed pushes her down an abyss of devastation. So much lies completely forsaken. What could have been glorious turns gruesome, dreams fuse into nightmares in this grotesque, deranged vision of the female body. Fate cannot be evaded, the price has to be paid.
The Ugly Stepsister (Den stygge stesøsteren, 2025) Plot Summary & Movie Synopsis:
The heroine believes she can wrest back high beauty at no great cost, even though there are all sorts of signs indicating horrors in store should she keep pushing, wanting more. She remains oblivious, resolved to remain in the dark. Her body is visited by deformities, all in the name and pursuit of beauty, getting to marry the prince, who himself is a bit of an asshole. In fact, all she, Elvira (Lea Myren), wants is an idealised man of her dreams, in keeping with royal lineage, who can lift her from the morass of ugliness and not be perceived with desire.
Elvira grows up on a diet of fables around this idealised, imaginary prince who is capable of rescuing many a damsel in distress just by sheer being. The prince’s presence and being linked in a relationship with him can make any girl’s life complete. Moreover, Elvira’s mother, Rebekka (Ane Dahl Torp), married an old man, hoping she could inherit his wealth. But he died soon, and she discovered he was even worse off than she. Now Rebekka aims to get her daughter married to a wealthy suitor. Rebekka had always told her daughter that she was ugly. Elvira’s step-sister, Agnes (Thea Sofie Loch Naess), is the exemplary model of beauty, thus inciting her envy.
Elvira daydreams about marrying Prince Julian (Isac Calmroth). Obviously, he occupies every racing thought of hers, invading her dreams, her waking consciousness. Rebekka pushes Elvira through an agonising routine of beautification. Elvira’s tooth braces are taken off. Eyelashes are sewn through her eyelids. Her pain is of no importance to her single-minded, cold, unfeeling mother. All Rebekka cares for is a rise in their fortunes, whatever it takes. Elvira’s nose is also brutally whipped into shape.
At school, there’s the intimation of a dance performance that’d open the ball that the prince will be attending. Elvira puts forth her best foot, but she keeps getting passed over. The instructor has her gaze firmly pinned on Agnes. It’s she who gets promoted to the forefront of the dance. Elvira remains sidelined and is not receiving due attention. Her efforts are in vain because her physical appearance distracts from the ordeal she’s putting herself through. Eventually, Elvira consumes a tapeworm egg, convinced it can fetch her the desired beauty. When she discovers Agnes’ relationship with the stable boy, she informs her mother promptly, who immediately expels the boy and turns Agnes into a domestic maid.
At the dance, Rebekka manipulates the way it’s planned out. She bribes the school and has the instructor push Elvira front and centre and remove Agnes entirely. Elvira, however, starts balding as the tapeworm inside her grows rapidly. Her mother pays no attention to her pain. Elvira has massive pangs of hunger and consumes food secretly. She goes through hell but is resolute that it’s she who must be at the ball. When she sees Agnes with a dress, she turns furious and bitter.
At the ball, all the mothers push their daughters forward for wedding proposals. The room is swarming with rich suitors, young to old. In fact, Rebekka belongs to the same breed of mothers who don’t care if her daughter ends up with an old man, as long as he has loads of money. At the ball, the prince chooses to dance with Elvira. She’d never dreamt he’d agree to it. But it seems his perception of her has radically changed. All her dreams seem poised to come true right when a woman in a blue gown appears. It’s Agnes, and Julian becomes drawn to her. Elvira is shattered.
Agnes had rushed back home at midnight but left a slipper behind. The prince is determined to find out to whom the slipper belongs. At home, Elvira directs all her rage on Agnes. Elvira chops at her foot, then her fingers. It’s a bloody mess. However, she has cut the wrong foot. Rebekka keeps abetting her daughter’s attempts at self-mutilation, persuaded it’ll save them from a life of debt. With the marriage to the prince, their lives could take a nice, dramatic turn for the better.
The Ugly Stepsister (Den stygge stesøsteren, 2025) Movie Ending Explained:
Does Elvira marry the prince?
The next morning, as the slipper fit Agnes perfectly, the prince declares he’d marry her. His pursuit is now complete. Elvira is heartbroken. She can no longer muster in herself the strength to fight, to resist her tragic fate. But her sister Alma persuades her to give up, throwing up the tapeworm. Finally, Elvira concedes. The long tapeworm gets out of her. Furthermore, Elvira experiences a surge of relief. The bitterness that had clouded her judgement, dampened her happiness, starts to lift.
Alma and Elvira leave the house for good. Their mother remains committed to the quest of a young, rich man. The film ends with Alma discovering her period stain. Having been closely confronted with her sister’s wretched beauty ordeal, she decides to be cautious about the price of pursuing torturous beauty regimens.
