“The Ugly Stepsister”: The Cruelty of Beauty Standards

After the surprise that was The Substance in 2024, it appears that body horror is here to stay. And that is not a bad thing. Let’s talk about The Ugly Stepsister.

About a month ago, while I was mindlessly scrolling through Instagram, I ran into the trailer of an independent Norwegian film, Den Stygge Stesøsteren (in English, The Ugly Stepsister) and it simply kidnapped my attention. The trailer’s style made me think of The Substance, but the content was more… let’s say, audacious. It was not until this week that I managed to watch the film, and it was as good as the trailer promised.

The Ugly Stepsister is based on the Brothers Grimm’s classic fairy tale “Cinderella”, but instead of the title character, it focuses on one of the stepsisters, named Elvira.

Our protagonist’s mother, Rebekka, gets married to an older man, trying to secure a situation for herself and her two daughters. The man also has a daughter of her own, Agnes, who is very pretty. The sudden death of the groom on the wedding night uncovers the truth: he was penniless. Doubting that she can find another wealthy man at her age, Rebekka decides to marry off her older daughter. The announcement of an upcoming royal ball, where Prince Julian is to choose a wife, seems to be the solution to everything.

The problem is that Elvira is not attractive at all, and with Agnes as a competition, her chances of success are dim. Pushed by Rebekka, the young woman will put herself through various procedures and diets to make sure she is “beautiful” in time for the ball.

Beauty is Pain

Even though you can tell that the film was made on a small budget, the production and costume design are wonderful. The historical period in which the story takes place is ambiguous, something that goes surprisingly well with the soundtrack’s pop music. These elements create an atmosphere that is dark and has a gloomy kind of beauty to it.  

The whole cast is excellent, but Lea Myren carries the film with her performance as Elvira. Our protagonist is an innocent and clumsy girl who is constantly belittled by others because of her appearance. Her family’s financial troubles are a powerful motivation to fight for the prince, but what Elvira is really desperate for is affection. In her mind, if she changed her looks, if she became “pretty”, she would be someone worthy of love.

So she tolerates extreme pain to fix her nose, get showy eyelashes, and even swallows a tapeworm to lose weight, which has a horrific impact on her health, both physical and mental. Madness reaches its peak when she commits a final act of desperation to make Cinderella’s slipper fit. That is partly why the horror scenes are so effective, aside from any technical aspect: Elvira is so determined to improve herself but at the same time so emotionally fragile, that watching her spiral into self-destruction is a real agony.

Her struggles with self-esteem are something the majority of the people can relate to; this makes you care for the character and feel very involved in her journey. You want to see her succeed, to have at least a small victory to compensate for all the pain.

Impressionable People, Beware

Maybe watching Terrifier last year desensitized me forever, but personally, I did not find The Ugly Stepsister to be all that extreme. I clarify this because while researching the movie, I read that when the film was screened at Sundance in January, someone in the audience threw up. It sounds like marketing to me.

To be clear, The Ugly Stepsister has some insane scenes, most involving the surgeries Elvira endures, and there are also a few sexually explicit shots, so have that in mind if you are planning to watch it. Again, what makes it most disturbing is the context. While not for everyone, I believe it is not too out there for people who watch horror movies on a more regular basis. They probably saw way worse than this.

The New Body Horror is “Feminist”?

The key aspect of the film is its heavy criticism of plastic surgery and all the aggressive procedures women go through to achieve “perfection”, and so reach the beauty standards. Even though the plastic surgeries depicted are quite primitive, the parallelisms with current times are evident. To some extent, Elvira evidences what many women experience in real life.

Some may feel tempted to stick The Ugly Stepsister inside the same bag that many movies Hollywood has been plaguing us with for the past decade or so: the “pop feminist” films that are just a shiny show of victimhood. Blaming men and patriarchy for women’s every struggle while assuming no responsibility whatsoever for their own lives. Their trademark is a scene where the female protagonist offers us a monologue explaining how oppressed she is. Something performative and intellectually dishonest.

As well as The Substance did, I think that The Ugly Stepsister acknowledges something that tends to have a heavier impact on women (in this last case, beauty standards), while also holding women accountable for taking part and promoting those standards as well. Elvira is willing to go to any lengths to make the prince fall in love with her, but who is the one enabling that dangerous behavior? Mainly, her mother. The teachers in the finishing school also do so, one by subjecting her to constant humiliation and the other by suggesting more radical methods to lose weight. It is said that a woman’s worst enemy is another woman, and I could not agree more.

Body Positivity for the Poor

Feminists can blame men all they want, but the truth is that we are exposed to media that pretends to push self-acceptance and “real bodies” through the mouths of public personalities and brands that sell the exact opposite. The same celebrities that lecture us on female empowerment and body positivity from the red carpets spend millions on beauty procedures, have their faces almost paralyzed by the amount of botox they had injected, and lose weight overnight taking Ozempic. In fact, I had the feeling that the tapeworm in the movie was a dig to that medication in particular. 

So we are not ugly; we are just poor. 

A Project That Deserves Our Attention

Unfortunately, The Ugly Stepsister has had a very limited theater distribution, but depending on the country, it can already be found on some streaming services. I ignore how much noise it has made online, but I really hope more people find this film.

I appreciate movies that, without lecturing their audience, can provide honest criticism and lead us to some necessary reflection. Social media and beauty trends will always be here, but it is time for us women to take some responsibility for our own choices and work on our self-esteem rather than looking for validation outside. 

I know body horror is a genre that does not appeal to everyone (it is not my favorite either), but if you feel capable of giving The Ugly Stepsister a chance, I highly recommend you watch it.