My Review of Snow White (2025)

 

Written by Erin Cressida Wilson 

Directed by Marc Webb

Snow White: "To honor the day I was born, my father named me Snow White."

I would've watched this sooner but I was busy and I thought I'd let the dust settle on this discourse it attracted. Mirror, mirror, on the wall - is this Snow White the worst of all? Not quite, not quite.

It's certainly not as good as it could've been and it's not hard to see why some of the changes didn't go down well with audiences but it's surprisingly okay for the most part. You've got two divisive leads and at least one of them was on good form here.

Rachel Zegler has become one of those Gen Z actors who somewhat has annoyed a large segment of those online but credit given where it's due, she's not actually miscast here. In fact, I'd say she's pretty delightful as the titular Disney princess and had the characteristics down nicely.

Snow White remained a likeable and selfless character who seemed dismayed by the misfortune of her people but unable to stand up to her stepmother, the Evil Queen (Gal Gadot). It also didn't help that that Queenie Dearest wanted the Huntsman (Andy Kabia) to kill her. Luckily for Snow White, the Huntsman had too much of a conscience to do that.

Then there's the other players in Snow White's story. I hated the CGI dwarves but at least the voice acting for Doc (Jeremy Swift), Bashful (Tituss Burgess), Dopey (Andrew Barth Feldman), Grumpy (Martin Klebba), Sneezy (Jason Kravits), Happy (George Salazar) and Sleepy (Andy Grotelueschen) was okay. I also thought their relationship with Snow White was modernised pretty well.

As for the love interest, well he's a bandit named Jonathan (Andrew Burnap) and the chemistry between him and Snow White was decent enough. It still however didn't play that differently to how the romance with the Prince in the 1937 movie played out.

The Evil Queen's downfall though was different but fitting for the movie. Saying that, I cannot deny that Gal Gadot was miscast for the part and her villain song - All Is Fair was genuinely horrendous. Gadot could've had so much fun with this role but she's horribly stiff throughout the whole film and never feels like a genuine threat either.

- Greta Gerwig wrote some of the script for this movie, though not enough to get credited. I'm pretty sure she's happy about that though.

- Snow White making a point of remembering names certainly played it's part in cementing the Evil Queen's downfall.

- Standout music: Waiting On A Wish, Princess Problems, The Silly Song and Good Things Grow are decent new songs for the movie. 

- Chronology: It's based on the 1812 story though it's clearly meant to be 16th century Germany.

I'm going to slightly go against the grain here and say that I thought this version of Snow White was okay at best. Some of the changes worked, some didn't and Rachel Zegler did fine as the title character. 

Rating: 6 out of 10 

My Review of Snow White And The Seven Dwarves (1937)

 

Written by Ted Sears And Richard Creedon And Otto Englander And Dick Rickard And Earl Hurd And Merrill De Maris And Dorothy Ann Blank And Webb Smith

Directed by David Hand And Perce Pearce And William Cottrell And Larry Morey And Wilfred Jackson And Ben Sharpsteen

Snow White: "We are standing by a wishing well / Make a wish into the well / That's all you have to do / And if you hear it echoing / Your wish will soon come true."

With the arrival of the live action movie in two weeks time, it was long past time for me to go back and rewatch the original. Has it aged it well? Is it too problematic for a modern audience? Are people incapable of separating fiction from reality? Those are the questions to be asked, notably the last one.

You got to remember, this was the first animated Disney movie to come out and it's success has reverberated the whole franchise ever since. It's partially why the upcoming live action adaptation has generated so much pushback but truthfully, it's a really good movie.

You've got your Evil Queen (Lucille La Verne), who for some time has been used to being the fairest of the land, if not the nicest of rulers. Then her Magic Mirror (Moroni Olsen) gave the Evil Queen a harsh reality check - that her stepdaughter Snow White (Adriana Caselotti) would surpass her in beauty. The Evil Queen didn't exactly take that news very well.

Unfortunately for her, the Huntsman (Stuart Buchanan) had enough of a conscience not to kill Snow White and despite taking over their house, the Seven Dwarves also liked having her around as a mother figure. The Dwarves being Doc (Roy Atwell), Grumpy/Sleepy (Pinto Colvig), Happy (Otis Harlan), Bashful (Scott Mattraw), Sneezy (Billy Gilbert) and Dopey (Eddie Collins). Those dwarves definitely lived up to their names when they werent mining for diamonds.

As for the Evil Queen, she decided that if a Huntsman couldn't kill her stepdaughter, she'd do it herself. She disguised herself as an old woman and tricked Snow White into eating a poisoned apple. Then she got a comeuppance herself courtesy of being atop of a cliff during a thunderstorm.

As for the Prince (Harry Stockwell) part of the movie, well he's just there to fall in love with Snow White and bring her back to life via a kiss. Other than that and like a lot of Disney princes that would follow, there's nothing there, character wise to grasp onto. 

- In the original story, the Evil Queen had a far worse fate than the one given to her in this movie.

- Originally the Prince was captured and nearly drown by the Evil Queen but elements of those would factor into later movies.

- Standout music: Someday My Prince Will Come, Whistle While You Work and Heigh-Ho.

- Chronology: An unspecified time period for both this and the original tale, though European in origin.

Maybe it hasn't entirely aged well but Snow White And The Seven Dwarves certainly made a last impression that's still felt to this very day. Is it my favourite Disney movie of all time? Probably not, no but it's definitely one that's iconic, if dated in certain ideas.

Rating: 8 out of 10