I prefer 'em with a tan

Rating: 7/10 (24 May 2004)

Walt Disney's first full length feature, animated, and in color, is now regarded as a classic above criticism. Well, while it is a huge achievement, especially for 1937, it IS a little thin on story.
Set in a European-esque fairytale world, Snow White is the pretty young Princess living under the shadow of her evil stepmother the Queen. Envious of her beauty she orders her huntsmen to lead her out into the woods and cut her heart out. He gets the first bit right, but chickens out on the actual heart-cutting. Instead he banishes her to the woods where she promptly invades a private home, claiming it for herself, and enslaves the forest animals to do her bidding.
When the rightful owners return they are first alarmed but then happy to have a woman living in the house to seize their passions and cook their dinners. I assume that all dishes served in Casa De Dwarf are all vegetarian since we never actually see Snowy kill, skin, and butcher the animals that she has enslaved.
Eventually the Queen learns that Snowy is still alive and aims to kill her with a poisoned apple (that can be reversed by a kiss from her true love). Why she doesn't just slit her throat or burn the house down is beyond me.
There are not really enough developments in the story to maintain the 83-minute running time, with a lot of space devoted to singing and rhythm-timed animation in the style of Silly Symphonies. But the animation, and especially the backgrounds, are wonderful to look at and really do create an atmospheric, beautiful world. It's a shame Disney didn't indulge in them more.
Still a classic, but perhaps a little too quaint from a modern point-of-view.