Setting the bar for animation

Rating: 6/10 (1 January 2014)

Now I don't want any hate mail (just kidding I do...I love getting emails) but I am scoring this beloved classic a 6. Not because its a bad film, no movie that is considered a stone cold classic and the starting point of one of the biggest film heavyweights in history could be a "bad" movie but I review my films on entertainment value to me. I could list pros and cons for this film all day and all night because I feel like it has a lengthy list in both columns. On one hand if you look at it from its conception date in the late 1930's, it is brilliant, breathtaking animation. The artistic value on this film is a 20 out of 10. Still today you have to marvel at the beautiful hand drawn art and characters. But you could argue against me until you're blue in the face but I believe this is a movie that could have been told in ten minutes. They drag it out and there is many scenes in the film that are simply too long. Its an extremely dark film (as many of Disney's adventures tend to be) so much so that I personally wouldn't let very young children watch it. And while most of the songs are iconic and lovely, they are far from the best in the Disney animation classic repertoire.
Snow White and The Seven Dwarfs created some of the most iconic well known figures in animation history or film history for that matter. Out of all the Disney princesses I have always felt that Adriana Caselotti was the least impressive of the bunch. There are times when her singing voice is almost irritating like sandpaper and her tones are off in various scenes. I don't know why Walt Disney took such a liking to her but she didn't do much else outside of this so I think I may be closer to hitting the nail on the head than you would think. Lucille La Verne is very good as the evil Queen cementing her place in animated villainy quite purposefully. I felt like in this most recent viewing that she was actually almost underused in the film but she does get some terrific and terrifying scenes. Each one of the seven dwarfs are fantastic. They all have such unique (albeit blatantly obvious) personalities. Everyone will find their favourite and while some get more scenes than others, they are terrific. Harry Stockwell as the Prince...well I can't say much of anything about his performance because he is probably the most underused Prince in Disney history. There is no build up to their romance and every scene he is in is very rushed and forced.
That is perhaps my biggest issue with the film. So much of it dragged and too much time was spent trying to fill empty void in an effort to make it feature length and then when you hit the climax of her eating the apple...it rushes right through to the end and credits are rolling before you even know what happened. The last ten or fifteen minutes are far too rushed and compact. This film holds its credibility because of what it did for Disney studios and animation and the characters that became so iconic. The six directors that worked on this film deserve most of that credit because it really is a beautiful film to look at. Even the background of each sequence is just lovely. For me, it was a bit of a dud in a few ways but I can appreciate artistic beauty and this film is full of that at the very least. 6/10