What went wrong with Snow White?

Yahoo

21-03-2025

Disney's live-action remake of 1937's Snow White and the Seven Dwarves, now simply Snow White, emerged this week to poor reviews and bad buzz. Rumour has it that the studio scaled back advertising for it, expecting (and ensuring) a box-office disappointment. Negative stories have been constant since the film started shooting three years ago, with the studio scrambling to control its fate — but maybe that is exactly how one of Disney's crown jewels became such a problem child.
Think about it: the first hurdle for director Marc Webb and his team was a storm in a teacup over the casting of Rachel Zegler. This was, to be clear, nonsense: if you're casting a musical Disney film you would be negligent not to consider the honey-voiced star of West Side Story who, incidentally, looks exactly like a cartoon princess. But for certain commentators, the 'White' part of Snow's name disqualified the Latina Zegler, so they claimed that Disney's casting choice was "woke" instead of obvious.
To address these critics, this film explains Snow's name in relation to her birth, in the middle of a snowstorm, as if we needed to know. But perhaps the furore is why they stuck so close to tradition in the way they dressed Snow, adopting the original film's jarringly bright blue and yellow skirt instead of bringing the kind of flare that costume designer Sandy Powell, a three-time Oscar winner and 15-time nominee, could have offered. It might also have created a general air of panic around the film.
The haters next leapt on Zegler's comments to Extra about the original; explaining how this would be different, she said "it's no longer 1937. She's not going to be saved by the prince…" and compared the relationship between the original Snow White and her prince to stalking. Zegler talked about how her Snow White would work to become the leader her father believed she could be, rather than waiting around for a love story.
This caused more faux outrage on the internet — such disrespect! — though the criticism is entirely fair if you actually watch the 1937 version. But perhaps that led Webb and the studio to feel torn between beefing up the role of Andrew Burnap's bandit leader Jonathan and telling the story of Snow White's own quest for her throne, overstuffing the story.
Then Peter Dinklage entered the chat, calling the whole idea of a new Seven Dwarves "backward" and something that perpetuated stereotypes. Disney panicked and assured the world that the new Seven would be VFX creations. Then other actors with dwarfism complained that that denied them jobs they might otherwise have had, so the studio scrambled again to assure viewers that they would still be represented. The resulting compromise pleased no-one.
On the upside, actors with dwarfism were cast to voice some of the CG dwarves, and in other roles (in Jonathan's gang, for example). On the downside, the new dwarves look extremely weird next to live actors despite the best efforts of the VFX team. They're supposed to be mythological creatures, fine, but they resemble balloons of classic Disney characters instead. And given that Jonathan has a team of bandits around him, you have to wonder if someone planned to use them instead of the small miners at some point.
Later came the political fuss. Zegler expressed her heartbreak at President Trump's re-election — hardly a niche position, but one for which she apologised soon after anyway — and her support for the Palestinian people, an equally mainstream view. Her co-star Gal Gadot, a former Miss Israel, has been steadfast in her calls for the release of Israeli hostages following the October 7 attack by Hamas and her condemnation of antisemitism.
Gadot told Variety, "I want everybody to have good life and prosperity, and the ability to raise their children in a safe environment." The two have expressed nothing but love and admiration for one another despite their differing views on the Palestinian conflict — which, given that both have chiefly expressed a desire for peace, hardly seems difficult. You might think that actors should avoid politics while they have a film coming out, but given that the film shot more than two years ago, how long exactly should they stay silent? Wouldn't we rather have celebrities who speak honestly about causes close to their heart?
And yet there was more studio panic, as the premieres were cancelled or scaled back and press junkets limited. By trying to please everyone and listen to all the critics all the time, Disney seems to have made whatever faults the film had much, much worse.
Its aggregate reviews score is hovering somewhere in the 45% range, far below the level that the talent involved should have ensured. Yet most of these controversies are nonsense. Dinklage had a fair point about stereotypes, yet it's also fair for other actors with dwarfism to just want to work on a big movie. The real issue was Disney attempting to thread the needle for both.
Controversies don't always hurt a film at the box office, but disappointing audiences will impact quite a bit. Zegler desperately tries to carry the film on her back, and Gadot and Burnap give her good and committed support (Gadot can sing! And is campy fun), but there's only so much they can do amid the design mess.
Little ones will still probably enjoy this film for its empowering message, but for the rest of us it's an oddly compromised experience. Worse, the sheer madness surrounding this film might make film studios more and more scared to confront online noise, and more timid in their choices, and that's bad news for all movies.
Snow White is in cinemas now.