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Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs is the first full length animated feature to be released in America. It is often wrongly named the first animated film ever created, although this right actually belongs to The Apostle. It was created by Walt Disney and was the first movie in the Disney Animated Features Canon. The story is adapted from the german fairy tale of the same name, although certain liberties were taken with the plot.
Plot
The movie stars Adriana Caselotti as Snow White, a young princess whos' father died when she was young. This left her in the care of her evil stepmother, the Wicked Queen (Lucille La Verne), who is also a witch. Every day the Queen consults a Magic Mirror (Moroni Olsen), asking it
"Mirror Mirror on the wall,
Who is the fairest of them all?"
In the past the Mirror had always assured the Queen that she was the most beatiful; however, as Snow White grew older her beauty had increased until one day the Mirror tells the queen that Snow White beauty exceeds hers. Outraged, the queen orders Snow White to dress in rags, but the Mirror's answer remains the same. The Queen calls a Huntsman (Stuart Buchanan) to take Snow White into the woods and kill her. She also tells him to bring her the girls heart in a small box, as proof that he had performed the murder.
Before the hunter calls her, Snow White performs the film's first musical number "Some Day My Prince Will Come". While she is singing her voice attracts a wandering Prince (Harry Stockwell), who falls in love with her instantly and calls to her. However Snow White is frightened by his sudden appearence and flees into the castle.
The Huntsmen takes her to the edge of a nearby forest and attempts to murder her while she is picking flowers. However, he finds himself unable to perform the task and instead order Snow White to flee into the woods. He then slaughters a pig (offscreen) and presents it's heart to the queen in place of Snow White's.
The frightened girl runs deep into the forest where she eventually passes out from fear and exhaustion. She wakes to find herself surrounded by forest animals, who lead her to the cottage of the Seven Dwarfs. Happy to have found a place to sleep but horrified at the cottage's lack of cleansiness, she begins to clean the entire hous, with the help of the animals ("Whistle While You Work"). After finishing with this job she falls asleep on one of the dwarfs bed.
The dwarfs eventually return from their job as diamon miners ("Heigh-Ho") and are frightened when they discover that their house had been entered while they were away. They at first take the sleeping Snow White for a ghost, and are relieved to discover that she is just a girl. Hesitantly they introduce themselves to her; Doc (Roy Atwell), Grumpy (Pinto Colvig), Happy (Otis Harlan), Sleepy (Colvig again), Bashful (Scotty Mattraw), Sneezy (Billy Gilbert), and Dopey (who remains mute for the entire film). After Snow White explains her plight they eagerly agree to let her stay (with the exception of Grumpy, who opposes but is overruled).
The Queen once again consults the Magic Mirror, and is ouraged when she discovers that Snow White is still alive and still more beautiful than her (the Mirror specifically mentions the Seven Dwarfs cottage in it's answer). She goes into the dungeon of her castle and cast's two spells; one is to change her appearence into that of an ugly old woman so that Snow White would not recognize her, the other is to create an apple that is poisonous on one side and will send anyone who takes a bite out of that side into a deep slumber. The slumber can only be broken by true love's kiss (the queen reads in her spellbook). Reasoning that Snow White does not know any men (the Queen is unaware of the earlier meeting with the Prince) the Queen sets off into the forest.
The next morning the Seven Dwarfs again leave for the diamond mive, warning Snow White not to allow anyone to enter the cottage. While they are away, the Queen (in her old woman disguise) approaches the cottage with the poisoned apple. Although Snow White refuses to let her into the cottage, she reasons that accepting one apple will do no harm (especially after witnessing the Queen take a bite out of the unpoisoned side). Snow White bites the poisoned apple and falls into a deep slumber.
The forest animals, who witnessed the event, race to the diamond mines and force the dwarves to return to their cottage, where they meet the Queen leaving. They pursue her to the edge of a cliff, and while she turns to face them, lightning strikes the cliff's edge. The Queen falls to her death.
Upon returning to the cottage, the dwarves assume that Snow White is dead. They build her a casket of glass so that they can still see her, even in death. As they are mourning over the casket, the Prince that Snow White had encountered earlier stumbles upon them. Grief-stricken at finding the woman he had fallen in love with dead, he plants a kiss on her lips, which wakes her up instantly. As the dwarves and forest animals cheer, the prince swwops Snow White into his arms and they ride happily into the sunset.
Production
Walt Disney spent large sums of money on the movie, to the point that he was forced to take out a mortgage on his house. He was urged against making the movie by his wife Lilian, his brother Roy, and most of the hollywood movie idustry, the latter of which mockingly reffered to the film as "Disney's folly".
A great deal of time was spent choosing voice actors for the various characters. Joe Twerp was orginally planned to portray Doc, but in the finished product only voiced him in the radio version of the movie. Mel Blanc was intended to portray Dopey, although in the end the character was simply made a mute. Lucille La Verne was said to have been originally unable to voice the Wicked Queen to Disney's liking, only being approved after she removed her false teeth.
Many scenes were also deleted from the finished product, most notably one featuring the Prince being held captive in the Wicked Queen's dungeon. This suggests that the Prince (who only appeared near the beggining and end of the film) was originally planned to have a larger role. A tweaked version of this scene did appear in Disney's Sleeping Beauty.
Reception
Despite it's many naysayers, Snow White proved to be an enormous sucess, receiving a standing ovation on it's opening night. The film won numerous Academy Awards, and became the first American movie to have a sound track released in conjuction with the film. The movie's sucess inspired Disney to go on to create 18 more animated films during his lifetime.
Adolf Hitler was purported to have loved the film, and was said to have offered Disney large amounts of money to create animated films for Germany. Disney is believed to have refused, and went on to make several anti-german propaganda films such as Victory Through Air Power.
The movie has been theatrically re-released several times, was released on DVD, and remains popular even today. It is currently the only film in the Disney Animated Features Canon to have been granted Great Movie status by Roger Ebert, and in 1981 was deemed "culturally, historically, or aesthetically signifigant" by the National Film Registry.
Legacy
Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs was given an unofficial sequel in Happily Ever After, a film created by Filmation. Many critics argue that this is not a real sequel to the Snow White movie, and the Walt Disney company itself has yet to release a sequel, direct-to-DVD or theatrical.The film occasionly plays on the Toon Disney tv block. The Merrie Melodies show (which can be considered Disney's competition at that time) made a spoof of the movie; Coal Black and de Sebben Dwarfs.
A videogame based on the movie was released for the Game Boy, and Snow White was later incorporated as one of the Disney Princesses, appearing in all media related to this franchise. Several characters from the movie appear as audience members in Mickey's House of Mouse, and Snow White makes a short appearence in the Kingdom Hearts video game.
Material related to the film (such as dolls and T-shirts) continue to be made today, with Snow White, Dopey, and Grumpy being the most used icons. People visiting Disney Land have the option of "meeting" Snow White, portrayed by an actor dressed in the princesses clothing. Several other Snow White characters can also be met, although many of them are made of full-body costumes.
