From the beginning, it didn’t seem like there was 100% effort put into this. A rebooted live-action film in 2025 isn’t going to deliver the same “feels” as its 1930s original. Some parts were canon while others were adjusted for our time. The target audience has to be questioned as well because this new crop of children born after 2010 is built differently than those who begged their parents for the deluxe VHS version when Disney opened their famous vault. There was nowhere near enough engagement to hold their attention, and then, the studio lacked in keeping our attention as well.
Disney stuck with the age-old “Once Upon a Time” structure with the visual storybook and turning pages onscreen to set the tone. There was a kingdom on the edge of a magical forest that was governed by a kind king and queen, who were the parents of a daughter named Snow White (Rachel Zegler). After the queen’s untimely death, a luminous stranger captures the king’s gaze and he marries her. His new wife goes for the jugular in a power-grab scheme that sends him on a mission where he never returns and in turn, serves as an Evil Queen (Gal Gadot). Despising her step-daughter, her second order of business is ridding herself of Snow White entirely, leaving her solely responsible for ruling the kingdom.
The question of, “Who’s the fairest of them all?” was a bit oversold here. No one can make me hate Gal Gadot, no matter how much the internet tries. But in the film, the jealousy of essentially being the prettiest was wildly overdramatized and often looked silly. Things were soft like a Disney classic should be, then all of a sudden, she’s ordering her Huntsman (Ansu Kabia) to lead Snow White into the forest and stab her with this magical knife she created. If that wasn’t dark enough, she then gave him an ivory chest and ordered him to cut out her heart and place it inside. That was a wild turn.
Instead of a prince, Snow White opts for a thief with good core principles in Jonathan (Andrew Burnap), who I instantly loved because of his name but it stopped there. There was no getting over the fact that he was wearing a hoodie. It was very distracting to see everyone else dressed for this fictional period and “bro” showed up stealing food and rocking a top that could’ve been found at H&M. Zegler herself was the only high point in the film. We know she can sing and a handful of numbers reflected the magic of the original film. Not to mention, it was nice to see a woman of color play the principal character.
Snow White gets a 6.5 out of 10. It wasn’t the worst film, but it certainly wasn’t mind-blowing. It was certainly a sensitive topic going into the film, but I think it would’ve boded well for Disney to use real actors for the dwarves instead of motion capture. Ultimately, it was a situation where they couldn’t win (using dwarves risked stereotyping; omitting them means actors with dwarfism missed out on a big budget opportunity) and they attempted to please everyone. So Dopey and co. are motion captured but Jonathan’s uprising included compatriots with dwarfism. The film is PG and that seems fair. Whenever the Evil Queen talks to the mirror, the environment goes dark and may appear scary, and then the aforementioned plot to kill Snow White might be heavy for a young child. Aside from that, it’s a decent film that you can stream on Disney+ when it becomes available.
Snow White premiers in theaters on Friday, March 21.
-Jon Jones
Genre: Adventure, Fantasy
Rating: PG
Runtime: 1 hr 49 mins
Trailer: Watch
U.S. Release Date: March 21, 2025