Fairy Tale Friday--Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (Disney, 1937)

Hello and welcome to Fairy Tale Friday. Are you sitting comfortably? Good. Then I’ll begin.

We are to the end of our Fairy Tale Friday look at Snow White. Today we will look at the 1937 Disney film. Chronologically, it should have come earlier, but I wanted to save it for last due to its significance. For many of you, this film was the gateway to a Disney obsession. While I can agree it was visually spectacular (and it truly is—when you think of all those choppy/jerky Betty Boop cartoons, they were only a few years before this) I have never liked the passivity of the heroine waiting (and doing nothing but housework and sighing) until her Prince comes.

The following information all comes courtesy of Wikipedia:

Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs was to be the first full-length cel animated feature in motion picture history. His brother and wife tried to talk Walt out of it. He had to mortgage his house to help finance the film's production, which eventually ran up a total cost of $1,488,422.74, a massive sum for a feature film in 1937. But it clearly was worth it as it was a massive success.

The film itself was released in Los Angeles in 1937, followed by a nationwide release on February 4, 1938. This was one year before The Wizard of Oz. Some interesting Oz trivia: The voice of Snow White Adriana Caselotti had an uncredited role in The Wizard of Oz. She provided the voice of Juliet during the Tin Man's song, "If I Only Had a Heart", speaking the line, "Wherefore art thou Romeo?" More Oz trivia: (because I will shoehorn Oz into any conversion) the slinky wicked queen in her cowl and crown was an early costume design for the witch in Oz based on the success of Snow White. Gale Sondergaard did a screentest as a slinky sexy witch but opted out when they decided to make her ugly.  

It was nominated for Best Musical Score at the Academy Awards in 1938, and the following year,  Walt Disney was awarded an honorary Oscar for the film. This award was unique, consisting of one normal-sized, plus seven miniature Oscar statuettes.  

In 1989, the United States Library of Congress deemed the film "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant" and selected it as one of the first 25 films for preservation in the National Film Registry. Whether I like it or not, it is a game changer. 

Another bit of interesting trivia: The dwarfs’ names were chosen from a pool of about fifty potentials, including Jumpy, Deafy, Dizzey, Hickey, Wheezy, Baldy, Gabby, Nifty, Sniffy, Swift, Lazy, Puffy, Stuffy, Tubby, Shorty, and Burpy.

Below is a summery courtesy of Wiki. I will insert comments and video clips into it.

Snow White is a lonely princess living with her stepmother, a vain Queen. The Queen worries that Snow White will be more beautiful than her, so she forces Snow White to work as a scullery maid and asks her Magic Mirror daily "who is the fairest one of all." For years the mirror always answers that the Queen is, pleasing her. Note: I admit I did not re-watch this one in its entirety, but I have no memory as to where her father is meant to be. I presume dead. The film opens with an illuminated manuscript which basically says exactly what Wiki does above but mentions her father not at all.  

One day, the Magic Mirror informs the Queen that Snow White is now "the fairest" in the land; on that same day, Snow White meets and falls in love with a prince who overhears her singing. Note: I do remember being in awe of the mirror but think Snow White herself was a bit of a drip.

Watch the Magic Mirror scene here: 

Here we also see Snow White in her very ragged dress (well done) and a pair of rough wooden clogs that don't make a clip clop noise which annoyed me. She is so good and sickly sweet it made me feel like I might go into a diabetic coma. Also all those pigeons would be crapping all over her wishing well if this was real. She does seem to have quite a lot of lippy on but then so does the Prince. 

The jealous Queen orders her Huntsman to take Snow White into the forest and kill her. She further demands that the huntsman return with Snow White's heart in a jewelled box as proof of the deed. However, the Huntsman cannot bring himself to kill Snow White. He tearfully begs for her forgiveness, revealing the Queen wants her dead and urges her to flee into the woods and never look back. Note:  I liked that the Queen presented the Huntsman with a box with a heart with a dagger through it for a lock that she must have either just had laying about as a sinister object or had it specially made for just such an occasion as this. 

It is nice to see the Huntsman’s reluctance. Several films, he is in cahoots with the Queen (or under her spell sexually) It does feel very sinister seeing the sunlight glint off his knife and his shadow fall over her as he creeps up to kill her. The lost in the woods scene also made an impression on me as a child. I found it very frightening and disconcerting.  

Watch it here: 

What I noticed from re-watching this scene is that she has changed clothes. She has been a scullery maid in literal rags with wooden clodhoppers on her feet but a moment ago, but to go out and pick flowers in the woods she gets spiffed up in the dress we think of as a Snow White dress (no holes) and heeled shoes (no clogs). That makes no sense. 

 Lost and frightened, the princess is befriended by woodland creatures who lead her to a cottage deep in the woods. Finding seven small chairs in the cottage's dining room, Snow White assumes the cottage is the untidy home of seven orphaned children. Actually, the cottage belongs to seven adult dwarfs—named Doc, Grumpy, Happy, Sleepy, Bashful, Sneezy, and Dopey—who work in a nearby mine. Note: Here we have the famous Heigh-Ho song. Many years ago we had a cassette of weird and wonderful cover versions of Disney Songs and there was a great, gritty cover of the Heigh-Ho song by Tom Waits. (would you expect anything less?) Listen to it below:

 

 Returning home, they are alarmed to find their cottage clean and suspect that an intruder has invaded their home. The dwarfs find Snow White upstairs, asleep across three of their beds. Snow White awakens to find the dwarfs at her bedside and introduces herself, and all of the dwarfs eventually welcome her into their home after she offers to clean and cook for them. Snow White keeps house for the dwarfs while they mine for jewels during the day, and at night they all sing, play music, and dance. Note: I know cooking and cleaning are important, but why does it all fall to her? Their house was a mess when she arrived and then they happily go on being lazy now that they had a dolly bird to pick up after them. Even as a child I felt like she aught to make them do their share of the work since they lived there too. Also as a child you think "wouldn't it be great to have woodland animals help you do your chore," but as you get older all you think is, "that is so unsanitary." 

Watch Whistle While You Work here:

Meanwhile, the Queen discovers Snow White is alive when the mirror again answers that Snow White is the fairest in the land and reveals that the heart in the box is that of a pig. Using a potion to disguise herself as an old hag, the Queen creates a poisoned apple that will put whoever eats it into the "Sleeping Death," a curse she learns can only be broken by "love's first kiss," but is certain Snow White will be buried alive. Note: I find this scene genuinely scary, even now. I have seen many transformation scenes, but this is one of the best. I love the way the spell was cast--both with witchy stuff and science (she has a whole chemistry lab in her lair). I love the bit in the transformation where her hands grow old and a flash of lightning reveals the bones inside for a brief moment. Also, the way lightning makes the potion go from still to sparkling made me laugh.

Watch (and shudder) here:

While the Queen goes to the cottage while the dwarfs are away, the animals are wary of her and rush off to find the dwarfs. Faking a potential heart attack, the Queen tricks Snow White into bringing her into the cottage to rest. The Queen fools Snow White into biting into the poisoned apple under the pretence that it is a magic apple that grants wishes. As Snow White falls asleep, the Queen proclaims that she is now the fairest of the land. Note: Trust the animals. They can see through her disguise and try to peck her death in a scene reminiscent of Alfred Hitchcock. The thing that made me laugh out loud though, was in between all the fuzzy forest creatures there were a pair of vultures sitting in a tree. Then the old hag pulls a Sanford and Son, and clutches her chest and fakes a heart attack.  Snow White is so gullible here and simple-minded, it makes my head hurt. The old hag is clearly using her evil voice in between bouts of her old helpless lady voice, but our heroine does not pick up on those subtle clues. 

Watch the poison apple bit here:

 The dwarfs return with the animals as the Queen leaves the cottage and give chase, trapping her on a cliff. She tries to roll a boulder over them, but lightning strikes the cliff before she can do so, causing her to fall to her death. Note: Though I am all for restorative justice in my real life, I find I really like a sense of punishment and justice in my fairy tales. This is a great “gets what is coming to her” ending. The vultures are here again and she runs away, gets trapped on a conveniently place cliff top situated in running distance of the forest, and tries to use leverage to release a boulder down on the dwarfs below. Instead, lightning cracks her cliff and she falls into the abyss with the boulder falling on her instead like Wile E Coyote. 

The dwarfs return to their cottage and find Snow White seemingly dead, being kept in a deathlike slumber by the poison. Unwilling to bury her out of sight in the ground, they instead place her in a glass coffin trimmed with gold in a clearing in the forest. Together with the woodland creatures, they keep watch over her. A year later, the prince learns of her eternal sleep and visits her coffin. Saddened by her apparent death, he kisses her, which breaks the spell and awakens her. The dwarfs and animals all rejoice as the Prince takes Snow White to his castle.

Watch the ending here: 

That is the last of the Snow Whites. However, I will treat you next week to one last Snow White. A hilarious comedy song I stumbled across whilst writing this last post. Stay tuned next week for death by fruit.