Snow White (dir. Marc Webb)

by Jack Martin | Mar 21, 2025

Certificate: PG

Running Time: 109 mins

UK Distributor: Disney

UK Release Date: 21 March 2025

WHO’S IN SNOW WHITE?

Rachel Zegler, Gal Gadot, Andrew Burnap, Ansu Kabia, Hadley Fraser, Lorena Andrea, Dujonna Gift, Colin Michael Carmichael, George Appleby, Samuel Baxter, Jimmy Johnston, Idriss Kargbo, Jaih Betote, Freya Mitchell, Jeremy Swift, Martin Klebba, George Salazar, Andy Grotelueschen, Tituss Burgess, Jason Kravits, Andrew Barth Feldman, Patrick Page, Emilia Faucher

WHO’S BEHIND THE CAMERA?

Marc Webb (director), Erin Cressida Wilson (writer), Jared LeBoff and Marc Platt (producers), Jeff Morrow, Benj Pasek and Justin Paul (composers), Mandy Walker (cinematographer), Mark Sanger (editor)

WHAT’S IT ABOUT?

The princess Snow White (Zegler) is forced to flee her kingdom, and is taken in by seven dwarfs…

WHAT ARE MY THOUGHTS ON SNOW WHITE?

Who’s the fairest of them all? Not Disney, that’s for sure. It’s no secret that the studio has lost much of its magic in recent years, relying way too heavily on familiar IP and audience nostalgia than the kind of universal storytelling that made them so revered in the first place, with their numerous live-action remakes of classic animated hits like The Lion King, Beauty and the Beast, Pinocchio and beyond all serving as Exhibits A though Z of Disney’s creative bankruptcy.

For a while, at least according to anyone you’ll find online, it seemed like their latest take on the classic of classics Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs was going to end up on the dung heap. After all, from reports of a troubled production to controversies surrounding the depiction of the titular dwarfs themselves, to venomous bigotry directed toward its star Rachel Zegler for the mere crime of not being white enough to play a role with “White” literally in her name, it was all but assured the final film would be just another dud for a studio in severe need of a productive overhaul.

So imagine one’s shock to find that the movie is… kinda decent? It’s far from perfect, as even the best of these live-action remakes are (of which The Jungle Book is still high on top), but for something with so many odds against its favour, it’s a mini-miracle that the film is as pleasant and endearing as it is.

In the film, as directed by Marc Webb and written by Erin Cressida Wilson, Snow White (Zegler) is the princess of a kingdom that is slowly taken over by an evil, vain Queen (Gal Gadot) who is obsessed with being the fairest of them all. When her Magic Mirror declares that it is Snow White who’s indeed fairer than she, the Queen orders the princess to be killed, but she escapes into the woods and comes across a cottage occupied by a septet of vertically challenged individuals who take her in. So far, so familiar, though this version repositions Snow White as a much less passive figure than she was in the 1937 original, often taking it upon herself to restore peace and prosperity to her inherited kingdom, rather than just fawn about waiting for her prince to come.

It is a necessary change, one that makes her feel better fleshed out and thus more interesting than her admittedly one-dimensional animated counterpart. As timeless as the original film is, that version of the character never had much of a personality beyond simply reacting to most things around her, whereas here you get more of a range of emotions and desires, as well as a better understanding of who she actually is as a person and why she’s considered the fairest one of all. Wilson’s writing and Webb’s direction go as far as they can to give extra depth to this take on Snow White, but Rachel Zegler eventually takes charge with a radiant turn that brings out the powerful pure-heartedness of the character, one whose kindness and grace serves as its own superpower and makes her a lovable lead who is incredibly easy to root for. Beyond her impeccable singing skills, Zegler also has a magnetic screen presence that grants her chemistry with nearly anyone she acts opposite, which is put to effective use in some of the film’s more tender moments (a near-silent interaction with woodland creatures, a scene largely lifted from the original, is a particularly striking example of the actor’s expressive nature) and, once again, makes the character a fair figure to get behind.

The same can’t be said, however, for the dwarfs. The characters themselves, from Doc to Grumpy to Dopey and so on, are perfectly fine, but the decision to make all of them CGI monstrosities rather than, oh I don’t know, casting actual actors with dwarfism (which surely would have cost less than what we see in the final film) is deeply distracting, enough to take you out of the film whenever they show up. It’s bad enough that the effects used on them look like nightmare-fuelled leftovers from Mars Needs Moms, complete with uncanny facial expressions that are often shown in tight close-ups to force the audience to see how unappealing they look. But it is the mere notion that whoever was in charge – and I suspect it wasn’t Marc Webb – decided that this was the appropriate way to go, especially for a film that is committing to a vision that is going in its own direction with the material, that feels particularly inhumane to real performers who would kill for this major opportunity to play arguably the most famous dwarfs in all storytelling. Again, it’s not like the dwarfs are written badly (and in parts they are genuinely endearing), it’s just the mere presentation of them and what it stands for in an industry that’s already so difficult for disabled people that makes them the worst part of Snow White.

Aside from that rather large factor, the film has enough charm and liveliness to be pleasant viewing for families and open-minded Disney fanatics. The sets and costumes are all neatly colourful, the new songs by Benj Pasek and Justin Paul are decent, there are some nods to the original film that don’t completely distract from the newer stuff it’s trying to do, and even Gal Gadot is having fun camping it up as the villain, though her singing sadly leaves much more to be desired. In terms of these live-action remakes, it falls into a similar category as Kenneth Branagh’s Cinderella, which much like Snow White takes what is a fairly known story and does its own thing with it, while remaining fairly traditional to both the original fairy tale and the animated version that precedes it. Both movies, though not without their share of flaws, do manage to set themselves apart enough to be distinctive from Disney’s past versions, and because of that Snow White is more able to stand on its own than, say, 2019’s The Lion King which does not work without the original in existence (then again it wouldn’t have worked as its own thing anyway, but that’s by the by).

Undoubtedly, and in some cases quite fairly, Snow White will be viewed as yet another shining example of Disney’s lack of inventiveness in its current era of severe corporate control. But it’s not quite as bad as it could have been (well, except for the dwarfs, which are somehow worse), which is more than anyone could say they were expecting.

SO, TO SUM UP…

Snow White is a fairly decent live-action remake of the Disney classic that, thanks largely to Rachel Zegler’s magnetic turn as the titular princess, carries enough charm and grace in its updating of the story and central character, though it is dragged down by a woefully misguided representation of the famous seven dwarfs.