If I’m being completely honest, what struck me most about Disney’s Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs was just how slow the storyline moved and how boring it was. Disney spent several minutes on rather mundane scenes such as when Snow White spent all day cleaning up the house so the dwarfs would let her stay as a guest. If you didn’t already know, watching someone scrub dishes for 10 minutes straight is not the most interesting thing in the world. Anyways, this was a pattern throughout the movie—as Zipes stressed in his argument, Disney did not care so much for the actual storyline of the movie as he did for impressing audiences with brilliant, high-tech animations, visuals, and sounds. Rather than focusing on creating multi-dimensional, interesting characters, Disney’s main concern was making sure audiences were transported to the setting of the movie through fast-moving, lively depictions. Why do you think Disney included so many birds, deer, turtles, and rabbits in the movie? So that there would constantly be astonishing movement. Why do you think Disney extended the scene of poor Snow White running helplessly through the dark, creepy woods? So the animations of the sinister eyes and clutching hands of the trees could both petrify and amaze viewers simultaneously.
In addition, what really annoyed me about the movie was Snow White herself. You would think that after all she had been through—being mistreated by the Queen, being almost killed by the hunter, and being thrown into the unfamiliar woods—she would have developed some sort of spine or strength. However, throughout the movie, Snow White proves to be helplessly and utterly dependent on others. First, she relied on the huntsman not to kill her. Then, without the help of the animals and dwarfs, she probably wouldn’t have been able to survive on her own in the woods. Finally, she is completely dependent on the prince to wake her up after she eats the poisonous apple. By depicting Snow White as a wimpy, fragile girl constantly in need of saving, Disney reinforced the conservative, outmoded stereotype that women are unable to be independent and need to rely on men for support. As with the Grimm Brothers, Disney’s work of creation is deeply intertwined with patriarchal messages. By creating a scene where Snow White went into the woods to pick flowers while a man was a hunter, Disney took the depiction of traditional gender roles way back to before civilized societies even existed, when women in tribes were gatherers and men were hunters. In addition, Disney’s choice to make Snow White all sad and mopey, singing “someday my prince will come” and yearning for her true love to carry her off into the sunset, puts forth the flawed message that women need to rely on male figures in order to be happy. I don’t know about you, but that is certainly not a lesson that I would want to teach young girls. Talk about the opposite of empowering.
Finally, another concept I found fascinating, first introduced to me by Zipes, was Disney’s striking similarities to the Prince and how the Prince was essentially a manifestation of Disney himself. The Prince did not play a major role throughout the movie, but suddenly appeared at the end of the film, kissed Snow White, and rode off into the sunset with the beloved, beautiful princess herself. He did not do the grunt of the work, and yet, he received the entire “reward” (although it is cringey to call Snow White a reward, because it makes her seem like a possession someone can take ownership of instead of an actual free human being). The dwarfs were the ones who opened up their home to a complete stranger. The dwarfs were the ones who tirelessly ran through the dark, rainy woods, chasing the evil Queen to the ledge she eventually fell off of and died from. And yet, how were the dwarfs repaid for all their hard work and effort? By being neglected and abandoned, left behind in the woods. Similarly, although there were many animators who worked for Disney who helped turn his vision to reality, Disney received all the credit. When we think of Snow White, we think of Disney—we don’t think of the workers who spent hours drawing tirelessly until their arms were sore.
Clearly, Disney’s Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, although technologically innovative, was far from progressive or revolutionary in its storyline and the concomitant, underlying messages.
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