Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937) - AJ's Take

Let me start off with saying that as a child, I didn't like Snow White at all. I didn't think the music was good, and I thought the animation and story was pretty shoddy at best. But after our most recent viewing of this movie, I find myself pleasantly surprised, and happy to have given this film another shot. The movie holds up incredibly well considering that it's about 80 years old. Admittedly there are some things that certainly do date this film such as the styles of hair, dress, and even the music. Let's take a deeper look into this film and break down what holds up, and what dates this amazing piece of art.

Let's discuss the artwork first. Let me start off by saying that this film is absolutely gorgeous, it's held up incredibly well for being made about eighty years ago. The backgrounds seem to vary with who's being portrait on screen. When Snow White is appearing the backgrounds are bright, full of color, and filled with flowers, birds, and bright sunshine. However, when we're dealing with the Queen, our backgrounds are dark, heavy oppressive colors are used, and there is a distinct lack of natural sunshine. Instead, she's closeted away focusing on her magic mirror, instead of what's outside of her castle. The amount of work that went into these backgrounds must have been incredible. Everything had to be hand painted or drawn, and it hardly seems like anything is recycled. The dwarfs we see mostly in the mines, and in wide open spaces, giving us a glimpse into their wild outdoor life. 

I will say one thing that throws me off about the animation in this movie is how eerily Snow White and The Prince look and feel. Their faces lack detail, and the movements seem way to smooth to be natural. Now, due to when the movie was made and the lack of training that animators originally had, they used early rotoscoping when dealing with Snow White and The Prince. The Queen was the only one out of the bunch that was traditional animated the entire way through. However, she still seems a bit off due to the lack of detail in her face. Due to this, there are some areas where Snow White can be saying something and it looks very realistic, whereas The Queen may be saying something, and the lips hardly move. It's a bit off putting, but nothing that pulls away from the film in any great sense.

There are some effects of the movie, such as the smoke in the Magic Mirror, that look to be rotoscoped as well, but these seem to work in favor of the film over all. The water effects and the effects in the mirror are fantastic. They're wavy, have some fantastic reflective qualities, and feel very real for what this is. Weather it be the rivers that run through the woods that we catch glimpses of, or the falling water from the rain or from the little water falls that we're shown, the glimmer, and shine of the water is always very eye catching. We also get some lovely smoke details when we're viewing the mirror, or inside The Queens dungeon when she's making her potion. While the smoke doesn't look totally realistic, it does provide an effective touch at giving us something that seems like it's almost within our grasp. The effects in this movie are genuinely fantastic, and have stood the test of time incredibly well. I almost wish these effects would've been used more with Disney movies that came out after it.

As far as the plot of this film goes, I feel that it's all over the place with pacing. We start off with The Queen talking at her Magic Mirror. We have no name, no idea who she is, or anything at all. We then find out she wants to be fairer than Snow White, and we're instantly thrown into a new situation with Snow White and her Prince, all within the space of five to seven minutes. To me, it feels rushed; I want more character building. It would be nice to help me feel more attached to Snow White. My first impressions of her just leave me with a feeling of "I don't really care what happens to this girl." Sure, I get that The Queen hates her, and that she really has no justifiable reason to other than just wanting to be the fairest in the land, but it does leave the plot feeling lacking. (Side Note: Again, I understand that there's not much to pull from here, especially since the original fairy tale only provides that The Queen wants to be the fairest in the land.) 

It slows down immensely when we're introduced to the dwarfs, and doesn't feel like it picks up again until we get to The Queen in her dungeon. We go through the transformation scene, and get to the finale, all in good time, then it just seems to rush the end. We just know that the dwarfs kept Snow White in a coffin until The Prince arrived again. Sure I get that there's nothing here to really interact with, but it feels like the grief that the dwarfs are feeling is just kinda brushed over. I will say the pacing doesn't kill the film by any means, and I'm sure part of this was all about Disney finding their way through trial and error.

Music-wise, I'd say this is where the film holds up the least. The music is pretty dated, and other than one or two catchy songs, it's not something I'd find myself actively humming through the day, or going through Spotify, or Google Music to listen to. I will fully say the orchestral scores work very well with the movie. The Queens theme lends an excellent tone of foreboding and dread, while Snow Whites simple and innocent melody lends you insight to how pure she is. Overall the music is good, but not something I'd go out of my way to look for. It's not overly catchy, and some of it is so forgettable, that even after watching this movie just an hour or two ago, that I've already forgotten some of the tracks.

My overall thoughts on this movie? It's aged incredibly well, and is a fantastic place to start this journey. Before re-watching this I honestly thought I was going to hate it, I didn't have any fond memories of it, and didn't think my mind would change. However, I'm glad that that's changed. The movie is simple, full of innocence, beauty, and fantastic art. Sure the story is a little rushed at times, and there are some very minor issues that I have with the film, but I still really enjoyed going back over this. The animation is beautiful, and I can find myself getting lost in the background work, as much as the characters themselves. The issues I do have with the movie I can easily forgive as this was a huge undertaking. Nothing like this had ever been made, and if it hadn't succeeded we may have never ended up with these kinds of movies.

-AJ

Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937) - CJ's Take

Yay! 

This is a first for us. Both the first movie review we've done and the first movie as part of our Disney series. And there's no better choice for such a monumental occasion. This movie is also a first in it's own right, as it's the first feature length animated film. And what a film it is. To be truthful, I've never really liked this movie so much. I've always understood the important of this feature, but I was very young the last time I saw it and it's never stood out as a good film in my mind. 

Original Poster Sourced via IMDB

                                                                                   

Summary: Snow White is a Princess living with her step mother, only referred to as The Evil Queen. The Evil Queen, being very evil and vain, asks her magic mirror who the fairest person in her kingdom is and is surprised to find out it's not herself, but Snow White. She tells her huntsman to kill Snow White, but he doesn't and Snow White escapes and finds a cottage with Seven Dwarves. She becomes friends with them and earns their respect just in time for The Evil Queen to turn into a witch, poison her with an apple and then get killed by falling off a cliff. The Dwarves are really sad, but the charming prince finds her and awakes her with a kiss and they all live happily ever after.

If anybody's like me, they may remember this film and know the basic plot points, but haven't seen it since the beginning of time. If you're like me, you may also dismiss this movie as old or boring. If that's you, do yourself a favor and watch this again. Seriously. Give it another watch. I was surprised to find that, in my most recent watch, this movie is great. Maybe not the best movie that Disney has ever made, but it is really quality in multiple ways.

First thing I want to point out in this regard is the art and animation. This movie is more beautiful than I remember. I would even say it's one of Disney's most beautiful films, though my opinion will probably change as I continue to progress through this series and review movies I haven't seen from a long time. I will definitely say that this movie looks better than a lot of Disney's other movies. As far as I understand, all the backgrounds were hand-painted and that quality really shows. At the same time, considering the time it was made, you'd assume that the animation would be 30's Betty Boop style animation, but I would say that everything is relatively smooth. At the same time, there are some areas where the age definitely shows. All the human character (Snow White, The Prince and The Evil Queen) have these strange, featureless faces that looks like those Facebook selfies where the photographer turns the saturation up to an insane level. On some level, it makes sense for Snow White, as radiant skin is her namesake, but it gives all the human characters a distinctly alien quality. Like wise, the lip synching is also pretty loose. This is one area where animation techniques have definitely improved. It can be disorienting to some, but I am familiar with anime, so I'm used to it.

The sound design and soundtrack for this movie is just as good as the animation. Admittedly, some of the voice acting is a little strange. It seems like the actors, not being used to animation, treated it like radio acting. With radio voice acting, it's okay to overact a bit, as there's nothing visual to back up the voice acting. As such, the voice acting in this movie comes off a little extra, but the animation doesn't seem to be reacting as melodramatically as the voices do. However, making up for that, is the excellent music and the synching between the animation and the music. I was surprised to discover that this movie had so many songs, despite not being considered a musical. The interplay between the animation and music is the best of both worlds, with the same synching you'd see in a hoppy 30's cartoon, but with the smoothness and quality you'd expect from a feature film. A large part of this movie is narrative light, really exploring what quality animation could be with the higher quality production and it's a joy to watch.

As far as narrative structure or plot goes, this movie is, admittedly, a little lacking. Everyone basically knows the story here and it's a basic blueprint for pretty much every princess film going forward after this. The plot moves pretty quickly, particularly in the beginning and the end. It seems that a large part of this movie was to just showcase the animation, which I appreciate, but I can understand how that might not be for every person. This movie is the genesis of a couple different Disney Princess tropes, but I'm not sure that people now understand the the intention or meaning behind these tropes. For example, Snow White is known to be beautiful and/or fair. It is this quality that she "uses" to get out of every situation. I have heard people turn this into a lame argument about how the movie is making some sort of statement about how beautiful people are good and, by extension, ugly people are bad. This is an easy conclusion to make from the material in this movie, but I think it's too simple and misses the overall idea that the film is going with.

I think the fundamental misunderstanding is with the term fair. Fair can mean beautiful, but it can also mean pure. Snow White, as a character, is fair in the beauty sense, but she is also fair in the sense of purity. She's good-natured, pleasant, naive, and hardworking She is also the rightful ruler of her kingdom. This level of purity is reflected by her extremely fair skin, sure, but it is also shown in the way she acts and the way the world reacts to her. This bring in another princess trope, the whole "princess controlling the forest animals" thing. Her presence is so good that nature responds to her positively. Her innocence is also shown by her actions, such as deciding to clean and fall asleep in the Dwarves' cabin as soon as she sees it. Likewise, she basically adopts the dwarves and "civilizes" these wild men, taking the absent role of a mother figure for them. Someone less naive or more skeptical would see this as a strangely dangerous series of actions to make, but to the good princess, putting the world into order is just a role she takes naturally. 

Likewise, whenever The Evil Queen appears on screen, the sky darkens, the weather gets bad, the animals that follow are vultures, signals of incoming death. Her transformation partway through the film, also follows the same trend. I've seen it argued that her turning into an old hag is just a way for the film to reinforce the statement that ugly people are bad and worthy of death. However, I feel this mixes things up. I feel her transformation can be read two ways, the first being is that her obsession on being the fairest and getting rid of Snow White causes her to become disfigured. The other is that her true nature is being revealed. Narratively, I think it makes sense, as she sacrifices the one thing she has that is important to her in order to try to kill Snow White, at the same time revealing her true nature, that she may have seemed "fair" in the sense of beauty, but she wasn't "fair" in the sense of pure or innocent. Following on that line, when she commits her worst sin, the murder of Snow White, nature reacts to her in a hostile manner, so much to the point that a bolt of lightening destroys the cliff she's on, causing her to fall and the rocks around here to fall with her, killing her.

The Dwarves seem to be some sort of representation of the wild aspect of nature. The live in dirty, uncivilized conditions. They are civilized only in the sense that they have a furnished home and a career of sorts, but when they happen upon Snow White, a balanced force of both Civilization and Nature, they are completely befuddled, as if they have never seen a human before. Likewise, you find that they live savagely, as Snow White discovers when she has to force them to wash themselves before dinner. As she takes up these motherly duties, she shows the dwarves how humans live and leads them to a more balance existence, such as hers.

Overall, this movie was much better than I was expecting it to be. If you haven't seen it in awhile, definitely check it out again. I think it might be hard to beat this, but we'll be checking out some more things I haven't seen forever, so my mind might be changed. Either way, it was fun and I'm looking forward to moving on to Pinocchio next time.

-CJ

Source

Disney Animation Studios Series

The first thing we're going to do for this blog is a series of reviews on every feature length film made by Walt Disney Animation Studios. We feel that Disney is the starting place for most people when it comes to animation. We all watch Disney movies when we're young and they set the stage for what we expect animated film to be. We chose to do specifically feature length films from Walt Disney Animation Studios because that is the easiest criteria for determining a "true Disney movie" and because it would cover pretty much everything one might consider a classic Disney film, but it includes some movies which are lesser known as well as exclude some of the better known movies. I should be an interesting series.

Below is the conclusive list of what we should be doing for this series:

1. Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937) CJ AJ
2. Pinocchio (1940)
3. Fantasia (1940)
4. Dumbo (1941)
5. Bambi (1942)
6. Saludos Amigos (1942)
7. The Three Caballeros (1944)
8. Make Mine Music (1946)
9. Fun and Fancy Free (1947)
10. Melody Time (1948)
11. The Adventures of Ichabod and Mr. Toad (1949)
12. Cinderella (1950)
13. Alice in Wonderland (1951)
14. Peter Pan (1953)
15. Lady and the Tramp (1955)
16. Sleeping Beauty (1959)
17. One Hundred and One Dalmatians (1961)
18. The Sword in the Stone (1963)
19. The Jungle Book (1967)
20. The Aristocats (1970)
21. Robin Hood (1973)
22. The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh (1977)
23. The Rescuers (1977)
24. The Fox and the Hound (1981)
25. The Black Cauldron (1985)
26. The Great Mouse Detective (1986)
27. Oliver & Company (1988)
28. The Little Mermaid (1989)
29. The Rescuers Down Under (1990)
30. Beauty and the Beast (1991)
31. Aladdin (1992)
32. The Lion King (1994)
33. Pocahontas (1995)
34. The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1996)
35. Hercules (1997)
36. Mulan (1998)
37. Tarzan (1999)
38. Fantasia 2000 (2000)
39. Dinosaur (2000)
40. The Emperor's New Groove (2000)
41. Atlantis: The Lost Empire (2001)
42. Lilo & Stitch (2002)
43. Treasure Planet (2002)
44. Brother Bear (2003)
45. Home on the Range (2004)
46. Chicken Little (2005)
47. Meet the Robinsons (2007)
48. Bolt (2008)
49. The Princess and the Frog (2009)
50. Tangled (2010)
51. Winnie the Pooh (2011)
52. Wreck-It Ralph (2012)
53. Frozen (2013)
54. Big Hero 6 (2014)
55. Zootopia (2016)
56. Moana (2016)

Those are all the films that are currently released. The following have been announced:

57. Ralph Breaks the Internet (2018)
58. Frozen 2 (2019)

We plan to watch those after our current series, once they come out. We plan to keep on top of them and continue to update this list and our reviews as more movies are released or announced.

-CJ

Introduction

Hello,

I'm glad you've found our blog. As you can see, we review animated films. What follows is a statement of purpose by the two contributors of this blog as to why we decided to make this. We hope that you like the articles and reviews we put up on this page.

This is a blog created for the expressed purpose of reviewing animation and animated films. Animation, as an art form, is a wonderful tool for artistic expression and, though the bias is fading, there is a tendency for animation and it's artistic merits to be dismissed as a product for a youthful mind. Part of what we hope to do is show the tremendous value that animation provides in the realm of art and narrative storytelling. I also hope for this to be a fun project where we can take a second look at some of our favorite films and share our thoughts for other people to see.

-CJ

Animation has always been important to me, and has been something I've wanted to pursue for a long time. With the disappearing art of traditional animation being phased out of the media, I would like to go back and see what brought us to the realm of living art and captured our interest for the first time. I want to find the answers to why we love these films, and why they've changed so much over time. Currently, I think that animation has made a turn for the worse, with traditional animation being done only by a few select studios. However, I'd like to see if my mind changes as time passes. 

Thank you so much for taking some time out of your day to read this blog. I hope you find it enjoyable!

-AJ