Not since 2023’s Barbie have conservatives found a film they so love to hate. Snow White’s press tour was doomed from the start, with lead actress Rachel Zegler first bashing the source material and then proudly endorsing various progressive shibboleths. If all press really were good press, the film probably wouldn’t have had such a middling opening weekend. The unfavorable reviews certainly haven’t helped.
But despite its infamy, the new Snow White is far from woke. It is deeply inoffensive, leaving one to wonder whether the film would’ve flopped even without the controversy. Perhaps in Disney’s eyes, at least we’re talking about it at all.
In many ways, Snow White had a lot to live up to. Its predecessor, which Disney released in 1937, was the company’s first full-length movie, the maiden voyage of its long line of Disney princesses, and one of the first animated features ever made. Film historian J.B. Kaufman writes of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs as “a motion picture whose historical importance is inextricably linked with the magnitude of its artistic accomplishment.”
Anxious to hold on to its existing intellectual property, Disney has made over 20 live-action remakes to date. Of the Disney princess remakes, Cinderella remains the only must-see, though Snow White is a tolerable addition to the mix and updates the original in ways parents may appreciate.
Read the full piece on the Washington Examiner