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The first is always the hardest to beat. Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs was Walt Disney’s first full length animated feature, made in 1937. The princess Snow White is a beauty to behold, with lips red as the rose, hair black as a raven’s, and skin white as snow. Her evil stepmother, the Queen, is a witch in elegant robes whose own beauty is unsurpassed in the land who consults her magic mirror to make doubly sure that no one can compete. The movie begins with the magic mirror breaking the news that her title of ‘fairest in the land’ is in jeopardy by the young princess. The queen orders her killed, but the faithful huntsman cannot bring himself to harm Snow White and tells her to flee into the woods where she finds shelter in a little cottage. The owners of the cottage, the seven dwarfs, come home that night surprised to find a princess in their house. They befriend Snow White and urge her to be careful as they leave to work in the mines. Once the queen hears of the huntsman’s deceit, she takes matters into her own hands. She changes her appearance to an old hag, armed with a basket of apples and one poisoned just for Snow White. What follows is one of the most recognizable scenes of any Disney film as the dwarfs avenge Snow White ‘death’ and Prince Charming makes his second appearance to give her love’s first kiss.
The movie provided a little more trouble than Walt Disney had anticipated. His team of animators had completed several cartoon shorts depicting four fingered (three fingers and a thumb) cartoon characters, including the famous Mickey Mouse. But this task seemed daunting. The animators had extreme difficulty in creating a realistic woman to resemble Snow White. To help give visual aid, Marge Champion dressed in character and acted out the scenes so the 
animators could accurately recreate the movements of her body and costume. It took three years to make the film and in that time, Walt Disney raked up an unheard of (way back when) $1,488,422.74 to produce it. He even had to mortgage his house to fund the project. His brother, Roy Disney, and his wife Lillian tried to talk him out of the feature saying, “No one is going to pay a dime to see a dwarf picture.” Naysayers called it the “Disney’s Folly”, a spoof on the studio’s previous shorts. Aren’t we glad that Walt could not be persuaded out of his vision? Snow White was wildly received at its star studded premiere and was given a standing ovation from Hollywood’s elite. In its original release, the film grossed over ten million dollars worldwide, about $184,925,486 today. Needless to say, Walt Disney got to keep his house.
In 1938, Walt Disney received an honorary award for this picture. The citation read: “For Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, recognized as a significant screen innovation which has charmed millions and pioneered a great new entertainment field.” It was presented to his as one statuette and seven miniature statuettes. The American Film Institute (AFI) named it the number one animated movie last year and Snow White has continued to be in the limelight as apart of the Disney Princesses.
Every young princess is going to adore this age old fable with the delightful Disney touch. It is scheduled to be rereleased yet again on DVD, this time on Blu-ray with the combo pack on October 6, 2009 and the two-disk collector edition on November 24, 2009.
For more information, check out these sites:
Walt Disney on his first film, Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs
The original theatrical trailer
Snow White satired in the popular Shrek III
Myth and legend: the seven dwarfs represent the seven stages of cocaine addiction
The real story behind the fairy tale of Snow White
The Official Disney Princess Website
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