My Corner

March 2025

Watching Disney’s new Snow White felt like sitting through a film unsure whether to honor the original 1937 classic with reverence or demolish its legacy to build a modern feminist parable, creating a narrative that lurches uncomfortably between overwrought stage musical and lifeless corporate product, with Rachel Zegler delivering a performance that radiates visual brilliance through her jewel-toned dresses and gossamer skirts yet never convinces viewers that they are witnessing a living princess rather than an actress posing carefully for a Disney marketing still.

The first twenty minutes unfold with such a stunning combination of awkward pacing, overwritten dialogue, and tonal confusion, swerving from syrupy sentimentality to smarmy self-satisfaction, that many viewers will consider abandoning the theater altogether, but once Snow White flees into the forest and the filmmakers unveil sets that resemble lush Thomas Kinkade paintings and insert a mine cart rollercoaster sequence seemingly designed to sell theme park expansions, the production briefly flickers to life with a glimpse of genuine Disney wonder.

Andrew Burnap as Jonathan emerges as the sole fully realized performance, infusing his rogue-with-a-heart character with a grounded modernity that prevents his scenes from collapsing under the script’s tonal mess, and while his hoodie and felt pants suggest a costuming department desperate to brand him as contemporary, his chemistry with Zegler feels organic and sincere, conveyed through fleeting glances, half-hidden smiles, and delicate gestures that imply the intimate language of two lonely outsiders rather than the perfunctory prince-meets-princess romance many expected.

Gal Gadot’s Evil Queen defines the film’s greatest miscalculation, as her line deliveries land with such painfully obvious cadence that entire rows of viewers burst into laughter at moments meant to instill terror, and her villain song, “All Is Fair,” meanders along in thin, strained notes that expose the filmmakers’ mistaken belief that Gadot could match the theatrical grandeur of Disney villains past, a belief that crumbles under the weight of her inability to conjure menace, seduction, or even mere dramatic presence.

Despite these glaring flaws, two musical sequences transcend the film’s shortcomings, as Whistle While You Work’s reimagined choreography channels kinetic exuberance through forest animals and sweeping camera movements while the Evil Queen’s castle number features swirling dancers and sharp tableaux that suggest filmmakers capable of crafting grand theatrical spectacle when liberated from convoluted narrative obligations.

The film’s moral heart rests in its redefinition of fairness not as beauty but as a virtue rooted in justice, kindness, and empathy, an idea introduced through Snow White’s engraved necklace and her parents’ teachings, and while the screenplay fails to interrogate this concept with any philosophical rigor or narrative coherence, the moral lesson remains accessible enough to resonate with young viewers who crave stories of goodness untainted by cynicism.

The final scenes, where Snow White claims her destiny not merely as a girl awaiting rescue but as a rightful queen who promises to rule with wisdom and mercy rather than greed and cruelty, reveal the only moment when the film feels emotionally true, presenting a quiet dignity and confidence that flickers against the encroaching darkness of Disney’s live-action creative bankruptcy and reminds viewers that fairytales hold transformative power when storytellers trust in sincerity rather than smothering narrative possibilities beneath branding obligations, empty homage, and endless committee revisions.

Snow White (2025) ultimately emerges as neither fairest nor foulest, but rather as a film so burdened by its competing intentions to modernize, monetize, and memorialize that viewers leave the theater not with a sense of enchantment or righteous fury but with a dull ache of disappointment at the unfulfilled promise of seeing a timeless story reborn for a new generation with courage, imagination, and unflinching grace.