With the exception of the ever-suspicious Grumpy (Pinto Colvig), the dwarfs promptly adjust to life with their beautiful and gracious houseguest. They warn Snow White about the sorcery skills of the wicked queen, but nonetheless she shows up, disguised as an elderly peddler, once the dwarfs are off to their mine. A sleeping death spell is cast upon Snow White, but since it is a movie, Prince Charming (Harry Stockwell) soon arrives to wake up Snow White and carry her off to his presumed castle.
How others will see it. The first full-length animated feature, Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs was a costly risk for Disney studios, since its frames (24 per second for an approximate total of 120,000) were drawn and painted by hand.
Fortunately for Dumbo, Pinocchio and other future classic Disney cartoon films, Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs was the biggest box office hit of the year, then made additional hundreds of millions (in 2017 dollars) in reissues and video sales over the year.
Since the film was fully animated, it did not receive many Oscar nominations, aside from Best Music. It did win an honorary Oscar that consisted of one statuette and seven miniature statuettes. But its legacy was momentous, and it was a first-year inductee into the National Film Registry when the latter was established in 1989.
Today, some viewers unwisely regard the film as strictly for children, or may become cynical of the film's innocence and naiveté. For example, Snow White is in love with a prince she met once for five minutes, and one wonders why the forest animals are such inseparable helpers of Snow White.
Nonetheless, most who see the film respect its achievements. The imdb.com user rating is a high (but not quite stellar) 7.6 out of 10. Those over 45 grade it higher, at 8.0. Except for excerpts, Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs has never appeared on television, thus it has been seen in recent decades mostly by the children of mothers who purchased the video. Still, the imdb.com user vote total is 150K, impressive for a film made before both Gone With the Wind and The Wizard of Oz.
How I felt about it. Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs is a spectacular accomplishment, with credit due nearly entirely to Walt Disney, who must have supervised every significant aspect of its production. The animation is fluid and charming, the songs are memorable, and the story, no matter how hokey, remains compelling. Snow White is predictably nice, demure, feminine, and chaste, but Dopey is an unexpected creation, a Peter Pan of the forest who cannot grow a beard and never surpasses the mental age of ten.
Comedy is expected from a cartoon, but the surprise is how much horror is present. The huntsman stalks Snow White, and she flees into a dark and scary forest. The sorcerer queen transforms into a cackling hag, and delivers a poisoned apple to Snow White, who after much suspense finally takes a bite.