SNOW WHITE
(PG) 109mins
★★★☆☆
MIRROR, mirror on the wall, is Snow White the wokest film of them all?
On reflection, no.
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Disney execs must be banging their heads on boardroom tables wondering how a film designed to delight five-year-olds proved so controversial.
This live-action remake of the 1937 animation could even win awards for trying hard not to offend anyone.
Rachel Zegler, who plays the titular young royal-turned-scullery maid, generated many of the bad headlines by spouting off about world politics and calling the prince from the original movie a “stalker”,
Then there were rumours that the seven “people of restricted growth” would be replaced by a more “diverse” group of magical friends.
It turns out the most “woke” thing about this film is Snow White being more “feminist” than the original because she actively fights against the Evil Queen (Gal Gadot).
But Disney has been making its princesses more kick-ass for years, with films like Rapunzel and Brave.
In traditional style, Snow White does have her life saved, more than once, by a handsome young man.
The main plot change is that her “true love” is a Robin Hood-style bandit called Jonathan.
The rest of the story stays largely the same.
There is still a jealous stepmother obsessed by beauty, cute animals able to communicate with Snow White and, most importantly, the merry band of hi-ho-ing little workers.
It is the computer-generated seven dwarfs who deliver all the laughs and entertainment.
Grumpy tells it like it is, Sleepy snores at inopportune moments and Doc uses modern psychobabble such as “where ethics are ill-defined” — which is a good in-joke.
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There is more self-referential humour from Andrew Burnap as Jonathan, who says Snow White “must have mistaken me for a knight in shining armour”.
The acting is so bad — with Gadot as wooden as Snow White’s broom and Zegler only impressive when she sings — I wondered at times if it was one big, tongue-in-cheek joke.
But the earnest messaging about being fearless and fair, plus the £200million budget, suggests it is supposed to be taken seriously.
If Disney thinks it can avoid “Princess Problems” — as a new track goes — by trying to please all by playing it safe then it is, as Jonathan sings, “living in a fantasy”.
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