Walt Disney Studios just can’t catch a break. And as always, it’s their own fault.
After years of film flops and failures, and a stock price that’s declined nearly 42 percent in the past three and a half years, Disney desperately needed its incredibly expensive “Snow White” remake to be a financial success. First, set photos leaked, showing a disastrous decision to change the famous seven dwarfs to what looked like characters from “Portlandia.”
Bad press, reshoots, and CGI redesign led to Disney delaying the release of the film by a full year. And then just a few months before its new date, lead actress Rachel Zegler decided to go off on Instagram about Donald Trump winning the 2024 election.
Exactly what Disney wanted to see, the lead actress of an overbudget, delayed, heavily criticized movie insulting half the country after a stunning election rebuke of her ideology.
Now the trailer is out, ahead of the new “Wicked” movie, and it leaked online to uh, more criticism.
The trailer hints at several problems with the “Snow White” release, in any number of key areas.
Former Disney Imagineer Jim Shull summed up many reactions on X, saying that the trailer is “unwatchable.”
And he’s right. The look and feel of the movie is quite simply, horrendous. An over-saturated, CGI’d mess, with what looks like zero real sets. The hastily inserted dwarfs look terrible, and there seems to have been some heavy editing to make Zegler’s face look abnormally soft.
Then there’s the “girl boss” attitude. That change was hinted at by Zegler during a disastrous press tour where she called the original story and prince “weird.” Sure enough, there’s a still photo of Snow White with weapons pointed at her and a crowd behind her. Instead of needing the help of her friends, it seems like Disney’s decision was to make her the leader of a resistance against the evil Queen. Ridiculous.
