Thursday, January 03, 2013

Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs

The Castro Theatre is ringing in the new year with the digital restoration of the Disney classic Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. I was probably a teenager the last time I saw it, & I was thoroughly entertained seeing it again. I hadn't realized the movie's songs are practically wall-to-wall. The movement of the characters is unusually captivating, & the witch is damn evil even by modern standards. Having just seen the Disney Museum's exhibit about the making of Snow White, I could recognize how Show White's small facial features & flirtatiousness were modeled after Betty Boop. The filmmakers were smart to reduce the prince's role to a cameo, after they realized they could not animate him convincingly.

I was glad to see several children at the evening show I attended, but it was the adults that were restless. A woman in my row left & came back twice during the movie. I heard people sniffling when Show White died. The organist played a medley of Disney tunes before the movie, though the inclusion of "It's a Small World" was a misuse of the mighty Wurlitzer.

§ Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs
75th Anniversary Restoration!
1937, 83 min, DCP
Castro Theatre
Tuesday January 1-Sunday January 6

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