Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs is a 1937 animated feature, the first produced by Walt Disney. While likely not the first full-length animated feature to be produced (the 1917 Argentine film El Apóstol may be the first), it was the first full-length animated feature to become widely successful within the English-speaking world, the first full-length animated feature with sound, and the first to be filmed in Technicolor.

Cast:

Roy Atwell as Doc
Stuart Buchanan as Huntsman
Adriana Caselotti as Snow White
Eddie Collins as Dopey
Pinto Colvig as Sleepy / Grumpy
Marion Darlington as Bird Sounds and Warbling
Billy Gilbert as Sneezy
Otis Harlan as Happy
Lucille La Verne as Queen / Witch
James MacDonald as Yodeling Man
Scotty Mattraw as Bashful
Moroni Olsen as Magic Mirror
Harry Stockwell as Prince

Summary:

Fairy story, probably the most lovely example of pure fantasy that has yet been seen on the screen. The plot, which follows closely that of the original tale by Grimm, tells of a Wicked Queen who is jealous of the beauty of her stepdaughter, Snow White. Eventually she plans to have her killed. The huntsman, however, who is charged with the deed, cannot bring himself to do it, and Snow White escapes, terrified, into the forest. She flies through the dim wood – which her fears people with clutching hands, glowing eyes and evil beasts of prey – to fall at length, sobbing, on the ground. And then the sun strikes through the trees and the little forest creatures come out to welcome her, shyly at first and then joyfully. They lead her to the miniature home of the Seven Dwarfs who work in a diamond mine and which, like the home of all bachelors, is in a terrible mess. Snow White, with the help of the animals, tidies it up before they return. With the coming of evening the little bearded men – Grumpy, Sneezy, Happy, Bashful, Dopey, Doc, and Sleepy – arrive home singing their marching song “Hi-ho, hi-ho, back from work we go.” After some hesitation they agree to allow Snow White to stay with them, although they are a little afraid of the possible vengeance of the Wicked Queen. Meanwhile the latter, told by her magic mirror of Snow White’s escape, disguises herself as an old woman selling apples and takes to the Dwarfs’ cottage poisoned fruit. Snow White bites an apple and falls to the ground in the sleeping death to which the only antidote is love’s first kiss. The Dwarfs, warned by the animals, return just too late and chase the Queen through a thunderstorm until she is killed by falling over a precipice. Sadly the little men build a shrine for Snow White in the woods where they keep watch through the seasons. The fame of the shrine grows, until a Prince who loved Snow White and had been seeking for her ceaselessly hears of the sleeping maiden. He visits the shrine, recognises the Princess and kisses her with the first kiss of love, the antidote to the poison. Snow White awakes, the Dwarfs’ tears turn to joy and “they live happily ever after”.

Images: