Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs Critique

Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs 1937

I noticed quite a few interesting things throughout the movie. First I noticed that at the beginning of the movie you could not tell that she was a princess since she was dressed in raggedy clothes that were torn. Plus she was cleaning outside which you may not expect a princess to be doing. To me this was not how a princess should or would dress or act. She appeared to be of low income or in poverty based on how she looked or dressed. I know this is an assumption but what do you think the children were thinking. They may be thinking that poor people have to do the cleaning and housework.

I also found it interesting that it seemed to portray that if you are beautiful then people dislike you and may want to cause harm to you. This is a little scary for young children to think like. First the evil queen wants to be the prettiest and since she is not she wants to kill whoever is even though it is her daughter. Little girls may start to think that you want to be pretty but never the prettiest. That to me is a mixed message. Little girls should not be worrying about the looks period, let alone at such a young age.

I did notice some gender stereotyping for the princess and for the dwarfs. For Snow White, she seemed to be the motherly figure and the one that cleaned up after the dwarf’s (men). While she cleaned all day, the men were at work doing manual labor. This is a typical stereotype portrayed in many movies and stories. This may make little children believe that women stay home all day and clean while the men do all the hard work outside the house. Women are supposed to be the nurturing and motherly figure where men need to be tough and able to get a little dirty. But not always is this true. Now a days we have many women in the workforce along side men. This is where children start to think that boys are the only ones allowed to work and women are only allowed to clean.

The last thing I noticed was how she was easily manipulated into eating the poisonous apple and could only be saved by a handsome man who was the prince. This to me was showing that women can be easily talked into doing things they should know not to. But I do not think that the children watching this will get the same thing out of it. The last part that scares me is the fact that the handsome man (prince) is the only way that Snow White can be saved. This makes our young girls think that they only way to be happy, loved and saved is by a man saving her. In turn this would mean to live happily ever after. We do not need to teach our young girls to rely on boys to be happy.

When I was younger and watched this movie, I do not remember noticing any of these stereotypes other than maybe women are responsible for housework. All I can remember is how much the Queen/witch scared me every time she came on.

Now when I researched the movie, I came across many sources discussing what I noticed. But I was able to find a few more additional interesting things. The first site (www.bodiesdontmatterhere.wordpress.com) was that from a feminist perspective. The site was showing how they felt that the characters were portrayed. They said Snow White was “innocent, beautiful, passive, domestic, nurturing, ideal feminine. She was rewarded with a man.” I agree with this portion because I saw it as being the same as they did. As far as what they saw the Queen to be was, “wicked, grotesque, selfish, narcissism, power hungry, dominating, and monstrous.” At first I never really took many notes about the Queen but I would also agree with these descriptions. She is the evil witch with bad intentions to harm her own daughter for her own selfish reasons. As for the dwarfs, they are characterized as, “childlike, clumsy, unclean, and unlearned.” I do agree that they are seen as childlike and not as clean or smart. They are being taken care of by Snow White. Grumpy even stated, “All women are poison”. That was an interesting point made by the website. This can be very misleading and stereotypical for children to be hearing.

            Another site that I found was www.dailycampus.com. This site said that, “Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs sends the strongest message about gender roles. She cleans the whole house and takes on the motherly role. This image was accepted in this time period.” I discussed this in my analysis portion but the part that got my attention was the last sentence which said, “now little girls continue to watch and assume her submissive role with a smile.” This was well put and in my opinion true. The girls may not understand it at first but later on they may.