It’s pretty amazing that I’ve never seen Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs before. Commercials for the movie never grabbed me and honestly I hate the music. So watching this movie on Blu-ray is a brand new experience for me. Snow White is the first Disney Disk (that I’ve seen) that uses something called Disney View. It’s an interesting concept, instead of watching the original black bars that come with the original 4:3 transfer, you have the option of watching it with static colorful borders to fill up your screen. You’d think these borders would be distracting but they are not, the movie theater curtains fit the film fairly nicely. It makes watching a 4:3 Blu-ray more than just tolerable. I’m sure true video files with loathe this feature so it’s nice that you have the option to turn it off.
One thing you can always expected from a Disney Blu-ray is an absolutely amazing HD transfer his movie is so vibrant and beautiful. The animation is really rich and detailed. The audio left a lot to be desired it sounded screechy to me, but that was probably just the old time original orchestral sound. I found the menu navigation a bit annoying every time you click on something it takes a good 10 seconds to load and when you click the menu pop up it only offers the ability to return to the movie or go to the main menu where you get the Mirror as your guide bugging you to make a selection, really irritating. Disney phoned it in when it comes to extras. There’s nothing here that really stands out. And there’s only about an hours worth of extras.
Disk 1
Previews
- The Princess and the Frog
- Aladdin
Features
- Two Commentary Tracks
- The Princess and the Frog Sneak Peek (8 Min) (HD)
- Snow White Returns (9 Minutes) – A look at the potential of a Snow White Sequel where they re-constructed the original storyboards. (HD)
- Two Deleted Scenes (HD) (4:3 Ratio)
- Some Day My Prince Will Come Music Video by Tiffany Thornton (HD) (4:3 Ratio)
- Games
Disk 2
Hyperion Studios (HD) – A look at the history of Hyperion Studios. This is divided into the following featurettes:
- Where It All Began (12 Mins) (HD)
- The One That Started It All (17 min) (HD)
- Family Business (2 min)
- Story Room
- Music Room
- Five Bucks a Gag (2 Min)
Comments
The movie is exactly what I expected it to be, it’s just too old fashioned for my taste and holds no appeal for me. It’s not a movie that stands the test of time. But it is one of the first full length animated films ever so on that basis alone it deserves it’s place in history. The transfer is gorgeous and while it’s really thin on the extra features it does provide a nice well-rounded look at how the film was made and it’s impact on animation. This is one of Disney’s big guns so I expected a heck of a lot more than what they gave us.
Grades
- Movie – C
- Video Quality – A
- Audio – C
- Menu/Navigation – F
- Features – C
Final Overall Grade – C
Review by
Michelle Alexandria
Originally posted 10.22.09