Imo she is easily better looking than the queen. Queen was better when played by Charlize
Which films have you seen lately? ΚΓ' - The thread is your movie hegemon.
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Yes. Generally, they are money-grabbing, sucking every last drop they can get out of nostalgia for their old/proven stuff...
No. They deserve a little more credit than that. I will concede however, that with the sheer volume of stuff they pump out, some of which is unmitigated trash, they are bound to "broken-clock-is-right-twice-a-day" occasionally. Putting that aside, since Inside Out 2015, which was a masterpiece, btw, they have had numerous other excellent productions, which meet your criteria ("different and risky"), just to name a few:
The Good Dinosaur (which was at least different, if not risky),
The Force Awakens (which was at least superficially different and risky in the sense that they could have repeated the PT, disappointment... although I will admit TFA was arguably not necessarily "different" or "risky", either substantively, or aesthetically),
Zootopia (which was both)
Dr. Strange (which was different, and would have been risky'ish earlier, but maybe less risky because it was riding the MCUs large coat-tails by that point),
Moana (which was both),
Rogue One (which I'd argue was both, but regardless, was such a chefs kiss* masterpiece that its worth a mention)
Guardians of the Galaxy 2 (which was undeniably different from everything, with the possible exception of itself, the only risk being that they would ruin the magic of the original, which they didn't)
Thor: Ragnarok, (which was both obviously, along with being a masterpiece)
Coco, (which was different, if you put aside that it was a shameless ripoff of Dreamworks' Book of Life, but it was also risky, because of the niche subject matter, and ended up being a brilliant, delightful film)
The Last Jedi (which, I think is iconic/quintessential in both regards, demonstrated in the star-level, white hot hate/animosity it receives even to this day)
Black Panther (which was undeniably different, and also pretty risky, even with the MCU coat-tails it was a pretty bold/ambitious project that obviously paid off)
Now Black Panther came out in 2018, and for at least 2 years after that, I will concede that not much else Disney made (films at least) after that even arguably passes your criterion of "different and risky", with maybe the exception of Ford v. Ferrari and Ad Astera, which don't even really count as "Disney" movies, except that they were produced by Disney studios, and with regard to Ad Astera, thinking about it... I think it possibly fails the "different" prong because of Interstellar, The Martian and Gravity, all of which preceded it.
But starting in 2020, Disney made:
Onward
Luca
Shang Chi
Encanto
Strange World (although the rip-off, or "reimagining" to be generous, of Innerspace, is pretty impossible to ignore)
After Strange World... I have to admit... I don't see much of anything else that passes for "different and risky", especially not anything that I would say was an excellent film or a hit. I will also concede that I obviously haven't seen all the films that Disney made over the past 15 years
. Also worth noting, is that most of the stuff on the horizon for the near future seems to be more of the same... sequels and remixes of existing content... So your overall point still seems valid.
Gori the Grey
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The thing is . . . the way I understand it, part of the problem with the latest Snow White does stem from the ways they wanted it to be "different" from the original.
So, to take one of the elements that is being lambasted: they demoted the original film's "Prince" (Florian, I learn by Googling) to a bandit named Jonathan. There is a felt need to make the reboots "different" from the originals because we don't want the motif of the helpless woman who needs rescuing by the able man. Evidently Snow White instead rescues Jonathan several times in the new one. Also, the original movie's kiss now feels too much to us like a guy kissing a corpse, and that's cringey.
Like even down to her interactions with the dwarves. Apparently, this Snow White doesn't cook and clean for them, because that would be demeaning to women. But as a result, she comes across as though all she is doing is ordering them around, and that's not appealing either.
What I guess I'm trying to say is that so many elements of the original movies are now objectionable (gender roles, "fairness" as a standard of beauty, monarchical government) that when you figure out how you're going to sidestep/rework each one of them, you end up with a movie that's a chaotic mess.
A movie like Inside Out can work because it has as its starting material stuff (the workings of the brain) that we all buy into, don't have major reservations about. Disney would probably be better off leaving the old princess motifs in the past and work out new worlds that are more in keeping with our own starting premises.
I actually want to see the movie, because I think the way its various elements don't cohere could make for a fascinating commentary on the times we live in.
So, to take one of the elements that is being lambasted: they demoted the original film's "Prince" (Florian, I learn by Googling) to a bandit named Jonathan. There is a felt need to make the reboots "different" from the originals because we don't want the motif of the helpless woman who needs rescuing by the able man. Evidently Snow White instead rescues Jonathan several times in the new one. Also, the original movie's kiss now feels too much to us like a guy kissing a corpse, and that's cringey.
Like even down to her interactions with the dwarves. Apparently, this Snow White doesn't cook and clean for them, because that would be demeaning to women. But as a result, she comes across as though all she is doing is ordering them around, and that's not appealing either.
What I guess I'm trying to say is that so many elements of the original movies are now objectionable (gender roles, "fairness" as a standard of beauty, monarchical government) that when you figure out how you're going to sidestep/rework each one of them, you end up with a movie that's a chaotic mess.
A movie like Inside Out can work because it has as its starting material stuff (the workings of the brain) that we all buy into, don't have major reservations about. Disney would probably be better off leaving the old princess motifs in the past and work out new worlds that are more in keeping with our own starting premises.
I actually want to see the movie, because I think the way its various elements don't cohere could make for a fascinating commentary on the times we live in.
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For Disney to succeed in the next few years, they need to do things like extend the Cinderella story through the honeymoon, having/raising 3 kids, and supporting the Prince as he becomes king and struggles to hold back the tide of invading savages who threaten the peaceful caring culture of the old king etc.
I think this is the real takeaway here... Disney's beloved princess films, particularly the oldest ones, were a reflection of the themes, tropes, etc., for their time. Trying to "update" them to suit current sensibilities is going to be fraught with all kinds of issues.
The thing is, they don't even have to necessarily abandon the name(s) of the old stories (Snow White, Sleeping Beauty, Cinderella, etc.), or even the very basic framework of the story(ies). They would just need to approach them as sequels or actual reboots rather than "versions", ie "live-action-versions" of the originals. What springs to mind is The Wiz, compared to The Wizard of Oz... the point being that the former is essentially a brand new take on a familiar story, that is only loosely based on the latter, rather than an attempt to simply re-skin the original into live action. Another example is Ever After, starring Drew Barrymore, compared to Cinderella... brand new stories, based loosely on the old familiar ones.
When they present/market the film as a "live-action-version" of the original animated film, they essentially set up an expectation that the film will essentially be almost a frame-for-frame, line-by-line, song-for-song, remake of the original, just with "live-action" in place of the animation. Dressing up identical/similar characters in identical/similar clothing, with identical/similar settings, and identical/similar music, just exacerbates those expectations. So every point that the live action version deviates from the original, is a potential pressure point for complaints from the audience and is going to serve as a point of controversy and source of demands for justification for the change(s).
If people like the changes, they will call them brilliant, bold, innovative, etc., and if they don't like the changes, they will condemn them as "DEI", "woke", "focus-grouped", "feminist", "Mary Sue", and so on. Then this gets compounded, because once folks have emotionally committed to not liking something, they can't suspend disbelief anymore or give anything the benefit of the doubt, or let any flaw slide... they start nitpicking every single flaw to further justify their dislike. Whereas when they like a film overall, they more easily ignore, dismiss and excuse flaws.
The bottom line is... that when they try to change the stories people know and love and have deep nostalgia for, lots of people aren't going to like that. They're better off being upfront that they are completely reimagining the story, and completely changing the characters, clothing, setting, etc., to reflect that... or just leaving the old stuff alone entirely and moving on to new stuff, that possibly references, the old stuff... via sequels, cameos, flashbacks, time-travel and similar... or just completely new stuff like Frozen, Moana, Encanto, Zootopia, Inside Out... and so on.
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Fippy
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Many viewers like being critics at heart, sure..
but most are not that thick, and open to changes surely.
Also..most don't really think about old fairy tales very often. Do you? I am not
Maybe it's just a really bad movie.
There are many reviews out there suggesting that (i mean reasonable reviews, not upset anti-whatever).
About Disney, the name has nostalgic value.
I for example think about their comics first..Donald Duck etc.
Great childhood memories..but then reality sets in, and there's not much left of that in today's Disney.
but most are not that thick, and open to changes surely.
Also..most don't really think about old fairy tales very often. Do you? I am not
Maybe it's just a really bad movie.
There are many reviews out there suggesting that (i mean reasonable reviews, not upset anti-whatever).
About Disney, the name has nostalgic value.
I for example think about their comics first..Donald Duck etc.
Great childhood memories..but then reality sets in, and there's not much left of that in today's Disney.
Gori the Grey
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I've been mulling this over. And there's one place where I don't feel entirely confident in my thinking. But I'm just going to step into it, at the risk of offending. You all will bring me to heel if I'm off base.
One question that arises is, if there has been success with movies built on a different set of starting premises--like Inside Out and Zootopia--why continue to bother with "princess" movies? If so many elements of princess movies have come to be objectionable, why bother to keep making them? The thing that's really driving this question for me is what Josu indicated: that in this movie, Snow White's parents weren't really a king and a queen, but like overseers of a communist utopia instead. I mean, if your princess can't even be a princess any more, why bother making a princess movie?
Yes, of course, a big part of the answer is just Hollywood being risk-averse, trying to bank on established properties.
But then I think there's this too. "Princess movie" is a whole genre. People who like princess movies like the fantasy of being a princess. Here's where I step in it: I think the appeal of princess movies for their target audience, young girls, is a power fantasy. One part of the appeal of being a princess is that you get to dress up in beautiful gowns. But another part of it is that you are important; you are a center of attention; you are waited on by other people; you are powerful. I think young boys have their own power fantasies: of being a soldier, e.g. The one thing you don't have as a kid is much power, so I think it's natural enough to fantasize about being more powerful. So I think there will always remain a strong appetite for princess movies.
But adults have to sit through them too. And all of the circumstances that would confer power on a child are now off-putting. "Princess" has come to have a pejorative sense: entitled brat.
What I'm trying to say is that I don't think the genre is viable anymore because the circumstances that would confer power on a child (being the daughter of monarchs) are objectionable enough to our present sensibilities that you have to bend over backward to minimize them in the film.
Elsa and Anna's parents have been dead for years and the kingdom of the movie has somehow sort of plodded along without them (while still acknowledging the princess status of Elsa and Anna).
One question that arises is, if there has been success with movies built on a different set of starting premises--like Inside Out and Zootopia--why continue to bother with "princess" movies? If so many elements of princess movies have come to be objectionable, why bother to keep making them? The thing that's really driving this question for me is what Josu indicated: that in this movie, Snow White's parents weren't really a king and a queen, but like overseers of a communist utopia instead. I mean, if your princess can't even be a princess any more, why bother making a princess movie?
Yes, of course, a big part of the answer is just Hollywood being risk-averse, trying to bank on established properties.
But then I think there's this too. "Princess movie" is a whole genre. People who like princess movies like the fantasy of being a princess. Here's where I step in it: I think the appeal of princess movies for their target audience, young girls, is a power fantasy. One part of the appeal of being a princess is that you get to dress up in beautiful gowns. But another part of it is that you are important; you are a center of attention; you are waited on by other people; you are powerful. I think young boys have their own power fantasies: of being a soldier, e.g. The one thing you don't have as a kid is much power, so I think it's natural enough to fantasize about being more powerful. So I think there will always remain a strong appetite for princess movies.
But adults have to sit through them too. And all of the circumstances that would confer power on a child are now off-putting. "Princess" has come to have a pejorative sense: entitled brat.
What I'm trying to say is that I don't think the genre is viable anymore because the circumstances that would confer power on a child (being the daughter of monarchs) are objectionable enough to our present sensibilities that you have to bend over backward to minimize them in the film.
Elsa and Anna's parents have been dead for years and the kingdom of the movie has somehow sort of plodded along without them (while still acknowledging the princess status of Elsa and Anna).
A Complete Unknown on Hulu. Bob Dylan's folk years. If you like him and his early music, you will like this movie. The movie ends when Dylan went electric at Newport in 1965. There was a lot of ground to cover and some parts were left out or glossed. Back in 1965 Dylan was an acquired taste and mostly panned for his terrible signing voice. I thought he was fabulous, right up there with the Beatles, Stones and British Invasion. 
My mistake. I should have clarified; my first sentence was directed at Disney and all its subsidiaries...
My second sentence was directed specifically at what has been released under the Disney/Pixar banner since 2015s Inside Out. Not including Marvel and Lucasfilm. Because yes, they released good stuff up until they started going stale and directionless too...
Ordnael
Emperor
Didn't watch, don't care. The original is a masterpiece! Why watch regurgitated content yet again?
I think this is correct.
The NETFLIX documentary The Toys that Made Us has an episode on the "HE-MAN and the Masters of the Universe" cartoon and toys... and it addressed this issue explicitly... the makers of the toy specifically created He-Man's catchphrase "I have the Power!" to tap into the frustration of little boys feeling like they had no power in their lives.
Dylan was a poet, not a signer... his bad signing voice just enhanced his charm. His famous writing of "All along the Watchtower", which Jimi Hendrix elevated with his iconic guitar, is even more endearing because Dylan later acknowledged Hendrix's genius and said that although he wrote the song, it really belonged to Hendrix. Jimi Hendrix wasn't much of a singer either, but like Dylan, he had an iconic voice, iconic sound, and genius music, which can outweigh a lot of deficiency in singing voice IMNSHO.A Complete Unknown on Hulu. Bob Dylan's folk years. If you like him and his early music, you will like this movie. The movie ends when Dylan went electric at Newport in 1965. There was a lot of ground to cover and some parts were left out or glossed. Back in 1965 Dylan was an acquired taste and mostly panned for his terrible signing voice. I thought he was fabulous, right up there with the Beatles, Stones and British Invasion.
Gori the Grey
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He got the Nobel Prize in literature!
Ordnael
Emperor
For which he didn't bother to come to the Nobel Prize gala to receive...if I am remembering it correctly!
And that pissed off a lot of "hard" writers!
That's worth pointing out, as a counterpoint to the notion that adherence to the original script makes it easier for lots of fans to accept/enjoy... except that there is a pretty significant difference there with The Lion King... even though they did a "live action" version of The Lion King, with that film, more than any of the others, the "live action" description can be put literally in scare quotes, because since the characters are all animals, it wasn't really "live action" characters at all, but was instead done almost completely with CGI, particularly the characters' talking/mouths... so The Lion King's "live action" version was really just another cartoon, except with more modern, CGI animation, instead of old-school, traditional animation. That alone may have undermined, and possibly cancelled out some of the favorability boost they may have gotten from staying mostly true to the original script... since the new version was just a less-good cartoon remake of the original cartoon
... which in retrospect... why did they even bother 
Oh, yeah... moneygrab, duh
EDIT: Thinking about it some more... it would be similar to if they took a beloved, classic like the original Star Wars:ANH, and did a new version, with almost nothing changed about the script, score, etc., except with all new actors, with makeup/CGI to make them appear more similar to the original actors... I mean... I'm here for it... I'd go see it... but I'm pretty sure the overall reaction to that would be pretty "meh".
As an aside... what I describe above is definitely, 100% going to happen. Star Wars is eventually getting re-booted, one way or another...
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Ordnael
Emperor
Some folks, my brother included, call that new version Star Wars: The Force Awakens.
Sure, but joking aside, TFA is a good example of what I'm referencing. TFA was presented as a true sequel, rather than a remake, or even a reboot, so they could tell a "new" story without being tethered to following the original one. They also had lots of leeway to stray from the source material in terms of the characters, themes, settings etc. Of course, even with that freedom, they made the wise call to pump the film full of nostalgia and fanservice, and use an overall storyline that in many ways tracked with ANH, even including using technically different, but aesthetically similar settings, supported by cameos of the old original fanfav characters. It was a well done sequel and very well received for those reasons. They left the haters with very little substantive to complain about, because it was, as you point out, a remix/rehash of ANH, but without actually trying to reboot, or "reskin" the original story. It left the original, beloved story alone and still gave us an "updated" version.
So fans got to have our cake and eat it too. The only big thing left to complain about was the "diversity" of the main characters... essentially that the main heroes weren't white dudes anymore, the main villain was, and the central Jedi-apprentice hero was a girl instead of a boy... which cast the critics in a bad light and further propped up the films' image/reception. The four main characters were essentially, spiritually, and in many ways, literally avatars for us as fans... they were all fan-bois/gurls of the original, source material... Rey and Finn repeatedly geek out about the original legends/characters... Rey is like the Galaxy Quest superfans that have scale models/memorized blueprints of the Falcon so much so that they could fix the "real one" if they ever had to in their wildest dreams... right down to Kylo Ren worshipping and cosplaying Vader while hating Luke and Solo with the passion that only a true fan-boi could have.
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Gori the Grey
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It is, after all, a princess movie.As an aside... what I describe above is definitely, 100% going to happen. Star Wars is eventually getting re-booted, one way or another...
A fun exercise for us all (maybe I'll start a thread) would be to imagine a version of ANH with all of its politically incorrect elements fixed the way the new Snow White film fixes all of the objectionable parts of the original.
One clever line that I heard about the new Snow White, by the way is this: "There's nothing wrong with the new Snow White film that couldn't be cured by making it 26 minutes shorter, animated, and 88 years ago."
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