It's been years since I last saw this movie. I remember as a kid I enjoyed it, but ha after re-watching some of the things I enjoyed back then I begin to wonder if I had any taste at all. Probably not. Back to the movie though, the story is basically a sequel to Snow White and rather than dwarfs it has the dwarfelles...how original.

Thinking back on it the animation was pretty bad, and the songs were sub par. They did manage to snag some good voice actors for the film though. The two characters that stood out I think were the owl and bat, a couple of the dwarfelles were ok too but were basically female clones of the dwarfs only with special powers.

The story kept me entertained, but again last time I saw this I was maybe...nine. I can't say I'd recommend it and I can't say it's terrible. I will say don't watch it unless you've got nothing better to do, either that or just skip it and watch Disney's Snow White.

Well, despite the horrid rep this film has gotten, I will admit that I rather enjoyed it. Yes, it was no Disney sequel (Gawd, it wasn't even made by Disney, thank the Lord. Now, let's cross our fingers and hope that Disney doesn't make one - although it would probably be better than this movie was.), but I found it to be charming and squeaky clean . . . maybe too much clean.

The story continues the classic tale of the beautiful Snow White after her handsome Prince saves her life and they plan to be wed. Apparently, the evil Queen that harmed Snow White is dead, and her brother, Lord Malice is pretty pissed off by this; so for revenge, he wants to destroy Snow White. (Such a silly villain, to destroy a girl over your sister's death . . . violence is not the answer! LOL)
Well, Princey and Snow are separated in the forest by . . . you guessed it, Malice, and Snow White rushes to the only safe haven she can remember: the cottage of the Seven Dwarves. However, to her surprise, their seven cousins, the Dwarfelles (oh, how original is that?) have taken over the cottage and used it for their own bidding. Together - and after a bit of guidance from Mother Nature - the eight of them travel to save the Prince and reunite the lovers, all while defeating the revenge-seeking lord.

Well, the story was a bit obvious, and the animation was choopy and not even close to bad TV cartoon animation, but I still found it as a nice rain-day watch. The voice talent was total . . . BLAH, and the songs weren't much better (maybe with slight exception for the ending credits song: "Love is the Reason", sung by the voice of Snow White . . . who sounds more believable when singing than voicing the classic princess. Sad, ain't it?).

I will have to agree with one of the previous reviews on the characters of Scowl and Batso - they were well-designed and animated, thus making my review go up a star. (IMO, I liked Batso's character the best, although little Thunderella, one of the Dwarfelles, comes at a close second.)

In conclusion, if you like classic fairy tales that have a lot of boring girl power in it, this is for you. If not, watch the original Disney classic "Snow White" instead.

My Rating: 2 stars.

I have an Aunt Sharon, and she had this film on VHS, and I would watched it every time I visit her; and after that it has become one of my favorite animated films (I love both Snow White films : Disney's version and this one); now I have the film on DVD.

Like I said (a million times), I was shocked and surprised by the negative reviews I would see on the web, I thought it's a great sequel to the Snow White story by The Brothers Grimm (only instead of Seven
Dwarfs there are Seven Dwarfelles in the film). I love the ending theme performed by Irene Cara (who also played the voice Snow White in the
film).

There’s an old biblical proverb which goes “He who lives by the sword, dies by the sword” which sounds apt for this film. Filmation had been producing some of the worse TV animation to ever grace the small screen and then had the gall to say that they were going to make sequels to popular Disney films. It is hardly surprising that this statement didn’t sit well with Disney, who attempted to sue Filmation, but ended up losing the case due to the very simple fact that the characters were in the public domain.

Happily is the second and last of those projects (Pinocchio and the Emperor of the Night being the first); it’s also the weakest and absolutely fails in every conceivable way. In sections the animation is below par even by Filmation’s standards, in fact the best animation in the film is on Scowl and Batso, who are tertiary characters at best. The rest of the film treks along at Filmation’s usual TV standard, in what could be described as lacklustre animation and is completely unfit and unsuited for theatrical release. This lack of interestingly animation is likely due to a staff being rushed to complete it so that the studio could close. There is, of course, the fact that knowing that one is going to lose one’s job regardless of how good one does is hardly incentive to do one’s best work. This apparent lack of interest also boils down to character design, while some of the dwarfelles reminded me of those small woodland creatures from She-Ra, Snow White’s and Lord Malice’s are almost identical recycles of characters in Filmation's Pinocchio (the Fairy Godmother and Puppetino respectively).

The seven dwarfelles are no replacement for Disney’s dwarfs, even though that is exactly what they are suppose to be, because while Snow White was in the public domain, Disney’s versions of the dwarfs were not (remember that the dwarfs in the original story didn’t have distinct personalities or names). The story goes that the dwarfelles have been giving the dwarfs cottage since they - the dwarfs - moved to another mine further away; they’ve also been given powers by Mother Nature. One of their number, Thunderella - associated names are another Filmation trapping – has been summoned by Mother Nature for not living up to expectations. Mother Nature is shown as an elderly half hippie, half hula girl, who has only half a mind on what she is actually doing. The part of the film with Mother Nature have little going for them, she simply tells the dwarfelles of, then lets them keep their powers so that they can prove their worth while aiding Snow White.

The writing is hardly to scratch to even get to an exciting level, at no point are you challenged on any level, I figured out who the cloaked stranger helping Snow White is long before the revelation at the end. The mission to get to the realm of doom is a breeze that never gets interesting. Along the way we have to bear some terrible and forgettable songs, all of which have their heads firmly wedged in the bad side of eighties music. Attempts at humour feel immensely forced and fall flatter than the 2D animation, which is poor throughout, although with Filmation’s standings this might not be a surprising statement. The dwarfelles barely contribute anything of real worth to the whole and neither does anyone else, Snow White has no real discerning personality to speak of and Malice’s is just a clichéd transforming villain/wizard in the vein of Disney Maleficent, or the Swan Princess’ Rothbart, only without being even the least bit as interesting as either.

One good aspect to the film is that it was Filmation’s last (In fact the film was released posthumously to the company’s closure). After it’s completion the studio was shut down, some reports that their new owners closed them for tax purposes, for me the more likely scenario was that after spending $16 million on two films which collectively made under $7 million the firm was practically bankrupted and had to sell up.

Maybe those years of making abysmal animation had finally caught up with and 'killed' them.