Disney’s live-action remake of Snow White has mᴀssively underperformed at the box office, but the similar Snow White and the Huntsman was a bona fide hit in 2012. Snow White is the latest in a long line of live-action reimaginings of classic Disney animated films. Most of them have been successful at the box office, like Aladdin and Beauty and the Beast, and some of them have even been well-received by critics, like The Jungle Book. But Snow White has been a critical and commercial disappointment; it received mostly negative reviews from critics and got review-bombed by audiences.

While A Minecraft Movie has been breaking box office records and exceeding expectations left and right, Snow White has been a flop. It was partly hampered by its whopping $250 million budget, necessitating a worldwide gross of $625 million to break even, but it’s not even close to turning a profit for the Mouse House. Snow White has grossed just $77 million at the domestic box office, falling far short of its initial projections. Snow White’s controversies haven’t helped it, but a different live-action Snow White movie seemed to set up a much stronger theatrical run.

Disney’s Snow White Remake Has Made Significantly Less Than 2012’s Snow White & The Huntsman

Snow White & The Huntsman Was A Bona Fide Blockbuster Hit

Back in 2012, a different live-action Snow White film — Snow White and the Huntsman — was a much bigger box office hit than Disney’s official live-action remake. Throughout its theatrical run, Snow White and the Huntsman grossed a worldwide total of $396.6 million against a production budget of $170 million (via Box Office Mojo). It was a big enough hit to turn a profit for the studio and score a sequel, The Huntsman: Winter’s War. Disney’s Snow White remake isn’t out of theaters yet, but it won’t come close to making that amount.

Much like Rachel Zegler’s Snow White movie, Snow White and the Huntsman set out to tell a more empowering version of the original fairy tale that gave Snow White a bit more agency. Snow White and the Huntsman tells the story as an action-adventure and turns Kristen Stewart’s Snow White into a badᴀss action hero. When Charlize Theron’s Evil Queen sends Chris Hemsworth’s Huntsman to ᴀssᴀssinate Snow White, they team up to overthrow the queen.

Why Snow White & The Huntsman’s Box Office Is So Much Bigger Than Disney’s Remake

Twilight’s Popularity Was At An All-Time High

By featuring Stewart in a gloomy fantasy epic, Snow White and the Huntsman was able to capitalize on the success of Twilight, which was at an all-time high in 2012 in between the first and second halves of Breaking Dawn. It’s also important to remember that movie theaters were in a much healthier place in 2012. It was long before streaming would dominate the industry and COVID-19 would land a devastating blow to the market. Still, even taking all of that into account, Disney’s Snow White remake isn’t close to matching the success of Snow White and the Huntsman.

Source: Box Office Mojo