You know that Snow White remake everyone was fighting about online for like two years before it even came out? The one with Rachel Zegler that broke the internet multiple times? Yeah, Disney just had to reveal exactly how much money they spent on it and I’m not sure anyone was ready for this tea.
$336.5 million. That’s THREE HUNDRED AND THIRTY-SIX POINT FIVE MILLION DOLLARS. For a movie that made $205.7 million total at the box office. If you’re not great at math, let me help: that’s really, really bad. Like catastrophically bad. And now we know exactly how bad because Disney got caught with their financial pants down thanks to UK filing requirements they couldn’t weasel out of per Forbes.
But before we get into all the drama, let’s talk about why this matters beyond just “haha Disney lost money.” The live-action remake thing has been Disney’s whole strategy for years now. Sometimes it works (Beauty and the Beast made $1.3 billion, The Lion King printed money), and sometimes it absolutely does not (looking at you, Pinocchio). Snow White was supposed to be a sure thing because it’s literally THE Disney princess, the OG, the one that started the whole empire back in 1937.
If you can’t make money off Snow White, what CAN you make money off? Apparently not Snow White 2025 Edition, but we’re getting ahead of ourselves. The point is, Disney’s been betting big on these remakes as a core part of their theatrical strategy, turning their animation vault into a live-action ATM machine. When one of these bets goes THIS wrong, it raises questions about whether the whole approach is sustainable or if audiences are finally getting tired of paying $15 to watch movies they already own on Disney Plus but with real people instead of cartoons.
How Did We Even Get These Numbers?
So here’s the thing about Hollywood accounting. Studios in America basically never tell you what their movies actually cost. They mash all their spending together in corporate filings and you just have to guess based on trades reporting “sources say” and industry analysts making educated guesses. It’s deliberately opaque because nobody wants you doing the math on whether their $200 million superhero movie that made $400 million actually turned a profit after you factor in marketing, distribution, theater cuts, and all the other costs they don’t advertise.
But the UK is different. If you film there (which tons of big movies do because of tax incentives), you have to create a separate production company and file real financial statements that show actual costs. Not estimates, not rumors, actual legally binding numbers. Disney set up Hidden Heart Productions (cute name, referencing the Evil Queen’s jewelry box) to make Snow White at Pinewood Studios, and those financial docs just became public.
The UK gives studios a tax credit worth up to 25.5% of what they spend filming there, which is why so many American productions shoot in Britain. But to get that money back, you have to prove exactly what you spent. The rules are strict too. The production company has to be responsible for “pre-production, principal photography and post-production of the film; and for delivery of the completed film,” and “there can only be one FPC in relation to a film.” Translation: you can’t hide costs in other companies or do creative accounting tricks. Everything has to be in these filings.
And that’s how we got the receipts. Disney spent $336.5 million making Snow White, got $64.9 million back from the UK government, so their net cost was $271.6 million. Still absolutely massive.
Why Did It Cost SO Much?
Here’s where it gets messy. By July 2022, when filming had JUST wrapped, Disney had already spent $183.3 million. That’s before post-production, before visual effects were finished, before music, before reshoots, before everything. And yeah, there were reshoots. Extensive ones according to reports.
Oh, and the set caught fire. Like actually caught fire at Pinewood Studios during production. So they had to rebuild stuff, reschedule, the whole nightmare scenario. Fire damage plus extensive reshoots equals budget going BOOM in the bad way.
The original budget was apparently lower, but the filings literally say the movie “was forecasted to be over the production budget” which is corporate speak for “this spiraled out of control and we knew it.” For context, Disney spent less on Rogue One: A Star Wars Story, less on Guardians of the Galaxy, and less on the 2017 Beauty and the Beast that made $1.3 BILLION at the box office. Snow White cost more than all of those.
Industry analyst Valliant Renegade actually predicted back in 2023 that Snow White would cost around $300 million, and everyone thought he was being dramatic. Turns out he was basically spot-on, maybe even conservative. Dude called it two years early.
The Box Office Bloodbath
Snow White opened to $87.3 million worldwide its first weekend. That sounds okay until you realize it was 13% BELOW what Disney was forecasting. And it only got worse from there. Final worldwide total: $205.7 million.
For a movie that cost $336.5 million to make (or $271.6 million after tax credits), that’s a disaster. Theaters keep roughly half of box office revenue, so Disney probably got around $102.9 million back from theatrical. Against $271.6 million in costs, that’s a loss of like $168.7 million just from the theatrical run.
Now, Disney will tell you (and they have told reporters) that box office isn’t everything. There’s home entertainment sales, streaming value on Disney Plus, merchandise, all that stuff. And that’s fair. But you also have to subtract marketing costs, which for a movie this big probably ran $100 million or more and don’t show up in these production filings. So even if Snow White sells a bunch of Blu-rays and Disney Plus subscriptions, the math is ROUGH.
This was the fifth-worst performing Disney live-action remake out of 21 total. Only Mulan (which barely had a theatrical release because of the pandemic), 102 Dalmatians, Christopher Robin, and the 1994 Jungle Book did worse. And when you adjust for inflation, 102 Dalmatians and Christopher Robin actually made MORE money than Snow White in real terms. You have to go back to a 1994 movie to find a Disney live-action remake that genuinely performed worse and that one wasn’t even dealing with a global pandemic like Mulan was.
The Controversy Couldn’t Have Helped
Look, we have to talk about the elephant in the room. Snow White was controversial before a single frame was shot. Rachel Zegler, who’s a talented actress for sure, made some comments about the original 1937 animated movie that did NOT go over well with certain segments of Disney fans. She called Prince Charming’s behavior “stalker”-ish and said the original was “extremely dated when it comes to the ideas of women being in roles of power.”
Whether you agree with those takes or not, they created friction. David Hand, whose father literally worked on the original that won Walt Disney an honorary Oscar, said the filmmakers “would be turning in their graves” over the remake.
Then the first trailer dropped and the CGI dwarfs looked… not great. People thought they were creepy compared to the cute animated versions. The trailer got over a MILLION dislikes on YouTube. That’s one of the most-hated trailers ever.
Zegler also made political statements on social media that apparently had producer Marc Platt flying to New York trying to get her to delete posts, but she refused. After Trump won the 2024 election, she went on what reports called an “expletive-laden tirade” against MAGA supporters. Again, Platt reportedly tried to get her to cool it but the damage was done.
I’m not here to debate anyone’s political views, but from a pure marketing perspective, alienating huge chunks of your potential audience before the movie even comes out is not great business strategy.
Disney’s Not Giving Up Though
Here’s the wild part. Despite Snow White absolutely eating it financially, Disney’s not slowing down on spending. Their Q1 2026 results showed entertainment division operating income dropped 35% to $1.1 billion partly because of “increase in programming and production costs.” They’re still throwing money at movies.
And honestly? It’s working out for them overall. The very next release after Snow White was Lilo & Stitch, ANOTHER live-action remake, and that thing made $1.038 billion worldwide. That’s the fourth-highest grossing Disney animated adaptation ever. One movie basically erased Snow White’s losses.
Then Zootopia 2 came out and made $1.803 billion, becoming Disney’s highest-grossing animated film of ALL TIME. Avatar: Fire and Ash pulled in $1.44 billion. So yeah, Snow White was a disaster, but Disney’s 2025 overall was actually pretty great because they had other hits that more than made up for it.
What Have We Learned?
The Snow White numbers prove a few things. One, big-budget filmmaking is RISKY. Spending $336.5 million on anything is a massive bet, and when it doesn’t pay off, the losses are catastrophic. Two, controversy absolutely can hurt a movie’s performance, especially when it’s happening for YEARS before release. Three, Disney’s strategy of throwing money at everything and hoping most of it works is actually kinda functional because when they hit (Lilo & Stitch, Zootopia 2), they hit BIG.
But also, maybe, MAYBE, spending a third of a billion dollars on a remake of a movie you made in 1937 is not always the move? Just a thought.
Alright, your turn. Do you think Snow White deserved to flop after all that controversy, or did Disney just make a mediocre movie that happened to cost way too much? Are you still excited for more Disney remakes or are you officially done with them? Sound off in the comments because I genuinely want to know if anyone out there is still defending this movie’s existence. And if you enjoyed this financial breakdown that made you feel better about your own bank account, share it with your Disney-obsessed friends so they can cry with you.
