December 21st

On this day - 21st of December in 1937 - The premiere of Snow White 

Snow White and the seven dwarfs is the first full length animated feature film. The movie is based on the fairy tale by the German brothers Grimm and the movie was made by Disney. The movie was awarded an honorary Oscar and nominated for Best musical score. Disney's take on the fairy tale was such a success that it was turned into a broadway musical, theme park attractions and even a video game. The initial budget was 250,000 USD. It is easy to see now that making the movie was a good idea, but both Walt Disney's wife and brother tried to convince him not to make the movie. Hollywood wrote the movie off and described it as "Disney's folly" when it was in production. Walt Disney had to take out a mortgage on his house to finance the movie which eventually had a cost of 1,488,422 USD. This was a massive amount for movies in 1937 and almost six times the budget. So it was with great anticipation when the movie was released and it was a major box-office success. The initial run ended up with 7,846,000 USD in ticket sales and a 380,000 USD profit. With numerous re-releases Snow White is considered a massive money maker, the lifetime gross is estimated to 418,2 million USD. Snow White paved the way for Disney to invest in a 4,5 million dollar studio. The success led to more classic movies such as Pinocchio, Fantasia, Dumbo, Bambi, and Peter Pan.