Production information
Release dates: April 7, 1982 (France)
Studios: Chloë Productions, Foch Production, Sphinx Films
Director: Jean-Claude Sussfeld
Writers: Philippe Bruneau & Jean Claude Sussfeld
Executive producer: Jean-Pierre Fougea
Composers: Jean-Philippe Goude & Ramon Pipi
Cinematography: Henri Clairon
Editor: Catherine Kelber
Main Cast
Snow White: Zabou
The traveling Prince: Thierry Lhermitte
Prince Charming: Martin Lamotte
The Queen: Claire Magnin
The cunning huntsman: Christian Clavier
The King of France: Jean-Paul Muel
The King of England: Jacques Monnet
Albert the Counstable: Philippe Bruneau
Little Red Riding Hood: Marilyn Canto
Back to References to Snow White from other studios
A French Snow White parody
Mixing elements from Snow White, Little Red Riding Hood and Victor Hugo’s Les Misérables, this 85 minute French comedy is not for the squeamish. Nudity and coarseness abound. The film is typically French and of its time and some jokes are probably difficult to understand for foreigners or even contemporary French. For instance, the King mentions a then-famous slogan of a commercial for mineral water, which would fly by most people nowadays. The characters of Snow White and the Queen are very obvious caricatures of the Walt Disney characters.
As for the story, the press kit reads: Fairies who govern the world like the Pentagon with the help of computers and control screens; a charming traveling prince who lingers in taverns and fondles the maids instead of searching for his princess; a little wild child raised at an orphanage in the forest by the cruel and torturous sisters of Perpetual Help, who make the children eat from pig troughs; a little red riding hood who delivers bottles for her father’s wine business in Préfontaines, and whose grandmother feeds into the erotic fantasy of dressing her husband up as a wolf; Eponine, Azelma, Cosette, caked in mud and dressed in rags, the wicked Thénardier, Jean Valjean, are also in the story.
A brief incursion also from Tarzan, who crosses paths with Robin Hood on his way to search for King Arthur, and D’Artagnan en route to England in search of precious ferrets.
All this little world, escaped from the tales and legends of our childhood, brings arms full of gifts to the wedding of Snow White. Gathered in the Romanesque chapel of the 12th century, peasants and knights attend the celebration of the hymn. Snow White, whom Huguette, the intern fairy, clumsily and ineptly made into a nymphomaniac, marries a little Puss, a macho devil turned Prince Charming in place of Mélusine’s wand. As for the real prince, who arrives late, he will marry Cosette in a proper ceremony. And as in the tales, they will live happily ever after and have many children…
From Play to Film
Philippe Bruneau wrote the play in 1979 for his wife Claire Nadeau to play the part of Snow White at the Café Théâtre. He wrote the play in trashy verse, an idea mostly abandonned in the film, although it was the funniest part of it. A group of 6 actors played all the characters. Among them, the young Gérard Lanvin had left his job as a market salesman to become an actor. He became a movie star a few years after that.
