Disney Live-Action Remakes Ranked, including 'Snow White'

24. “The Lion King” (2019)

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One of the worst films of the 21st century, the 2019 remake of “The Lion King” is nothing less than a disgrace to animation as an artistic medium and a slap in the face to Disney’s own history. If that sounds a little histrionic, it’s underselling what a torturous experience it is to watch this rehash of one of the studio’s most vibrant and cinematic 2D fantasies, and how genuinely rancid the implicit notion that it was founded on — that photorealism is superior to something impressionistic like the 1994 film, that the original movie and its gorgeous visuals are “lesser” to the brown wasteland savanna of the remake — truly is. An almost entirely computer-generated eyesore, 2019’s “The Lion King” doesn’t technically belong on this list. But it was sold to audiences as a live-action rendition of Simba’s quest to save the Pride Lands, and most of its problems come from how it transforms the colorful characters of the original we know and love into dead-eyed “realistic” animals incapable of expressing an iota of emotion. While a fairly direct rehash of the original film doesn’t sound like the worst thing in the world — “The Lion King” is one of Disney’s best and sturdiest plots, after all — the medium change kills it entirely, as we can no longer feel the pain, the sorrow, the triumph, or the joy that Simba and his friends experience. Instead, as the credits of 2019’s “The Lion King” run, you probably will feel exactly like the film itself: dead inside.
23. “Alice Through the Looking Glass” (2016)

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This list is awash with sequels no one asked for to remakes or adaptations that nobody asked for. There’s not much to say about many of them that can’t be said about the “original” films, so let us get through “Alice Through the Looking Glass” quickly. A swiftly forgotten sequel to Tim Burton’s original remake/sequel monstrosity of the 1951 original Disney film (Burton didn’t come back for this; it was handled by James Bobin, who does such a bad job here one can barely believe he ever made a movie as charming or as funny as “Muppets Most Wanted”), “Through the Looking Glass” has a paper-thin plot about Alice (Mia Wasikowska) going back in time to save the family of the Mad Hatter (Johnny Depp). Really, it’s just an excuse to reunite the entire cast of the original film to continue doing their exasperating shticks, and add in Sasha Baron Cohen doing another exasperating shtick for good measure. Filled with CGI muck, the entire thing lacks in any imagination or wonder, which is almost impressive when you remember this is supposed to be an “Alice in Wonderland” adaptation.
22. “Pinocchio” (2022)

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IndieWire recently ranked the original “Pinocchio” the greatest Walt Disney Animated feature of all time, with writer Christian Blauvelt calling it a “movie that unlocked the entire possibilities of a medium in showing that animation could be a work of powerful, disconcerting art.” So while Robert Zemeckis’ 2022 straight-to-Disney+ remake of the film has many of the same issues as so many other Disney remakes — facile humor, tired and soulless visuals, a deep sense of worthlessness — they’re amplified by the fact that we’re comparing the movie to a masterpiece like the original “Pinocchio.” All of the imagination and wonder of the original is drained out here, and what’s left is the dead-eyed, unnerving stare of that hideous CGI recreation of the original 1940 Pinocchio design, which doubles as a good metaphor for Disney live-action remakes as a general phenomenon.
21. “Alice in Wonderland” (2010)

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Tim Burton’s “Alice in Wonderland” came out in 2010, four years before the term Girlboss was popularized by the Sophia Amoruso book of the same name. Yet his take — technically a sequel — on the absurdist Lewis Carroll story of a little girl traversing a bizarre world located underneath a rabbit hole is unquestionably of that general shallow feminist ethos, molding the character from little girl lost into badass warrior woman fighting to save Wonderland from the Red Queen (Helena Bonham Carter). It’s a proudly unimaginative and boring blockbuster wearing the tatters of something much more inventive and unique as its clothing, and features a whole host of talented actors giving the worst performances of their careers, especially Johnny Depp as the obnoxious version of the Mad Hatter. Give “Alice in Wonderland” credit for this, though: it’s bad in the way that bad Tim Burton movies are bad, not in the way most Disney remakes are bad.
20. “Mufasa: The Lion King” (2024) n

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In the months before “Mufasa: The Lion King” released in theaters, cinephiles everywhere wondered: with a talented director like Barry Jenkins at the helm, could a seemingly misguided project like “a prequel to the ugly ‘Lion King’ remake about how Mufasa took the throne” actually be something artistic, meaningful, even special? The answer is a resounding no; you really can’t feel a lick of Jenkins’ influence on “Mufasa,” which is marginally better than the 2019 “Lion King” by virtue of at least telling an original story this time around. Although “original” is in air quotes: the journey from Mufasa (voiced by Aaron Pierre) from stray orphan to king is predictable and overlong, badly handling so many of its characters that the lead character is the most boring part of the film and the only motivation that can be mustered up for an iconic villain like Scar (Kelvin Harrison) is “he was a soyboy cuck.” The animation is still stiff and lacking in emotion, the songs by Lin-Manuel Miranda are instantly forgettable, and the whole thing — framed as a story Rafiki (John Kani) tells Simba’s daughter Kiara (Blue Ivy Carter) during a rainstorm — is less inspirational than it is sleep-inducing.
19. “Maleficent: Mistress of Evil” (2019)

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The original “Maleficient” was already a pretty flimsy film as is, a perspective flip on “Sleeping Beauty” that betrayed the mystique and menace of the iconic titular villain in favor of a tired victim narrative. Still, it deserved way better (as in, it should have been left alone) than a follow-up film like “Mistress of Evil,” which arrived five years later to a resounding “Why?” With the story of “Sleeping Beauty” already told, “Mistress of Evil” is insistent on continuing to portray Maleficent (Angelina Jolie) as a misunderstood and unfairly hated figure, something the original movie already resolved. What results is a muddled plot that strands Jolie, Elle Fanning, and Michelle Pfeiffer as the evil queen in bad visual effects and banal melodramatics that hold so little weight it leaves your memory pretty much immediately. The most entertainment value you can get from watching “Mistress of Evil” now is going back and realizing that, oh yeah, that was Harris Dickinson playing Prince Phillip.
18. “Aladdin” (2019)

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Even by the standards of Disney’s readaptations of its iconic ’90s Renaissance films, “Aladdin” is an unpleasant and boring affair. Inexplicably directed by Guy Ritchie on what’s clearly autopilot, the adaptation of one of the studio’s biggest hits cleans up some of the aged elements from the original film’s depiction of the city of Agrabah, from the offensive old lyrics of “Arabian Nights” to its very intentional casting of almost entirely Middle-Eastern, North African, and South African actors. But the windswept desert sands and the enchanting, magical land of the original are replaced with fake, badly shot CGI soundstages that never succeed in transporting you away to a whole new world. And while the acting in these movies is never particularly great, “Aladdin” suffers from a particularly weak cast, with only Naomi Scott as a spirited Princess Jasmine really delivering anything memorable. As the titular street rat and the scheming villain Jafar, both Mena Massoud and Marwan Kenzari are painfully stiff. Will Smith, meanwhile, is entirely miscast as the Genie, trying and failing to add something new to a part that the late great Robin Williams made his own.
17. “Lady and the Tramp” (2019)

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It’s a rough fate for a film, after all of the unimaginative slop remakes that Disney has released in theaters, to be deemed second-tier and shunted off to Disney+. That’s the fate that befouled “Lady and the Tramp” in 2019, as the remake of the iconic doggy Romeo and Juliet story was cosigned to being a launch title for the company’s then-new streaming platform, where it was promptly forgotten. Not that it would be remembered if it was granted a theatrical release: this is one of the most forgettable films in Disney history, a straight rehash of the original 1955 classic with uglier filmmaking and animated-canine dog mouths that don’t really hold the charm of the original. At the same time, it also doesn’t inspire the bile hatred of the company’s worst offerings: it’s just there to be watched and immediately forgotten.
16. “102 Dalmatians” (2000)

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As “101 Dalmatians” has (unfortunately) been turned into a franchise, the main character stopped being the heroic dog parents Pongo and Perdita from the original animated film, who rescued their pups from the villainous fashionista Cruella de Vil. Cruella took control as the face of the films, which is fair enough when she’s the one with the iconic theme song. But it did lead to the unfortunate and annoyingly named “102 Dalmatians,” a sequel to the 1996 live-action remake which dropped all of the heroic characters so that Glenn Close could reprise her performance as Cruella for a much less interesting go around. “102 Dalmatians” is a classic sequel that just repeats the beats of the original again in less interesting ways, and you can feel Close going through the motions this time. At least the puppies are still cute?
15. “The Sorcerer’s Apprentice” (2010)

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“The Sorcerer’s Apprentice” barely qualifies for this list: aside from one scene paying homage to the original Mickey Mouse “Fantasia” segment, it’s basically its own original story. That makes it less artistically bankrupt than the other films on this list, but doesn’t actually make it good. Starring Nicolas Cage as the incredibly named wizard Balthazar Blake, it is a fairly cliché zero-to-hero action film about a nebbish loser (Jay Baruchel) who gets recruited to train in magic and combat a great evil. There’s some amusement to seeing Cage play the dead serious warlock, but on the whole the film is more of a lame attempt to cash in on YA tropes popular at the time than anything magical.
14. “Beauty and the Beast” (2017)

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The 2017 remake of “Beauty and the Beast” is like watching a bad production of a brilliant stage musical: all of the parts that made it a classic are there, but it’s lacking a spark. Slavishly faithful to the 1991 classic love story to its detriment, “Beauty and the Beast” can coast by on the barest charms of the study bones the original had: the perfect musical score, the strong central love story. But the magic is dulled by the poor CGI visuals, the awkward staging of numbers that came alive in animation, and the unnecessary narrative additions (from attempts to make the already perfectly independent Belle a feminist hero to the vestigial LeFou subplot that gave us the “first gay Disney character” meme). The casting is spotty — Luke Evans is a hoot as Gaston, but Emma Watson is a perfect Belle on paper that in practice lacks the star power and the vocal ability to shine — and the attempts to recreate the original’s most iconic moments fall flat. It’s a roughly $200 million budget film that’s probably not as good or as charming as whatever local kids’ theater company production of “Beauty and the Beast” is happening near you right now.
13. “Snow White” (2025)

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One of the most exasperating and annoying trends with Disney live-action remakes is that, while many of them are terrible, so many people hate them for the wrong reason. And no remake received more pointless pre-release discourse and backlash than “Snow White,” which became the target of alt-right trolling and review bombing due to the (not uncommon) pro-Palestine, anti-Trump views of lead Rachel Zegler (the fact that Zegler is a woman of color only made her target larger). Add in discourse over how the dwarves would be portrayed and controversy over co-star Gal Gadot’s unwavering support for Israel, and you had a film that was pretty much impossible to discuss as an actual film and not as a political flashpoint moment. So, what about the actual film? It’s, admittedly, bad: the CGI dwarves are hideous, the filmmaking from Marc Webb is atrocious, the new songs from Pasek and Paul are forgettable, the plot additions are irritating, and Gadot’s performance as the Evil Queen is so utterly devoid of witchy charisma that its awfulness loops back around to performance art. Still, by the standards of these films, “Snow White” really isn’t any worse than usual, and it benefits from Zegler giving great pluck as Disney’s initial heroine, selling the hell out of a classic like “Whistle While You Work” or livening up the only good original number, “Princess Problems,” with some comedic wit. Her biggest princess problem? She deserves a way better movie than this.
12. “Christopher Robin” (2018)

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Points for mild originality here: “Christopher Robin” is, thank god, not trying to do “Winnie the Pooh” with live-action bears and tigers and piglets. Still, this gloomy and tonally confused fantasy drama is essentially just “Hook” with A. A. Milne characters rather than anything actually interesting. Ewan McGregor is the grown-up version of the human protagonist, now a neglectful dad with no imagination who must help a resurfaced Winnie the Pooh reach the Hundred Acre Woods when he ventures into the human world. The stuffed animal creatures are genuinely cute, but the whole film feels rather gloomy and sad for something theoretically inspirational, never really conjuring up the nostalgia it’s aiming for.
11. “Cruella” (2021)

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In the wake of “Wicked” becoming a cinematic sensation, it’s amusing to look back on movies like “Cruella” or “Maleficent,” which constructed themselves around vaguely feminist revisionist looks at iconic villains that clearly owed a bit of inspiration to the original Gregory Maguire novel the musical loosely based itself around. These films tend to be hollow to their core, removing much of the fiendishness that makes the women they’re about memorable in favor of easy and vapid storylines about childhood trauma that lack much bite. “Cruella” gives the fabulous fur fashionista of “101 Dalmatians” a particularly flimsy backstory — her start of darkness is that a dalmatian killed her mom. But even beyond the hackneyed screenwriting clichés, the film from Craig Gillespie fundamentally misunderstands the appeal of the character, softening her into an aspirational wounded woman in the least interesting way possible. And this uninspired comedy is given a countercultural, punk sheen that only feels sinisterly corporate coming from Disney. Points for Emma Stone’s performance, which is entertainingly outsized enough to offer some scene-to-scene amusement.
10. “Dumbo” (2019)

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“Dumbo” made it as high on this list as it did because it’s at least interesting to think about. Director Tim Burton has been very clear since the comedic fantasy film wrapped that he hated working on it and would never collaborate with Disney again. You can feel all of that frustration on screen, as the original classic Disney heartbreaker about a bullied elephant separated from his mother gets transformed into a weird and murky film that’s pretty explicitly anti-corporation, coaching a lot of criticisms of Disney in a plotline about an evil big amusement park owner (Michael Keaton) buying up Dumbo’s smaller traveling circus. It’s…not subtle, and gives the film a strange tension that’s way more compelling than anything that happens in most of these remakes. “Dumbo” is still quite bad — the title character gets sidelined hard in favor of a bunch of boring humans — but there is something to admire about a Disney remake about how Disney is an evil corporate monstrosity.
9. “Mulan” (2020)

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When the 2020 “Mulan” remake was first announced to be in production, many people online groused at the omission of the beloved songs from the 1998 original, as the director Niki Caro said she wanted to lean into the badass action rather than the comedy of the original. And, while everyone loves “Reflection” or “Make a Man Out of You,” it’s hard not to appreciate a remake that at least attempts to make real alterations and changes to the story. From cutting out tiny dragon sidekick Mushu to introducing a new love interest, the 2020 “Mulan” makes a concerted effort to tell the classic “Ballad of Mulan” story through a more serious, historical epic lens. The result is certainly worse than the original, less charming and with a stifling seriousness that works against it. But the action is oftentimes genuinely impressive, and you are getting something new out of the 2020 “Mulan” that you didn’t from the 1998 version.
8. “Maleficent” (2014)

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When you’re talking about Disney remakes, the bar for a successful film is so low that a movie as lame and uninspiring as “Maleficent” can still resonate as one of the best offerings. A revisionist, “Wicked” inspired take on the lead villain of “Sleeping Beauty,” with Angelina Jolie in the title role, “Maleficent” justifies its existence as a film by making big sweeping changes to its source material, from its perspective flip to added mythology. The problem is that, frankly, the title character is just more fun in the original as a menacing, terrifying force of pure evil than she is here as a misunderstood, slightly drippy anti-hero. Still, Jolie has good presence, and some questionable CGI aside, the film looks significantly better than most cheap remakes in this ilk.
7. “101 Dalmatians” (1996)

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There’s a lot about the “101 Dalmatians” live-action film that absolutely does not work: the strained slapstick, the hokey sentimental storytelling, the utter lack of the chill vibe that makes the original 1961 film such a treat. The dogs are cute but lackluster protagonists (given that they don’t, you know, speak), while Joely Richardson and Jeff Daniels are a snooze as Anita and Roger. But! This film has Glenn Close, whose fiendish embodiment of Cruella is easily the best and most iconic performance in any Disney remake. Adorned with clothes that are simply to die for, Close is having a lot of fun here, making a meal out of this puppy-killer’s antics. She doesn’t just make “101 Dalmatians” watchable, she makes it enjoyable.
6. “The Little Mermaid” (2023)

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Before “The Little Mermaid” even filmed, it was the unfortunate target of racist blowback thanks to the casting of Halle Bailey as Ariel. In reality, Bailey’s performance is the main thing that makes the Rob Marshall remake of Disney’s genre-defining 1989 classic worth watching. She’s utterly terrific in the role, with an angelic voice that makes old classic songs feel brand new and a screen presence that somehow makes the CGI-muck around her feel a bit more vibrant. The retooling of her relationship with Prince Eric (a charming Jonah Hauer-King) to give it a touch more depth is one of the more successful changes any of these remakes have managed, and the new songs from Lin-Manuel Miranda are actually pretty good (well, minus the execrable Akwafina rap song). Ultimately, the movie fails Bailey in key ways: the underwater world of adventure is too dark and murky to be inviting, the CG creatures too dead-eyed to be fun, and Melissa McCarthy too miscast as wicked sea witch Ursula for the film to have a real sense of danger. But it’s one of the more likable Disney remakes, which counts for something.
5. “The Jungle Book” (2016)

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When it was released in 2016, Jon Favreau’s take on “The Jungle Book” actually received positive reviews, which would quickly become a rarity for a Disney remake. Years later, the film is already showing its age — the acclaimed special effects that brought to life and snagged it an Oscar win already feel stiffer and more outdated than you’d like them to, with harsh lighting that punctures the mood of this vibrant jungle world. Still, there’s real charm and beauty in the film, which faithfully goes through the story of the original with more finesse than usual for these often sloppy recreations. The 1967 film still has more charm and vibrancy than this can ever hope to have, but it’s not an embarrassment, and for a Disney remake, that’s a huge achievement.
4. “Peter Pan & Wendy” (2023)

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One of the oddest and easily the most charming micro-trends within the Disney remake machine is that “A Ghost Story” and “The Green Knight” director David Lowery directed two of them. The results aren’t exactly as cool as that suggest, but they’re easily among the best of these films by virtue of actually feeling like real movies, with a human touch and genuine care to the filmmaking and aesthetic that elevates them considerably among all the slop. The weaker of the two, “Peter Pan & Wendy” suffers from Peter being a bit of a drip, but Wendy (played by Ever Anderson) gets a very human and touching arc that reorients this story in surprising ways. And Jude Law is genuinely great as Captain Hook, injecting some swagger and surprising melancholy into Lowrey’s rather wistful take on the story.
3. “The Jungle Book” (1994)

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This is on here with an asterisk: technically speaking, the 1994 “Jungle Book” film directed by Stephen Sommers is not based upon the 1967 animated movie. Despite getting distributed by Disney, the film only credits Rudyard Kipling’s first two “Jungle Book” novels and not the version everybody remembers. Even then, Sommers mostly focuses on adapting the second book as opposed to the more familiar original and makes several massive alterations, resulting in a plot that is, beyond the presence of a man named Mowgli (Jason Scott Lee) raised by animals, completely different to what people think of when they think of “The Jungle Book.” That’s a very good thing: gone are the talking animals and cutsey kids that could be overly saccharine in live-action. Instead, we have a swashbuckling adventure film in British Colonial India, with great action and direction from Summers (this was basically his test run for “The Mummy”) and a solid cast of ringers like Sam Neill, Lena Headey, and Cary Elwes giving great caddish villain. It’s a window into an alternate world where Disney let directors do unique and original things with the IP they hoarded, rather than just repeat the same beats we’ve seen a thousand times over and over again.
2. “Cinderella” (2015)

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One of very few films on this list to exist in the realm of “genuinely good,” Kenneth Branagh’s “Cinderella” works because it’s not straining too hard to recapture the magic of the 1950 original film. Instead, it’s just a smart, opulent, and well-crafted take on the original fairy tale, just with a recreation of that iconic blue dress. With the original film being an intentionally thin and archtypical fable, there’s room to make genuine changes: the mice get cut, thankfully, and the efforts to give Cinderella and her Prince Charming more meat to their relationship really pays off. The casting, across the board, is strong as well: Lily James and Richard Madden are lovely together, while Cate Blanchett wisely plays her Wicked Stepmother cold as ice rather than hamming it up. It’s a modest film that feels infinitely more satisfying than the many Disney’s eyesore its success birthed.
1. “Pete’s Dragon” (2016)

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There are some films on this list that are horrific, some that are merely bad, many that are mediocre, and maybe one or two that actually rise to the level of good. There is only one that is genuinely an unqualified triumph, a genuinely great film on its own merits and without having to grade on a curve, and it’s David Lowery’s “Pete’s Dragon, which manages to take the kitshy 1977 animated/live-action hybrid and turn it into something genuinely moving. Lowery has real vision for the film, throwing out the musical numbers and most of the story to really drill into the story of a feral boy living in the forest with a protector dragon. The tone is less syrupy Disney than it is melancholy ’80s Amblin film, an “E.T.” riff that puts most modern “E.T.” riffs to shame with its craft and care. Gentle and very human — there’s no real antagonist here, more misguided people doing their best — “Pete’s Dragon” is the one Disney remake that truly understands what can make a remake vital and worthwhile.

Disney’s Unending Live-Action Adaptations Ranked, from ‘Snow White’ to ‘Mulan’ to ‘The Little Mermaid’

Billboard Women in Music 2025

24. “The Lion King” (2019)

23. “Alice Through the Looking Glass” (2016)

22. “Pinocchio” (2022)

21. “Alice in Wonderland” (2010)

20. “Mufasa: The Lion King” (2024) n

19. “Maleficent: Mistress of Evil” (2019)

18. “Aladdin” (2019)

17. “Lady and the Tramp” (2019)

16. “102 Dalmatians” (2000)

15. “The Sorcerer’s Apprentice” (2010)

14. “Beauty and the Beast” (2017)

13. “Snow White” (2025)

12. “Christopher Robin” (2018)

11. “Cruella” (2021)

10. “Dumbo” (2019)

9. “Mulan” (2020)

8. “Maleficent” (2014)

7. “101 Dalmatians” (1996)

6. “The Little Mermaid” (2023)

5. “The Jungle Book” (2016)

4. “Peter Pan & Wendy” (2023)

3. “The Jungle Book” (1994)

2. “Cinderella” (2015)

1. “Pete’s Dragon” (2016)

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