You know, I never really liked this movie either. In a lot of ways I didn't like it for the same reason I didn't like Snow White, the premise of a love story between two people who know nothing about each other and spent all of two minutes together never worked for me even as a kid. On one hand, this holds still, but having watched it again I am starting to appreciate and enjoy the movie more than I use too.
The story is pretty simple and exactly as you would expect of a fairy tale, Cinderella is tormented by her stepmother and sisters, being forced to do all the chores while wishing for something more. Her Fairy God Mother appears before her and gives her one night to go to the ball dressed in a wonderful attire and driven by a magical stagecoach. This, inevitably, leads to her meeting her true love the prince. Now I still don't like the story itself, the actual plot is rather dull as it was in Snow White. My main criticism of the movie hasn't changed from my youth.
That said, I appreciate that Cinderella is allowed to show frustration. Whereas Snow White was way too pure and wonderful to feel like she really existed, there are several times where Cinderella shows her frustration and seems to feel like all of her hard work is for naught. This makes her actually feel like a real person, and while the goal she is striving towards is dull (Finding her true love essentially), there is still a sense of joy once she fulfills it as a result.
Where the show really starts to shine through is the comedy. Probably a little under half of the movie run time is dedicated to the activities of the mice and birds that help Cinderella out, the entire Climax of the show is pretty much just them trying to get her a key. And this is where I started to turn around in the movie because it is constantly funny when it wants to be. It's that old school kind of slapstick where they are whiled and animated enough to allow for all kinds of shenanigans, yet when an impact comes they are just solid enough to feel like it has an impact. It's a lot of fast-paced physical comedy, so if that's your thing there is a lot to like here.
I also never really go into the Step-Mother as a great villain. Her and the sisters are fine and all, they accomplish the goal. But it's a bit odd when you see Cinderella being given more depth as a character than previous leads in Disney, but the villains start to feel flatter. This can be fine if a villain at least hits it's one note well, or has some kind of flair or accompanying atmosphere, but here it just doesn't do anything for me.
The story and characters are all so simple though that much deeper analysis feels a bit pointless. How much you enjoy the main story depends entirely on how much you can stomach the fairy tale romance, which I've never been able to do. The rest of the movie though is a lot of fun slapstick comedy that is done very well, so if that is also your thing you'll likely enjoy the viewing based on that alone.
Also, there is this moment in the movie where one mouse says 'Cinderelli like-a you too' as she makes this face of.... questionable intent.
