Film Review: Frozen

I remember seeing trailers for Frozen on Disney blu-rays and DVDs, I may also have seen one in the cinema. I remember the animation with a snowman losing his carrot nose and having to fight a reindeer to get it back. It reminded me of the little skits from Ice Age featuring Scrat and his acorn.

And then it came out and my Facebook feed exploded with people going on about how good it was, how good the songs were, how their children were re-enacting scenes from it, the whole lot. It went quiet for a while and then picked up again when it was released on DVD and blu-ray.

But still I didn’t get to see it. Mr Click and I tend to go for Disney films for birthdays and Christmas, outside of those times we don’t always buy the films right away (with the exception of the ones like Monsters University which we’d seen in the cinema and had to see again as soon as possible). Because of this we’d not got Frozen yet. Luckily a colleague leant me the DVD and I ended up watching it two weekends in a row (partly because I couldn’t get one of the songs out of my head).

Frozen is loosely based on Hans Christian Andersen’s ‘The Ice Queen’. Very loosely based on it. Princesses Elsa and Anna live in a small kingdom named Arrendale. Elsa, the oldest of the sisters, was born with ice powers but an accident injures Anna causing Elsa to shut herself away from her sister for many years. With their parents dead, when Elsa turns twenty-one she comes of age, unfortunately Anna pushes her a little too far, prompting her to reveal her powers to the horror of all her subjects. And it’s up to Anna to put things right.

It’s a lot like Tangled, so alike in fact that Rapunzel actually has a cameo in it right at the beginning. I’ve since read online that it’s set in the same filmverse as Tangled. One of the key things that made me think of Tangled right from the beginning was the sheer number of songs throughout the film. I didn’t keep track but it seems like you barely go five minutes without someone bursting into song.

And I don’t mean that in a bad way. I love the songs. They’re quirky and uplifting and funny and sort of worm their way into your head and set up residence there.

My two favourites are ‘Do you want to build a snowman?’ and ‘Let It Go’ but the song Olaf the snowman sings comes in a very close second. I really need to get the soundtrack. ‘Let It Go’ will be a brilliant song to blare out of the car CD player in the summer.

The characters are fantastic too. I think as far as Disney Princesses go, they’re right up there with my all time favourite (Belle from Beauty and the Beast, in case you’re wondering, she loves books)! I love that Elsa and Anna look quite similar, enough to be sisters, but still have their distinctive features, like Anna’s freckles.

Plus their outfits are beautiful. Everything about the animation is beautiful. There is so much detail in there that even watching it twice I’m sure there are still loads of things to see. Especially the snow, you’d think that snow would just be white, but there’s so much detail put into that whiteness, it’s gorgeous.

I get the impression that it might have worked well as a live-action film in a similar sort of vein to Alice in Wonderland or Oz the Great and Powerful, particularly during Elsa’s ‘Let It Go’; I can just imagine a real-life actress doing it. That said, I’m glad it’s an animation, there are some bits which would probably rely a bit too heavily on CGI in a live-action film, at least with everything being animated it all works well together.

I’ve given the DVD back to its owner now, but I’ve added Frozen (and its soundtrack) to my wishlist. I can’t wait to see it again!