Frozen
Director: Chris Buck, Jennifer Lee
Writer: Jennifer Lee
Based on (or rather inspired by): Hans Christian Andersen‘s fairy tale The Snow Queen
Cast: Kristen Bell, Idina Menzel, Jonathan Groff, Josh Gad, Santino Fontana, Alan Tudyk, Ciarán Hinds

Plot:
Anna (Kristen Bell) and her sister Ella (Idina Menzel) were really close until Ella accidentally hurt Anna with her magic power that controls snow and ice. As a precaution their parents, the king and queen, effectively isolate Ella completely, much to Anna’s chagrin who doesn’t remember anything about the power. After their parents die, Ella is supposed to take over but things go out of hand and Anna finds herself on a mission to save not only Ella, but their entire kingdom with Kristoff (Jonathan Groff).

Frozen is beautifully animated, funny and very sweet. The plot is nice as well and surprisingly feminist. And to round things off, the music was really nice.

I had heard mixed things about this film going in. There was this amazingly stupid statement by one of the animators that didn’t bode well for the film or the message it would send. But I also heard that the film was one of the best Disney had done in a while. I’m happy to say that the animator being an asshat didn’t hurt the film. In fact, it’s a story about sisters that is not about jealousy, but their support and love for each other. And that is something we get way too little of in general and especially aimed at children. So that was awesome.

And they wrapped that story in a beautiful package: the design and animation were great, especially when it came to Ella’s magic. And it’s a musical and the songs are really nice, too.

I was a little afraid beforehand that the snowman – Olaf (Josh Gad) – would get on my nerves during the film and that he was kind of a one trick pony. And while it’s true that he wasn’t the most changeable of characters with the biggest joke repertoire, he was always funny (much of that is to do with Josh Gad’s charming performance).

Despite all the positive things I mentioned plus the generally awesome cast, the film isn’t perfect. I’m not a hundred percent happy with the story set-up that seemed a bit too forced. And there were some rather lengthy moments. Nevertheless, it was extremely entertaining and I’d gladly watch it again.

Summarizing: Totally recommended.