Frozen: Why People Won't "Let It Go"

****----THIS POST CONTAINS VERY MINOR SPOILERS FOR FROZEN---****

This is a topic that I've wanted to talk about for a while, but due to my schedule I've not been able to do so. I write this now, hoping that this hasn't already become a dated topic. Last year's Frozen has come out of nowhere to become a box office phenom. At the time of this posting, Frozen sits as the 10th highest grossing movie EVER at the worldwide box office. It was only the 18th film to ever cross the billion dollar mark at the global box office. This past weekend it eclipsed both Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest and Toy Story 3 to become the highest grossing animated film of all time. Of the top grossing 18 films that have broken $1 billion, #3 (The Avengers), #5 (Iron Man 3), #10 (Frozen), #11 (PotC: Dead Man's Chest) , #12 (Toy Story 3), #13 (PotC: On Stranger Tides), #15 (Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace), and #16 (Alice in Wonderland) are Disney properties. With Star Wars Episode VII, Avengers: Age of Ultron, and a slew of original and sequel PIXAR flicks on the way, it doesn't look like they will be anything but dominant in the coming years at the multiplexes, but I digress.

 So what is it that made Frozen the sleeper hit that it is?
The marketing effort leading up to the film's release wasn't it. It was horrendous. If I had only ever heard of the film from the ads I would have thought it was about the misadventures of a probably annoying talking snowman. The poster even features Olaf (the aforementioned snowman) more that either of the film's leading ladies. The movie itself is deeply flawed and reeks of being over written. In other words, it feels like the movie is draft #394, and frankly I will go so far as to squarely accuse the writers and producers at Walt Disney Animation of making this more a commercial than artistic endeavor. The story on which it is based, "The Snow Queen" features the Snow Queen as the VILLAIN! This would explain the limp noodle of a villain in Frozen. I think that having both Anna AND Elsa as good characters, Disney was banking on a two-for-one opportunity for their ever lucrative Princess line of merchandise. This caused them to soften the conflict between the sisters and thematically rob the film of some of it's potential power. For me, the film opened VERY strong. The opening musical number featuring Anna and Elsa established a very powerful bond between them and created something that people could really identify with. By bringing the emotion hard and early, you really grab people as evidenced in other Disney films like Up and The Lion King. Thus it would follow that this sisterly bond and it's troubles was to be the main theme of the movie and it WAS, but the musical meeting of the two sisters once the plot had been set into motion was NOT in fact the song that everyone remembers and is NOT the one that the audience I saw the movie with applauded. The power of this applauded song, and really the whole first act set a very high bar that the rest of the film simply did not live up to. A musical encounter with the magical trolls of the Norwegian forests threatens to upend the momentum built up so far and is hands down one of the most out of place and forced feeling interludes that I've ever seen in an animated musical. Even the Disney formula defying ending ended up falling a bit too flat to really bring around the emotion of the first act. I never would have guessed that the song that everyone at the midnight screening aboard the Disney Fantasy Cruise ship clapped for would be playing on the radio a full FOUR MONTHS later. That song, "Let It Go," though not the entire reason for the film's absurd success is a key element of WHY people have taken to this movie so fanatically.

"Let It Go," for those of you who have somehow avoided hearing it, is about Elsa letting go of her fears and letting who she really is out. It's an empowering song that is thematically identical to the song "Defying Gravity" from the Broadway super-hit, Wicked. Both songs are originally sung by Adele Dazeem...I mean Idina Menzel. (I seriously thought Travola might have been having a stroke when he called her Adele Dazeem at the Oscars) She's an immensely talented actress/singer and brought a bravado to the song that elevated it's emotional content to a fever pitch. Elsa is a strong woman who fights a constant internal battle about her powers. Many people have pointed out that the movie could very easily be an allegory for Elsa coming out of the closet. It's this progressive spirit that has permeated most discussion and driven the movie to such heights. I have a name for the syndrome this movie is afflicted with. I call it "The Brave Effect." Brave...and Frozen are two films that feature tremendously interesting, well defined characters that happen to be stuck in a movie that is not of equal quality. Anna, the princess AND hero of Frozen is a powerful female lead especially compared to some of her other Disney Princess counterparts. Look to her side and we find Kristoff, who would commonly be the hero. He is not in fact the hero, but unlike Flynn Rider (Eugene Fitzherbert by birth) from Tangled he remains a foil to Anna's heroics, and a strong presence to guard her from her own naivete. He matches her blow for blow and it's a refreshing sight to behold in a Disney Princess film. Flynn, I feel was never really comfortable relinquishing control of the situation to Rapunzel and becomes something of a Weenie-Hut Jr. when she takes charge. Kristoff maintains his macho status and confidently stands shoulder to shoulder with Anna. In addition to these fantastic leads there is the aforementioned talking snowman, Olaf. Against all odds, he is not an unbearable annoyance, but a fun and welcome source of comic relief and a fiercely loyal companion, but not in a clingy irritating way. This cast of characters, though familiar in template push themselves away from the standard Disney Princess yarns. People, I think, have taken to these characters very quickly and this has elevated them to the upper echelons of popularity. Rapunzel and (my personal favorite of the Disney Princesses) Tiana have no doubt made their presence unmissable in the time since their respective films have hit the big screen, but there is a certain "je ne sais qua" about Frozen that has taken it higher in a much shorter time. The two-for-one approach has no doubt been a part of it, as now sisters can fight over who gets to dress up like Elsa next Halloween and who has to settle for Anna. In all honesty the fact that these characters go through a notable growth from the movie's start to it's end builds a sense of camaraderie between the audience and the characters on screen, but I think that the key factor of it's success is ultimately how much of a shedding of the Disney Princess tropes of old this film is. The strong women at the helm of this film, Kristoff's unique relationship with Anna, and the ending even attribute to this, not to mention "Let It Go" and the messages everyone attributes to that song. Several years ago Enchanted was the first time Disney openly poked fun at it's princess roots...that movie by the way...ALSO featured Idina Menzel. The characters however, weren't taken to as fiercely and unfortunately Amy Adams, who plays the lead, Princess Giselle, did not allow her likeness to be used in perpetuity for the character. Perhaps it's for the best because I cringe at the thought of children seeing Princess Giselle in films like The Fighter, The Master, and American Hustle. In conclusion though, what effects is this going to have on the future?


One thing that Frozen and many other films in recent years has paved the way for is more female-centric stories. It's odd that it's taken so long for studios to understand that women are just as capable of heroics and being deep characters as men. Cinema has it's fair share of amazing leading ladies to be sure, but only now is it becoming more commonplace. This, on the surface, is a great precedent to set, but will the Frozen effect be all good? I fear that maybe it won't. There is no denying, regardless of how good the movie may objectively be, that a huge opportunity was squandered in THIS being the adaptation of "The Snow Queen" that we get. Because of copyright laws, the year 2108 will be the earliest someone else can take a crack at adapting the story. It's an epic tale that was squandered on Frozen. That's not meant as an indictment of the film itself, but it IS an indictment of Walt Disney Animation Studios. I would hate to see other works taken up by Disney only to have the source material's influence reduced to mere character designs for the sake of major box office revenues. Don't get me wrong, Disney has been doing it right since Princess and the Frog. Frankly both Tangled and Wreck-It Ralph were better than Frozen. It's hard to predict the way a film that makes this big of a splash will influence the industry as a whole. Can you name the movie we have to thank for entire sets and environments being CGI? If you said 300, you're wrong. That distinction goes to the all but forgotten ambitious failure of 2004 known as Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow. It was actually quite a critical success, but audiences failed to show up en masse. Despite that, it launched a new precedent into the mainstream. If we're lucky, Disney will understand that it's the PIXAR quality characterization that makes Frozen a worthy addition to it's line up of classic films and will keep bringing relevant thematic content to it's films. Hopefully they will take better care to write compelling stories that have more focus and heft. I liked the movie a lot. I still am quite shocked at the reception it's gotten despite the reasoning I've laid out. Maybe my dear reader has additional insight they would be willing to share? Feel free to leave your take in the comments below. Whatever the reason ultimately is for it's success, nobody knew this frosty little flick would become blizzard it now is...but that's the magic of the movies isn't it?