Emily Vaartstra | rawr reviews
There is no resisting a movie that has a talking snowman singing happily and ignorantly about his dreams of summertime.
Golden Globe winner for Best Animated Feature Film, “Frozen” is one of the best Disney animated films since “The Lion King” — even surpassing “Tangled.”
In a beautiful land that resembles Norway, Princess Anna (Kristen Bell) knocks continuously on her sister Elsa’s (Idina Menzel) door year after year asking, “Do you want to build a snowman?”
But Elsa never answers the door in fear that she will accidentally use her magical powers on Anna like she did so many years before, almost killing her. Anna, who has no recollection of the childhood mishap thanks to a memory wipe from a troll, only wants to play and talk with her sister but is always shut out.
After their parent’s death and years of the gates being closed to the castle, it is finally Elsa’s coronation day to become Queen of Arendelle. The gates are opened and Anna dances and sings around the village in joy and runs into the handsome Prince Hans (Santino Fontana) of the Southern Isles.
At the evening ball, Anna and Hans fall in love and announce their engagement to Elsa — who refuses to bless the relationship. After Anna’s insistence, Elsa gets angry and exposes her magical powers to the people. Elsa runs away but her powers have caused Arendelle to freeze over and become covered in snow during the middle of the summer. Anna must go find Elsa with the village ice-delivery boy Kristoff (Jonathan Groff), his reindeer Sven and the magically created snowman Olaf (Josh Gad) to get Elsa to bring back summer.
The musical numbers are extremely well written and incredibly catchy. The combination of Bell’s and Menzel’s Broadway voices with other fantastic accompanying vocals and orchestra is what makes “Frozen” the most outstanding animated film of 2013.
The animation and special effects in this movie also contribute to the beauty and magic of the Scandinavian winter wonderland in which the film is set. A spectacular scene of the film shows Elsa on the mountain finally letting go of trying to hide her powers, as she builds an elaborate stairway and ice castles during the popular musical number “Let it Go.”
Even if you aren’t the biggest animated movie fan, “Frozen” is still worth the watch and will have you singing “Do you want to build a snowman?” in the shower until the water freezes over.