Frozen is the tale of two sisters, Anna (Kristen Bell) and Elsa (Idina Menzel). Princesses of Arendelle, they are as close as sisters can be in their youth, until Elsa’s powers to create snow and ice accidentally wound Anna while they play in the castle one day. Fearing the end of Anna, her parents take her to the most magical of trolls, who removes all of Anna’s memories of Elsa’s powers and suggests that Elsa be kept away from Anna and everyone else until she learns to control her preternatural abilities.
Like something spun off from X-Men, Frozen offers a brief look at how those with strange abilities are judged and how the most popular course of action is to relegate them to some out of the way place. In a series of scenes, Anna speaks and sings through the keyhole of Elsa’s door, imploring her to emerge and play once again. But we never seen Elsa come out, not to speak with her sister, and not when her parents parish during a violent storm at sea. We don’t see Elsa, with her gloves meant to “conceal” her power until it is time for her coronation as Queen of Arendelle.
The coronation is a success and the sisters are reunited until Anna quickly gets engaged to Prince Hans, a man whom she met only hours before, and Elsa refuses to give her blessing. Somewhere in here, one of Elsa’s glove gets removed, and she is unable to control her powers that heighten according to her emotion. Jagged icicles emerge from the floor as the guests decry her as a villainous sorcerer. As any Queen on the verge of being pitchforked will do, she flees across the fjord and up to the highest mountain she can find. In turn, she turns Arendelle into a city in the midst of an eternal winter.
Of course, Anna leaves the castle to search for her sister and things unfold as they most often do in a story that centers on an “act of true love.”
However, Frozen is a breath of fresh air in a number respects. First, it is a Disney film that harkens back to the Disney musical of old. Not since the quartet of The Little Mermaid, Beauty and the Beast, Aladdin, and The Lion King has a Disney film (not Pixar related) been scored so wonderfully. Each song is complex and clever while the soundtrack experiments with different genres.
More interestingly, the film debunks the “love at first sight trope.” Instead, Anna’s initial betrothed, Hans, turns out to be a bit more nefarious than we might expect given his debonair coif, decent singing voice, and tender smile. The reveal of his true motives is one of the best in the film insomuch as it reminds us that everything worth experiencing takes time, including love. Far too many films depict love as the apex of success. And while Anna might believe that love is a requisite for both happiness and recognition, the film ultimately shows that this is not the case. Subtly, it also shows that those who want the rapid and easy path to love are those that spend too much time emulating fiction. As the coronation approaches, Anna is elated by the prospect of the gates to Arendelle finally being opened since Elsa’s little accident. While Elsa fears that day and the prospect that her powers will be discovered, Anna relishes the occasion to interact with others and become a real person. Despite the joyous lyrics that she sings, we see in a subtle fashion that she is trapped and naïve to the world and its intents. As she sings, she leaps and bounces through the castle, mimicking images in the painting by which she flies and at which she stops. Trapped in the castle, she is bound to learn through artistic renditions, but is unaware of the artists inspirations or the movements that bookend those trapped in the frame.
What I mean to suggest here is that Anna is a representation of those that idolize the contemporary mythology of success and fame. All in all, the greatest lesson to learn from Frozen is that love is often all around us, and true love takes a while to find.
