Not quite as good as 'Tangled' but beautiful visuals and excellent music nonetheless

Rating: 9/10 (21 April 2014)

I have wanted to see this film since I saw the teaser trailer featuring Olaf, a goofy yet cute and funny snowman and Sven, a dog-like and equally hilarious reindeer. Both my mother and I laughed at the trailer really hard when we saw it at the cinema before 'Monsters, University.' The official trailer was also good and I liked the line, "That's no blizzard, that's my sister!" that wasn't included in the final cut of the film much to my disappointment because it is funny, clever and as sassy as Anna is. I watched this film on Amazon Prime Instant Video last night and it met some of my expectations, particularly the story, the visuals and the music but I felt certain elements were similar to those from 'Tangled,' particularly Anna and Elsa being modelled in a similar manner to Rapunzel, the horses looking like Maximus, Sven behaving like him, Anna's gingery-brown hair changing colour when Elsa strikes her like Rapunzel's did when her long, golden hair was cut off and the kingdom here looking a little similar to that in 'Tangled.'
Other than the similarities to 'Tangled,' this film has many positive aspects such as the animation being as good as that in 'Tangled,' 'Wreck-It Ralph' and recent Pixar films, the stunning visuals with beautiful, cool and rich colours, Anna, Elsa and Kristoff all looking cute as children, the attractive special effects and the excellent soundtrack. My favourite songs are 'For The First Time In Forever,' 'Love Is An Open Door, and 'Let It Go (I didn't like this song too much to begin with because it sounded a bit too shrill for my liking but when I heard it on Heat Radio when they were playing movie songs all day to celebrate the Oscars, it has grown on me since).' While one reviewer wasn't hugely keen on 'Fixer Upper,' the song performed by the trolls, I personally found it the funniest song in the film while 'Do You Want To Build A Snowman?' primarily sung by young Anna is sweet. I also liked the acapella opening music and while the score wasn't quite as memorable, it had its moments of beauty and tension although it became more memorable since I purchased the soundtrack on CD. The film was quite fast-paced and the story and dialogue were dramatic with the odd heartwarming and funny moment and I was happy that the ending used bits of animation from the teaser trailer on Olaf. The voice acting was exceptional, particularly from Kristen Bell as Anna and Idina Menzel (Nancy Tremaine in 'Enchanted') as Elsa.
Overall, this film didn't quite impress me as much as 'Tangled' did due to its similarities but it was worth watching thanks to its story, music and visuals. 8.5/10 to round up to IMDb's 9/10 rating.