A nice love story that had great potential

Rating: 6/10 (16 December 2013)

Frozen is a love story but not a story about romantic love. Its a story about acceptance and love within the family, more particularly a story about a love between two very different sisters.Though I like the story, so much more could've been done and I feel like there are several misfires as far as the story is concerned. We have Anna the youngest, the very extroverted, and bubbly sister; and then we have Elsa the very introverted and insecure of the two. Their relationship has been severed because of Elsa's inability to control her winter powers. After having unintentionally hurting her own sister when they were children she is forced into isolation and shuts Anna out after Anna's memories of Elsa's winter powers have been erased from her mind. From that moment Elsa has always been told to "conceal not feel, don't let them see, don't let them know."
It isn't until they're older during Elsa's coronation that her powers are revealed to everyone and is treated like a witch. Elsa then runs away into further isolation into the mountains thus begins the plot of Anna going to get her sister back.
Here's where I have a problem. We have two main characters Elsa and Anna. Anna is looked at as the primary main character and Elsa is secondary, this is a mistake. Elsa's character was setup so well she was complex and interesting. She's full of insecurities, she's unsure about herself. She was so very different from what we usually get when it comes to the Disney princess. Usually what we get with our fellow Disney princesses are the perky, spunky, feisty, some-day-my-prince-will-come- types.
There is a great turning point for her character that is shown in the "Let it go" musical sequence. The message during the song being I may be alone but I'm free to do what I want I don't have to hide who I am anymore. Its after this sequence and her transformation that you kind of want to see more of her you want to know what kind of person she's going to be now, now that she has free reign of her power.
Instead what we get is Anna going on an adventure with a guy named Kristoff,his reindeer Sven, and the comic relief, a talking snowman named Olaf. Everyone knows what purpose Kristoff serves but before I talk about him heres some previous information I forgot to mention. During Elsa's coronation Anna tries to get Elsa's blessing to marry a man she just met who goes by the name of Hans. Elsa says she can't because you can't marry a man you just met. Anna says you can if its true love. They argue and this is what triggered Elsa to release her powers in the first place and into her isolated frozen palace.
So Kristoff is obviously meant to be Anna's real true love but I didn't care I didn't care about their relationship at all. I would've been okay with this if the role of the romantic interest had been given to Elsa. That would've been a good story right there, kind of like Beauty and the Beast only this time the Beauty is the Beast and the guy could show Elsa that she is someone worth loving. That's something I can see audiences rooting for. Anna and Kristoff is just okay whatever. Also, its like this if you're doing a story about mending a bond between sisters do our main characters even need a romantic interest? No not really. I mean I can see why they put it there for the sake of the plot twist but it still would've worked without it.
The resolution of Elsa figuring out how to get Arrendale out of eternal winter was justÂ….stupid and it was. In Disney films when something goes wrong and the hero has to fix it the answer is always "true love" or "true love's kiss" in the case of Anna and Elsa okay fine that works I was okay with that but to get Arrendale out of eternal winter? "Love will thaw"? that's the answer? No explanation? So Elsa just has to feel extreme love or something and the snow will melt? Deus ex machina much?
Overall despite my feelings about the story, visually the movie is absolutely stunning you can tell the animators really went the extra mile. The music and songs were also fantastic it was my favorite thing about this film. I wouldn't be surprised if this was turned into a live action Broadway musical. These elements alone make the movie worth watching.