Young Writers Society

3) I like how there's no backstory about Elsa's powers

You are kidding right? That very fact is one of the major reasons I liked Frozen less. Elsa should have relatives, or her mother, or grandmother, or someone else who has powers. She's born with them and yet she doesn't have anyone in the family who has similar powers? Ridiculous.

I think what irked me most was her power's unjustified potency. I mean, no one else possesses this power? It's scandalous to possess one?

They could at least take a few minutes to tell us where it's from and whether it's been seen before ...

I wanted to enjoy Frozen so much, but I couldn't. The plotline was scattered, there were too many plot holes for it to be believable, and Olaf was just unnecessary. Gorgeous songs, though. My favorites: "Love Is an Open Door", "Fixer-Upper", and "Let it Go." FTFTIF was a little cliché for my taste, but it was gorgeous as well.

No, @Messenger, I don't think so. See, had she been cursed, then the plot of the movie would have changed to finding whoever cursed her and getting them to lift the curse. Which is why I think they make a point of having those couple of lines of dialogue with the troll. And had a relative had it, then her parents might have had more of an idea of how to deal with it.

As I say, I see it more like a child born with say, a sporadic form of severe haemophilia, as opposed to familial (as happens in around 30%). Actually, think of Alexei Romanov (even though it was a genetic trait in his case, but none of his relatives suffered as severely. He's still a good example). No one else in the family has it, but here's this little kid who's at risk of having serious bleeds whenever they go outside. So what do you do? You keep the kid indoors, you do everything you can to protect them. Maybe you tell their siblings not to play with them. Actually I really like this analogy. Elsa's powers are like Alexei's haemophilia, but she's at risk of hurting others rather than herself. And the thing is in Elsa's case she is terrified of hurting others. She begins shutting herself away, closing herself off from Anna and their parents. And they live in a world where there's no cure, and there's no psychiatric care either to help Elsa overcome her issues. She just has to live with them.

No, I think it was important that they didn't dwell on how she got the powers. It would have totally changed the story had there been a reason behind it.

Ok, I'm a little hesitant to get into this whole argument, but here's my opinion:

I love the movie for many reasons:

1. It's different. The first Disney movie that has powers in it not caused by a spell or anything.

2. Have you seen the animation?! Gorgeous!!!!

3. The songs are amazing.

4. I love the casting.

Ok, so there are some (in my opinion, small) plot holes. But if you've read some of the theories like me, it definitely gets filled in some. We own it, and I love it!

To answer the question: I LOVED FROZEN. I also loved Tangled. And I love Disney. If it's not obvious.

To the sauna comment: I don't remember the actual bit in the film, so I don't have an opinion on whether it was a man or a woman in the sauna, but: I don't see why Disney would not put a shirtless woman in a sauna. You're meant to be naked in a sauna, but there's nothing sexual about it. It's a cultural and ages-old thing (and before hospitals, sauna used to be the place of giving birth!) so Disney film or not, a woman in a sauna in a bathing suit would look much, much stranger than a topless woman in a sauna. So, I don't think it would be a problem. [/Finn]

Here's the sauna family.



See the woman next to the blond guy? She seems childlike at first, but she's about the size of Anna/Elsa on closer inspection and is proportioned appropriately to the blond guy (i.e., they both seem to be adults or late teens versus the children around them).

Lucrezia wrote:Here's the sauna family.



See the woman next to the blond guy? She seems childlike at first, but she's about the size of Anna/Elsa on closer inspection and is proportioned appropriately to the blond guy (i.e., they both seem to be adults or late teens versus the children around them).

Also on closer inspection the woman has some junk up front. Plus the towel is risen higher than any of the children's.

Messenger wrote:

3) I like how there's no backstory about Elsa's powers

You are kidding right? That very fact is one of the major reasons I liked Frozen less. Elsa should have relatives, or her mother, or grandmother, or someone else who has powers. She's born with them and yet she doesn't have anyone in the family who has similar powers? Ridiculous.

@Messenger, I think you're making an assumption here that said back story would actually be GOOD and thought-out and not cheesy at all. I think that's easier to do in the novel format than an animated movie. Traditionally, the back story for magical things in movies is usually something like "evil ugly person curses pretty good person for some moral transgression (Beauty and the Beast) or revenge/jealousy (Snow White, Little Mermaid).

Frozen subverts this narrative in several ways. As I stated before, Elsa was supposed to be the main villain, which would have been very cheesy. The most obvious origin story would be that she was "cursed", probably by an evil witch who is jealous that she is a pretty princess. There's other explanations, but that would probably be the one presented. By going with she was born with it, it adds a new point of interest and creates a more sympathetic response to her "evilness".

Also, genetics isn't always that simple. You can be born with something that isn't just genetic (e.g. Fetal Alcohol Syndrome). Some genetic conditions don't generally onset until later in life, but some anomalies show up much earlier (examples include: schizophrenia (there's a documentary about a girl who was diagnosed at 6 months old!), some cancers, Alzheimer's, etc.). If a relative's powers didn't show up until later in life, he/she might have been able to deal with it better and keep it secret.

Second, Hans is good-looking, charming, and very good at putting on a compassionate front. Most Disney/cartoon villains are portrayed as the exact opposite, which is not realistic at all. Also, his motivations are very logical and similar to things that have probably happened in the real world. Hijacking a kingdom via marriage and doing something crazy/desperate as the last in line to the throne (I mean, what else can princes really do)? That's probably happened, though I lack specific examples.

Jafar in Aladdin was similar, but it's worth noting that the main hero was Aladdin. In Jafar's mind, Jasmine was a pretty prize and not his main opponent. While she certainly helped out, it was more indirect. In Frozen, it's the reverse: Anna is the main heroine, while Kristoff comes in initially as a helper (like does Hans even know he exists?).

In contrast, your average Disney villain motive boils down to "I'm jealous because she is younger/prettier than I am", which definitely exists in the real world, but is rarely something people kill over.

Okay, I need to stop spending so much time thinking/writing about this!

Tl;dr Frozen was fun and enjoyable. I think they made certain choices about backstory etc. not knowing how successful it would be. These could be explored in the inevitable sequel, though that will likely be a disaster. I do think it is a bit overrated because everyone (on here and elsewhere) talks about it a lot. Plus there was that woman who paid 1500 dollars for an Elsa dress for her daughter. Um, desperate much?



Edited b/c I can't shut up. About the "gay family": yeah I'm not really sure that's true, but wouldn't it be cool if Disney actually had a gay character like that? Like it was there but not The Most Important Thing? I'm pretty sure they'll have a gay protagonist in time, but also pretty sure said character will be super stereotypical (Prince Fabulous, anyone? )

]Mmm... overrated. Frozen was good, but it wasn't everything everyone cracked it up to be, and people on tumblr and Facebook totally ruined all the twists.

Both, actually. I absolutely loved it the first time I saw it, but afterwards I grew sick of the overplayed songs very quickly. C'mon guys, let it go already. :p

I think it's overrated IMO. Lots of people at my school and even some of my friends treat it as if it's the best existing movie since Titanic. I honestly don't understand what was so amazingly special about it. Not that I disliked the movie, I liked it a lot, though I don't think it was Disney's best go at a featured film, let alone that great of a movie to be the talk of the world even months after it came out. If I were to be real here, I'd say it was a lazy excuse for a 2014 Disney film (again, IMO). The movie itself had its ups and downs, especially when it came to its cliche plot and story line. Although, it did have its strong points for being unexpected at times, I'll give it the benefit of the doubt for that alone.
I'm just saying, it could have been much better than what it was and to this day I will never be able to understand its viral hype. Especially now that it's done and out there, people need to calm down about it. Believe it or not, things do get old.
Frozen was good, that's all. As a critic, I give it a solid 6 out of 10, which is pretty darn good on my part.

#IMO

Hands down the worst movie I ever watched-period.

Extremely overrated. I never wanted to watch it, but gave it a chance when they played it at school (yes, they showed that movie to a bunch of teenagers...). The plot is bland and there's no explanation to a lot of things.

The first time I saw it, I actually cried. I mean literally, I cried, which I don't do often when it comes to movies. I cried at the end when Anna nearly died. I don't really know why I did, maybe it's because I have three sisters... So yes, I loved it. The songs were WONDERFUL! I really loved Do You Want To Build A Snowman. I do admit though, when people start singing Let it Go all of the time, I do get a little, um, *cough* crazy. Overall though, this was a wonderful movie. I really loved Olaf, I mean, who doesn't love a crazy little talking snowman! Anyway, insanely awesome movie.
~Snazzy
(sometimes though the songs can get annoying... )

I think Frozen is one of the most overrated films I've ever personally seen. The plot was thin, the ending was predictable, and there were maybe 2 songs that I wouldn't cringe at listening to. I'm so sorry if I offended anyone, but I personally think both Tangled and Princess and the Frog were exponentially better than Frozen. I think that people got caught up in the feminism aspect, which I was appreciative of, don't get me wrong, and forgot to judge the movie for what it was. If you want to see my opinions summed up, I mostly agree with the CinemaSins assessment of Frozen; you can find it on YouTube, but don't watch if you don't like cursing.
All in all, I think it was a lackluster film that garnered attention for reasons that had very little to do with the film at all. I do really love the Demi Lovato version of Let It Go, although she could sing my least favorite song and I'd still find away to love it because I love her. Anyway, yeah. Not a fan of frozen. In fact, my sister points out every piece of Anna/Elsa merchandise just to taunt me because she knows I dislike it. I just think that Disney missed the mark with this one.