Frozen (Movie Review)

The best thing, worst thing, and main thing about the new Disney musical "Frozen" in about the time it takes to watch the trailer. Don't miss the "Best Ever" Challenge at the end!

 

REVIEW TEXT:

 If you thought the days of animated musicals were over. You may want to think again.
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“Frozen” is the latest animated feature from Disney based on Hans Christian Anderson’s Ice Queen and her sister’s mission to warm her heart while at the same time finding true love. It’s also another attempt at capturing the magic that Disney musicals had 20 years ago. And though it would be hard for anything to live up to our collective memories of Aladdin, Beauty and the Beast, and The Lion King, I have to admit, this one is absolutely on the right path.
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Seriously, there is so much to love about this movie but let’s just start with the music. Though it’s hard to say after one viewing It really feels like some of these songs could be new classics. They all serve the story and are sung incredibly well by this cast, especially Idina (uh-dee-nuh) Menzel, who you may know from the Broadway show “Wicked”. Her performance of “Let it Go” is as stunning a song as I’ve heard on the big screen in years. The score is great as well, as is the gorgeous animation, the voice work, and the amazing story telling. But the other wonderful thing, let’s even say the best thing, is just how perfectly funny this movie is. My 10 year old called it the funniest movie he’s ever seen, (put that on the DVD cover Disney) and I’m not sure he’s far off. Off the top of my head, I can think of at least a half dozen laugh out loud moments or lines, most involving Josh Gad’s killer sense of comic timing as the sentient snowman Olaf. Seriously, this movie is so stinking cute. But you know what? That humor doesn’t keep it from delivering the emotion as well. The movie is lined with wonderful metaphors about fear, judgement, and true love. The last of which becomes a powerful theme that intentionally turns the classic Disney idea of true love on its head with an incredibly meaningful and insightful result.
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So is there anything not to like about Frozen? Eh. Not much. I mean I guess I was disappointed that the songs seemed to stop too early, making it seem as if the story was front loaded with the tunes. I guess we can call that worst thing, although it’s actually not much different than most of Disney’s musicals where the music dominates acts 1 and 2 and the drama dominates act 3. Other than that there were a few of the themes and settings that were a bit too reminiscent of other Disney efforts, especially the recent and also amazing “Tangled”, but honestly the overall plot and theme was so unique and beautiful that those moments didn’t bug me at all.
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At the end of the day I absolutely loved “Frozen”. It’s funny, beautiful, meaningful, and incredibly well performed. In fact the worst thing I can say about it is I didn’t want it to end. Frozen earns an A.
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Thanks for checking out this Your Movie Friend review, stay tuned for this review’s “Best Ever” challenge here in bit but first, I’m going to put up some stuff you can click over in this area. If you’d like to subscribe, which I would much appreciate, you can do so by clicking the big gray subscribe button. Want to see more reviews? You can click here to see a review of the Christian Christmas movie “The Christmas Candle”, the Vince Vaughn comedy “Delivery Man” or the latest “Hunger Games”. You can also Click the logo up here to go to yourmoviefriend.com where you can search by title for reviews. And finally this review’s “Best Ever” Challenge, where you name the best movie ever in a particular category and also try to identify mine. So here you go, since we’re dealing with musicals lets keep it broad, “name the best musical ever”. Mine features a song where a prophet mistakes his foot appendages for a floral arrangement. Drop your own answer and a guess at mine in the comments and don’t forget to subscribe!