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In the Disney rewatch, we have AT LONG LAST reached Frozen! The movie absolutely blew my tiny mind the first time I saw it in theaters. I remember watching, thrilled yet disbelieving, as it seemed more and more likely that Anna’s act of true love would involve Elsa - but could it involve Elsa? Was an act of sisterly true love allowed in a Disney movie?
And it was! It was! Anna rushed out on the ice, and flung up her hand, and shattered Hans’s sword as he swung it to slay Elsa; and that act of true love saved not only Elsa, but Anna herself!
(Julie pointed out that TECHNICALLY it should have counted as an act of true love when Olaf kindled a fire to save Anna: he is putting her welfare above his own, lighting a fire that will melt him but save her. This is true and I reject it utterly. No! No acts of true love from annoying sentient snowmen!)
On a rewatch, of course, you know what’s coming. You can’t feel again that thrill of amazement as the movie breaks the previously established act-of-true-love-means-kiss-of-romantic-love rules. But it’s still a delight to watch, probably one of my favorite Disney movies.
I love the early sequences especially, Anna and Elsa’s close friendship as small children, followed by their estrangement as Elsa struggles to control those powers, culminating in the moment after their parents died when we see Elsa in her bedroom, which looks like her ice powers have just exploded out of her…
I also love how much fun the movie has with Elsa’s powers, always coming up with interesting new ways for Elsa to use them.
I see in my earlier review that I thought Hans’s betrayal was effectively foreshadowed, but funnily enough I didn’t feel that at all, this time round, when I was watching the movie partly with an eye toward that arc. I must have felt the betrayal itself was so effective (and it is! Absolutely gut-wrenching! The moment when he’s like “Oh, Anna. If only someone loved you”... GOD) that I projected signs of it earlier in the movie, because they really aren’t there. Yes, some of the lyrics of his courtship duet with Anna can be interpreted that way if you squint, but you really have to work for it.
And the movie would be stronger if there was just a little hint. I’m thinking particularly of his meet-cute with Anna. They meet, they banter, Anna walks off, and the camera goes for a close-up on Hans’s face as he gazes after her with uncomplicated heart-eyes.
Now you don’t want to give the game away so soon by having him make a full wicked villain face, but if the expression had just a little edge to it - a slightly calculating look, even just a certain thoughtfulness instead of soppy adoration. Then his villainy later would feel like a piece falling into place rather than a bolt from the blue.
But ultimately I don’t think this really matters. In fact, as a more general observation, I’ve noticed that people will forgive enormous flaws in a story (in structure, in pacing, even in the ending) if there is something about it that really works; and Anna and Elsa’s relationship really works. The heart of the story are these two sisters torn asunder and then knit back together by Anna’s persistence and Elsa’s ultimate realization that it is not separation, but love, that will protect Anna from Elsa’s powers; and this heart is flawless.
And it was! It was! Anna rushed out on the ice, and flung up her hand, and shattered Hans’s sword as he swung it to slay Elsa; and that act of true love saved not only Elsa, but Anna herself!
(Julie pointed out that TECHNICALLY it should have counted as an act of true love when Olaf kindled a fire to save Anna: he is putting her welfare above his own, lighting a fire that will melt him but save her. This is true and I reject it utterly. No! No acts of true love from annoying sentient snowmen!)
On a rewatch, of course, you know what’s coming. You can’t feel again that thrill of amazement as the movie breaks the previously established act-of-true-love-means-kiss-of-romantic-love rules. But it’s still a delight to watch, probably one of my favorite Disney movies.
I love the early sequences especially, Anna and Elsa’s close friendship as small children, followed by their estrangement as Elsa struggles to control those powers, culminating in the moment after their parents died when we see Elsa in her bedroom, which looks like her ice powers have just exploded out of her…
I also love how much fun the movie has with Elsa’s powers, always coming up with interesting new ways for Elsa to use them.
I see in my earlier review that I thought Hans’s betrayal was effectively foreshadowed, but funnily enough I didn’t feel that at all, this time round, when I was watching the movie partly with an eye toward that arc. I must have felt the betrayal itself was so effective (and it is! Absolutely gut-wrenching! The moment when he’s like “Oh, Anna. If only someone loved you”... GOD) that I projected signs of it earlier in the movie, because they really aren’t there. Yes, some of the lyrics of his courtship duet with Anna can be interpreted that way if you squint, but you really have to work for it.
And the movie would be stronger if there was just a little hint. I’m thinking particularly of his meet-cute with Anna. They meet, they banter, Anna walks off, and the camera goes for a close-up on Hans’s face as he gazes after her with uncomplicated heart-eyes.
Now you don’t want to give the game away so soon by having him make a full wicked villain face, but if the expression had just a little edge to it - a slightly calculating look, even just a certain thoughtfulness instead of soppy adoration. Then his villainy later would feel like a piece falling into place rather than a bolt from the blue.
But ultimately I don’t think this really matters. In fact, as a more general observation, I’ve noticed that people will forgive enormous flaws in a story (in structure, in pacing, even in the ending) if there is something about it that really works; and Anna and Elsa’s relationship really works. The heart of the story are these two sisters torn asunder and then knit back together by Anna’s persistence and Elsa’s ultimate realization that it is not separation, but love, that will protect Anna from Elsa’s powers; and this heart is flawless.
