Frozen: Unfreezing Hearts and Opening Doors

Who wouldn’t like a movie with two princess for the price of one, a talking snowman, and a song like “Let it Go.”  It appears everyone does, because the movie is the highest grossing animated film of all time now.  I found the movie Frozen (2013) to be entertaining and more mature than most Disney princess movies.  Fun fact: Elsa is the only Disney princess who isn’t a teenager.  This may be a reason for why the film’s themes are more mature.   I especially liked the twin themes of frozen hearts and closed doors.Frozen Poster

As the story unfolds, we find out that Elsa has a gift from birth to makes things cold and icy.  And as kids Elsa and her sister, Anna, would play in the snow created by Elsa.  Then one day Elsa accidently hits Anna in the head with an icy blast.  She is healed by a rock troll and made to forget that Elsa ever had any such ability.  Ever afterwards Elsa’s parents decide to shut up the castle, reduce the staff, keep Elsa in her room, and put gloves on Elsa’s hands—all in an effort to conceal and restrain her abilities.  Elsa is literally and figuratively confined so that she has no human contact.  But as the years pass Elsa’s powers grow, to the point that it is hard for her to contain them.  As Elsa says later in a song, “Couldn’t keep it in, heaven knows I tried!”

Years pass and as usual the sisters’ parents die at sea—because this also wouldn’t be a Disney movie without at least one parent dead.  The now orphaned sisters have grown far apart, and only grow farther apart.  We see Elsa shut up in her room, despairing of her situation.  We come to realize that Elsa’s power to freeze is much like the frozen life she has lived—without community or love.  We start to wonder if her heart is frozen too.  But the opposite can be found in her sister Anna.  She is unrestrained in her life and seeks out community in the castle—wanting to build a snowman with Elsa and talking to the paintings on the walls.

On Elsa’s coronation day, the castle is opened up.  Anna meets Prince Hans and accepts his marriage proposal, because she has such an unrestrained and open heart and “love is an open door.”  Elsa’s ability is found out at the ball and she flees into the mountains.  But during her flight she unintentionally winterizes Arendelle.

Elsa EmpoweredOn the mountain Elsa really ‘lets it all go.’  In the now famous song she says “Don’t let them in, don’t let them see  / Be the good girl you always have to be / Conceal, don’t feel, don’t let them know / Well, now they know!”  Because the cat is out of the bag, Elsa lets go of her fears, of her control, and of the ‘perfect’ girl she dutifully was.  She lets her hair down, takes off the gloves, and shuts the door on the world.  And she freely lets loose her powers, because “it’s time to see what I can do.”  It’s the happiest we’ve seen her.

This is my favorite part of the movie.  I love the freeing empowerment it invokes in me.  And I don’t think I’m alone in loving this part.  I’ve seen YouTube videos of grown men, even Marines, singing along as they watch this part.

But Elsa has wrongly concluded that she either needs to conceal herself or ostracize herself.  When Anna visits Elsa in her icy mountaintop castle she pleads with Elsa to “please don’t shut the door.”  In the end, Elsa hits Anna with a frozen blast in her heart.  Eventually, Anna and her companion Kristoff make it to the rock trolls.  Grand poppy tells Anna that “only an act of true love can thaw a frozen heart.”  This is also straight out of the Disney handbook.

Now Anna has literally a frozen heart, but Elsa has a metaphorically frozen heart.  She has endangered Arendelle and Anna.  And even though she knows what she has done to both, she is too scared or too frozen to act.

Meanwhile, Kristoff races to take Anna to the castle to receive true love’s kiss from Hans.  But Hans turns out to be a villain and leaves Anna to die.  Olaf the snowman finds Anna and wisely tells her that “Love is putting someone else’s needs before yours.”  Olaf shows sacrificial love for Anna, risking melting himself to warm her by the fire.  Kristoff also returns for Anna and shows his love for her.
Frozen
When Elsa hears of Anna’s supposed death because of the frozen heart she gave her, she shows deep regret and sorrow for her actions.  And the storm she had conjured ends.  And Anna, with her last act before she becomes totally frozen, saves Elsa from Hans.  She could have chosen to reunite with Kristoff and save herself with true love’s kiss, but she chose to save her sister instead.  And in a nice twist, Anna’s love for her sister thawed her own frozen heart.  And Elsa begins to unthaw Arendelle, using her power in unrestrained love, rather than in restrained fear.
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I also liked the repeated theme of the closing door.  Elsa’s parents close the castle doors and the bedroom door on her and she keeps it closed—despite Anna’s pleadings through the keyhole.  When Anna meets Hans she tells him that “All my life has been a series of doors in my face / And then suddenly I bump into you.”  Elsa closes the door to her icy castle to keep everyone out.  The door is shut on Kristoff after he delivers Anna to the attendants at the castle.   Hans shuts the door on Anna and leaves her to die.  But in the last scene Anna says to Elsa, “I like the open gates.”  To which Elsa replies, “We are never closing them again!”  Truly, love is an open door.

This movie is more about learning to love, than about falling in love—more about opening the doors in life, rather than closing them.  All that to say that the message of the movie thawed my heart towards Disney movies.

(On a side note, I recently came across a video parody that is a mashup of Star Wars and Frozen.  It’s hilarious and worth watching.)

Posted in Movie Reviews Tagged with: ,
  • Movie Review Disclaimer

    While most movie reviews speak of the acting, the directing, the cinematography, or sets and costumes, my reviews focus on the message of a movie. And this message is what was communicated to me, rather than necessarily what the writer, director and producer of the movie intended to be communicated to me. These reviews of a movie’s content also contain spoilers, so be forewarned.
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