by Cori Fulcher
When I was younger, my favorite fairy tale was The Snow Queen. Like all the best fairytales, it had everything: wise crow couples,
doppelgangers, and a “robber princess.” The story has stuck with me for a long time, not in the least because of its creepy beginning: a long tangent about a demon who built a magic mirror to show all of the evil of the world. The pieces of the mirror broke and the shards were still floating around, striking peoples’ hearts and making them evil. I was terrified of this happening to me.
So when I first heard of Frozen, Disney’s adaptation of The Snow Queen, I was really excited. The original tale was so powerfully feminist, a complete reversal of the damsel in distress trope. The story centers around Gerda as she journeys throughout Scandanavia to rescue her neighbor Kai (one of only three boys in the narrative) from being the prisoner of the wicked Snow Queen. I think my exact thoughts on the matter were “this is going to be the best Disney movie ever!” About a minute latter, I learned it was a Disney princess movie and I was really confused. Was the movie going to be centered around Gerda’s unnamed friend, a princess of thieves? I was baffled. It turns out that Frozen is an “adaptation” of the beloved Hans Christian Anderson story in the loosest sense. By the loosest sense, I mean they named two supporting characters after the main characters of The Snow Queen, and Anna has magical ice powers. That is all.
Instead, Frozen’s plot centers around two sisters, Elsa, the newly-crowned queen, and Anna. Elsa was born with the power to control ice and snow, as well as create snow-based lifeforms, stemming from her x-gene. (I’m sure I’m not the first to say so, but I would be shocked if Disney and Marvel don’t use some of their magical brand synergy in the future and mention her as a mutant in one of their many many X-Books). She hides this power from everyone, including her younger sister.
The change in plot wasn’t all bad. Anna and Elsa were complicated and nuanced in a way I haven’t seen animated characters since Avatar: the Last Airbender. I cried at least once (though I also cried multiple times during the Doctor Who 50th Anniversary Special so I may not be the best barometer). Elsa dealt with her social anxiety in incredibly realistic and powerful ways, and Anna was determined and impulsive and naïve–most movies intended for children don’t give much thought to showing what motivates their villains, and this refreshingly wasn’t the case here. Both characters were complicated in a way women aren’t allowed to be even in adult blockbusters. (But yes: both Anna and Elsa did look suspiciously like Rapunzel, while Ana’s love interests Hans and Kristoff looked absolutely nothing like Flynn Ryder Eugene Fitzherbert.)
I do find it very sketchy to throw out all of the plot to a story in the name of creativity while keeping all of the main characters white. The story of the Snow Queen is found from Japan (as Yuki-Onna, a terrifying spirit of a woman who perished in the snow) to Germany, so I’m sure Disney could have found some non-European setting they found aesthetically pleasing. Adding more movies with all white casts is boring and Eurocentric on Disney’s part–Europe doesn’t have a monopoly on great folk tales! Plus, (a) there are native people of color in Europe and (b) even then, there are things called trade and migration so there were non-native people of color pre-Enlightenment.
That said, I went in with incredibly low expectations, and Frozen surpassed nearly all of them. Like all Disney movies, it was gorgeous: everyone was beautiful, the snow was sparkly and desolate depending on the light, and I sometimes found myself wondering how the cinematographers were able to do such spectacular shots (Hint: it is a computer generated movie). The story of family and sisterhood was powerful and raw, and the songs are still stuck in my head a week and a half latter. I would recommend this film, but only with a long disclaimer about intersectionality and Eurocentrisim.