directed by Jennifer Lee and Chris Buck
written by Marc Smith, Bob Lopez, Kristen Anderson-Lopez, Lee and Buck
When Walt Disney Animation Studios released Frozen back in 2013 it was truly a breath of fresh air, with its dazzling animation and its empowering storytelling, punctuated by the song that eventual became an anthem for girl power all around the world, "Let It Go." It demolished the age-old trope (the propagation of which Disney actually abetted for some time) that a princess needed a man to somehow validate her existence in the world and inspired little girls everywhere. With over a billion dollars in the bank, a sequel was all but assured, and the only surprise is that it's taken Disney over six years for to make it.
As much as I'd like to say that the sequel followed through on the winning magic of the first film, I really...can't.
First, let's get the story out of the way.
In a flashback (which is, itself a frequent trope used to justify a sequel), young princesses Elsa (Mattea Conforti) and Anna (Hadley Gannaway) listen to a bedtime story from their father King Agnarr (Alfred Molina) who tells them of an enchanted forest far to the north of Arendelle one which he visited in his boyhood alongside his father King Runeard (Jeremy Sisto) when they presented the people of the north, the (sigh) Northuldra tribe with the gift of a great dam. A conflict broke out for no apparent reason, and Agnarr was whisked away by an unknown savior back to Arendelle, where he was crowned king, with his father having been lost in the conflict, and with the spirits of the forest now barring entry to it.
Years later, Queen Elsa (Adela Daz--err--Idina Menzel) starts hearing a voice that calls her from what she is sure is the forest up north, and grows restless. It's been a few years since she was crowned queen and came to terms with her powers, and things are looking well for her and her sister Anna (Kristen Bell) whose beau, Kristoff (Jonathan Groff) is working up the courage to propose marriage to her, and their enchanted snowman friend Olaf (Josh Gad) who, as before, is just happy to be alive. After Elsa tries her best to shut the voice out, but when mysterious magic causes things in Arendelle to go terribly awry, from the lamplights flickering out to the very ground starts shaking uncontrollably, Elsa realizes there is a connection between what is happening and what she is hearing, and she sets out immediately, with Anna, Olaf, Kristoff (and his reindeer Sven) in tow, to learn the truth behind these mysterious events.
Okay, I will now flirt with spoilers.
From the time that Disney Animation was revitalized back in 2010 with Tangled, almost all of its releases have had a very specific plot structure, dating back to 2012's Wreck-It-Ralph, which regularly involves a twist regarding the villain of the story. Of all the times it's been done, in my opinion it only really worked in 2016's Zootopia. Without going into specifics, Disney employs the same technique again here, and it makes for really clunky storytelling. The thing is, movies can survive clumsy twists (e.g. Iron Man) when they have something else going for them, but given that this film has basically no meaningful character development at all, and is essentially just plot-driven, it's hard to not notice how badly structured the story is, and how it telegraphs its intentions far, far too early. The whole problem with mystery-box storytelling is that it has to hit hard with its payoff, and when the payoff is as predictable as it was here, the entire point of the mystery set up is defeated. It irks even more that it took Disney SIX YEARS to get this movie off the ground, and this was apparently the very best their brain trust could come up with.
I get that this movie is for kids, but to cite Disney's very own work, so was Zootopia, and that worked on a number of levels, particularly in terms of the lead characters' personal journeys. The writing here, in contrast, feels woefully cut-and-paste. The difference between a film like this and Zootopia is not unlike the difference between a thoroughly thought-out Marvel pic like Captain America: The Winter Soldier, and copy-paste efforts like Doctor Strange, which basically rehashed Iron Man's plot. In short, the "it wasn't made for you" argument is just plain lazy; parents are the ones who have to pay for their kids' tickets, so we're within our rights to expect a plot that isn't completely by-the-numbers. Unfortunately, in their slavish adherence to their new "twist" formula, Disney couldn't be bothered to give us that.
Fortunately, though, as compensation for the lackluster writing, they gave us Gen-Xers a catchy soundtrack, particularly a show-stopping, 80s-inspired love ballad right smack in the middle of the second act called "Lost in the Woods" sung by Jonathan Groff's Kristoff which evokes Queen, Air Supply and Peter Cetera all at the same time. It kind of upended the entire tone of the movie at that point, but I pretty much didn't care; it was disarming and charming and hilarious all at the same time. But the song ended, and I still hadn't forgotten that the story was simply not well-written.
Of course, for additional incentive there's the animation, which is basically beyond reproach at this point. Since getting their shot in the arm when John Lasseter and Ed Catmull took over Disney Animation years ago Disney has basically gone from strength to strength, pretty much matching Pixar in terms of craft, and standing pretty much head and shoulders above anyone else. So it's never in issue that the picture looks absolutely gorgeous.
Of course, whatever I may think of it, the movie is currently fulfilling its purpose of making a ton of money, so another sequel is a foregone conclusion at this point. I just hope that next time they put as much thought into writing their story as they do into their animation and their writing of 80's-inspired songs.
6/10
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