Over the years, I’ve complained a lot about Disney’s expansive line of princess tales, from Cinderella to The Princess and the Frog. Even with renditions that I liked overall, namely their adventurous undertaking of Rapunzel (Tangled), I still had moments where I felt something was left to be desired. Well, Disney, you’ve finally done it. I enjoyed your newest princess movie, Frozen, as both a story lover and as a feminist. As a movie that follows your classic princess formula, i.e. one that has romance as a focus, this is an improvement.
Like many princess tales, Frozen‘s featured protagonist is a teenaged princess, Anna, but in this case, she’s not the only one. Anna’s got an older sister named Elsa and, as we’re quickly shown, the two are close. But Elsa has a little secret. She was born with a magical, wintry power that allows her to create ice and snow with just the touch or wave of her hands. It’s all fun and games until Elsa accidentally hurts Anna with her powers, which leads Elsa to close herself off from everyone to protect them. The years pass and the sisters grow distant as they live their separate lives in a castle completely shut off from the outside world. Soon, however, Elsa comes of age and must emerge for her coronation. While Elsa is terrified of what might go wrong, Anna is ecstatic and wants to use the opportunity to the fullest after the years of loneliness, maybe even find her “prince.” But when an argument breaks out between the sisters and Elsa’s powers are revealed, she’s labeled a sorceress and flees, inadvertently putting her kingdom into an eternal winter as she goes. Worried about her sister and the kingdom, Anna sets off to find Elsa, picking up some help in the form of a boy and his reindeer (not to mention a talking snowman) along the way.
In recent years, Disney has made an effort to put forth princess protagonists who don’t wilt at the first sign of trouble and Frozen is no exception. Both Anna and Elsa are dynamic characters who display fears and flaws viewers of both genders can relate to while amply showcasing their inner steel as well. And although the sisters get into their fair share of difficult situations, neither feels like a helpless doll, collecting dust while they wait for a prince to save them. If anything, spunky Anna could be viewed as taking the hero’s place for her sister, although Elsa is anything but helpless and has her own crucial part to play. Needless to say, the interaction between Anna and Elsa is wonderful and while Anna’s relationships with Kristoff and Hans are very important, the plot between the sisters is just as much so. In Disney’s past princess films and many other romantic fiction, it’s been hammered home that romantic love can overcome anything, but through Anna and Elsa, Frozen wisely makes it clear that romantic love is not the only powerful form of love.
As for Elsa, overall, I like that the queen/witch character is not vilified. Typically, the queen/witch has great power and independence, but she ends up ruled by jealousy, vanity, and other shallow, ugly emotions, resulting in her torment of the innocent heroine before her inevitable downfall. As a result, power and independence in women almost goes hand-in-hand with evil in many classic Disney princess movies. Elsa, however, is an independent, powerful woman who girls and boys can relate to and like. Of course, it’s arguable that Frozen‘s queen/witch character loses some of the authority and power her evil counterparts command since Disney puts her in the role of the persecuted victim. That was done to garner sympathy for a character that plays the villain in the tale Frozen is based on. This role change is something I’ll try to look at more in-depth in a later post. For now, however, I’m just happy that Disney is trying something new.
Disney also continues its trend of pulling away from perfectly plastic prince charming in favor of a more layered, interesting male lead with flaws and quirks of his own. In Frozen, just as there are two female leads, there are two male leads: one prince (Prince Hans) and one average guy (Kristoff), both of which play vital roles in the story. Hans very successfully sets himself apart from the 2D princes of old and I found Kristoff to be an improvement to Disney’s gruff male lead formula. In their attempt to create a new down-to-earth male lead in the princess movies, Disney began featuring more rugged types, the opposite of the stark, clean blankness of past prince characters. The result in the last two movies were somewhat the “bad boy” type. Prince Naveen from The Princess and the Frog starts off as an egotistical playboy while Tangled‘s Flynn Rider is a wanna-be “cool criminal” type. Both were good guys deep down, of course, a goodness which the heroines eventually bring out in them. It’s a charming and fun concept in fiction, but since this trend has been used a lot and can send the wrong message about real-life relationships, I’m happy that Disney took a slightly different approach with Kristoff. As with the past two male leads, Kristoff is a little gruff with the heroine, Anna, resulting in fun and dynamic interactions between the leads, but not once does Kristoff try to pose as a “bad boy.” Instead, he’s an honest, hard-working guy who is perhaps a tad socially awkward, a trait which he shares with Anna and that reflects their mutual struggles with loneliness and isolation.
I also feel Disney has improved its messages about romance. Toward the latter half of the movie, a song starts in which one of the male leads is referred to as a “fixer-upper.” At that moment, my heart sank, thinking this was when fiction would once again announce that if your potential mate has traits you don’t like, all you have to do is stick with and change him/her. But Disney didn’t say that this time. In fact, they made a clear effort to tell viewers that you can’t change people like we’re always told you can. Rather than searching for the “perfect” one like Cinderella or even The Little Mermaid suggest, or finding someone who has flaws that you don’t like and believing you can change those aspects as movies like Beauty and the Beast and The Princess and the Frog seem to say, Frozen settles upon middle ground. That is, recognize that we all have flaws and don’t expect to whisk those flaws away with love. It also directly challenge the romantic idea that one can simply bump into the right person and know instantly that this is “the one.” Instead, Frozen sends the message that you must get to know someone before love truly enters the equation. In the end, it touches on the issue of accepting reasonable flaws, but cautions viewers to watch out for duds.
There are still things to improve such as including a lot more POC in their movies, but Frozen is a step in the right direct for Disney’s romance-focused princess films. After years of transition, trying to balance romantic fantasy with modern ideas, I feel they’re finally starting to hit the right notes; female and male leads who break stereotypes and standard roles, a plot with just the right touch of magic, hilarity, and heart-felt moments that both adults and kids can enjoy, and messages that freshen up an old genre, even directly contradicting old fairytale notions. I haven’t read “The Snow Queen” which Frozen is based on so, if you’d like to read an insightful post on that angle, check this post out, but just judging the film, I would recommend it as a large improvement to the classic Disney princess formula.
Thank you for adding the link to TheFeministFangirls review! It’s great seeing two different perspectives, and I agree with the both of you! I enjoyed Frozen greatly, I love the characters, the broken stereotypes, and the surprises.
However I wish the Saami people had gotten some good representation.
And Christoff criticized Anna for being irrational for falling in love in a day, but he fell in love with her in two days and this is treated as “true love”, as if when a girl falls in love, she’s being silly, but is a guy falls in love, it’s mature. Our society stresses that girls are to be sought after by boys, and not the other way around (guy has to ask girl out on date. Guy has to propose marriage.)
I also wish they had also followed the story of “The Snow Queen” to a greater extent. It’s such an amazing exciting story and the girls and women in it are diverse and wonderful.
After reading about “The Snow Queen” and hearing people’s comments about the story in response to Disney’s adaptation, I’m really intrigued. It sounds like a great story and even though I haven’t read it myself yet, there’s a part of me that wishes Disney had stuck closer to the original tale, too. I suppose that kind of story is still too radical for Disney, evident in the fact that they morphed it into something closer to the usual Disney princess formula. As a story that falls into that formula, Frozen is an improvement and I enjoyed it, but I need to read “The Snow Queen” now.
Also, good point about gender bias in the media’s (and society’s) representation of falling in love. It’s true that girls are often represented as foolish in these situations and Anna falls into that trap. Of course, I think Kristoff is supposed to be naive about love himself, but Anna definitely comes off looking more the fool and Kristoff more mature. And I agree that while Disney’s message about getting to know someone before you can really love someone is great, the execution of that in the plot could have been represented. Two days is no better than one, as this comic humorously points out.
Nice review. I like Frozen, but I will like it better if Disney didn’t replace the robber girl (at original Snow Queen) with a dude. Two girl went adventure together, bonding and became friends together is very very rare.
I’m thinking we set the bar lower with the last decade, I mean, how does something like Frozen stand against Mulan? We’re taking baby steps.
I agree that Frozen and the other princess movies made in the past decade are no where near as radical as Mulan, but then again, I won’t compare them to Mulan because I don’t think that movie is a princess movie at all and I dislike how Disney shoves it into the princess corner simply because the protagonist is female. I’m judging Frozen as a movie that follows Disney’s classic princess formula, i.e. romance, princes, and princesses. If I was comparing it to non-traditional princess films like Brave then, no, Frozen isn’t particularly setting the bar high, but as a movie that follows Disney’s classic formula, this is an improvement. If they made something more like Mulan again, I would be thrilled.
Oh, I get it, sorry about that. I like that Mulan’s on the line because female main characters that aren’t get extremely little merchandise.
That’s true! If Mulan weren’t, she probably won’t get a lot of merchandise, would she? It would be nice if Disney could find a way to sell Mulan merchandise without making her a “princess” though. I’d love to see merchandise with Mulan dressed in armor or at least not dolled up once in awhile. 🙂
That would be amazing, do you remember that when the movie was first released, there was this action figure of her with her sword and removable hair so you could replicate the hair cutting scene?
Set the bar lower? How is my Mulan a better example for feminism? Feminism is supposed to be about equality. Mulan teaches that women are stronger and smarter than men. This obviously isn’t realistic. Not everything feminist has so be about female warriors, that prove that their stronger than men. I don’t want my son to grow up in a world in which they are tough to be inferior. Feminism is about being confident and doing what you feel, no matter what sex.
I really loved that the cure for the curse were sisterly love, no romantic love. Yes, familial love was the key in Brave, but there wasn´t a love interest, while here there´re two potential love interests so it´s a improve.
Han´s revelation…I don´t know, it´s fine but I think they could have gone for the middle ground: not Anna´s true love but neither a bad guy. It´s a good broken cliche anyway.
My main problem is Elsa´s power. I mean, how many female characters have powers closely linked to their emotions that become useless/dangerous for themselves and their loved because they can´t be in the right mood anytime? It´s a too convenient handicap and I haven´t seen it applied to male characters. At least she was rescued by her sister and no by Mr Right.
I hadn’t thought about Elsa’s powers in that way, but you’re right. It’s getting into that territory of women are moody and therefore a woman with magical powers attached to her moods is dangerous. I need to see the movie again to analyze details like this more closely, but my initial impression is that Elsa’s power had less to do with her moodiness and more to do with controlling and overcoming her fears. It’s still connected to emotions, but it felt less like she was a “moody woman” who needed to learn to control herself like a rational being and more like a triumph over one’s fear. But again, that was just an initial impression.
Also, it just occurred to me as I was reading your comment about a lack of males with this emotions-tied-dangerously-to-their-powers dilemma that Avatar: the Last Airbender does have a rare example of this. Two male characters, Aang and Zuko, have to learn to control themselves more if they want to successfully control the power of fire. Of course, perhaps more stereotypically, one of the big emotions that must be controlled is anger, the one emotion connected more commonly with men than any other emotion. Anyway, it’s an interesting thing to consider. Maybe I’ll do a post on it in the future.
Umh, I didn´t think about Avatar but you’re right. The thing is they are mostly funtional along the series except in specific times. In fact the Avatar State saved Aang´s ass many times and Zuko only needed a change in his philosophy for recovering his firebending. Elsa merely fearing her powers caused an eternal winter and she couldn’t undone it even when she wanted. And it´s a frequent phenomenal in media. You could be interested in this essay ( http://snarp.dreamwidth.org/273210.html )
Good points! The essay was very interesting as well. I agree that even with a few male character examples, female examples are much more common victims of this trope. This is definitely something I’ll look out for in the future.
If you want a show that really uses this trope, you should watch puella magi madoka magika, it’s quite worth it too. ^^
Great post! One of the things I found most interesting about “Frozen” was how it seemed to be based more so on “The Wizard of Oz” and “Wicked” rather than “The Snow Queen.” In that sense, it felt like Disney was using the Princess formula, but not really making “a princess movie” or fairy tale for that matter. “Frozen” felt like it could belong in the assortment of Disney movies, like “Pinocchio,” “Peter Pan,” “The Fox and the Hound,” ones that focus on family and friendship rather than true love in terms of romance.
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my favorite cartoon is frozen too elsa is so pretty
What is worse yet about “fixer upper” is that the only “issue” with Ana is that she is engaged, reinforcing the assumption that a woman is incapable of know what is best for her, and that she must be prevented from her own mistakes. Everything about this film’s attempt to skirt the status quo feels like an after though. While true love here is between two sisters, we all know who the REAL true love is, and that is between Ana and Sven.