Parent reviews for Frozen

This was a good movie overall. I enjoyed how the "true love" message played out in a different way than usual. There is no real villain in the movie, and limited violence, but my 4-year old did get scared by the ice monster and wolves; there is also a scene where a girl punches a boy, which he didn't like. It felt more like a broadway musical than a typical cartoon film, but it was a nice change. I thought it was more of a girl movie, but all four boys I had with me (ages 4-11) really enjoyed it and were humming the tunes on the way home.

without giving anything away, the parents both die at the begging of the film, leaving two sisters almost entirely alone in a castle. Within a week of seeing this film, my 6 1/2 year old started obsessing about us both dying, and what would happen to him (who would care for him). Until now, he's always seemed well adjusted, so I was surprised to see him reduced to tears by anxiety. In fact, it took me two weeks to realize what had caused his fears. Whilst not saying it's not age appropriate, I'd recommend you think about the developmental stage of your child before seeing this film. By 6-7 reality is being cemented and the more realistic events can be generalized to oneself. Death is again touched on later in the film, and it's not natural causes.... I've had to field several questions on this front, too. On a personal note, I felt this film was created in tandem with the musical theater production that's sure to arise. The characters burst into song unnecessarily, and I found this tedious. My son enjoyed the film at the time, but (apart from the ongoing anxiety) forgot it soon afterwards.

I am pleasantly surprised by this movie. For the most part, it's good clean fun for families and kids. My 7 year old loved it and has been pretending to be Elsa ever since. She said, "You know why I like this movie, Mom? Because there's no prince with a kiss - her sister saves her!" My almost 11 year old son also really enjoyed it. The animation is beautiful, and the characters are well balanced and relevant. Both of my kids loved the character of the snowman, Olaf. The story is sweet, there is no real villain, and the singing is contemporary and lovely. The musical element is also well proportioned - the action and plot are not interrupted by the singing, they are actually enhanced by it. Even for adults, the movie is engaging and entertaining. The positive messages include: don't marry a guy you just met, true love can be sisterly love, and fear is destructive and can turn a person's gift into a curse, but love and acceptance can turn our gifts into beauty. One complex element that is not addressed is that young Elsa remains in fear and isolation because of her parents' reaction to her power, not because of her power itself. A four year old sitting behind us in the theater was whimpering during some of the action scenes; the characters are in peril at times, so little ones may be afraid. The elements I don't care for about this film for kids are: the sisters are very skinny, and Elsa's liberation is unnecessarily sexualized. My 7 year old noticed how skinny the sisters are, and we talked about that they clearly are not meant to be real people because you never see people with giant heads and tiny bodies walking around. Also, as Elsa stops trying to control her powers and uses them to create beauty, she sings the song "Let It Go." During the song and her transformation, her cartoon character is converted from a sad and controlled young woman in a high necked gown into a very sexy character, wearing an updated lower cut, sheer dress, including swishing hips, more makeup, and a knowing expression. The idea that freedom from your fears and converting your gift into beauty means becoming sexy and wearing stilettos while walking around in an ice castle is absurd, especially for little girls. That part demeans the beautiful message it is attempting to convey, in my opinion. Having said that, Frozen is an improvement on the usual itinerary of the Princess story line. I recommend this movie for families, and I believe it will be right up there with the other Disney favorites. The powers that be will make a mint releasing this just before Christmas, because little girls will want to dress up as Elsa and Anna, and have the toys associated with the movie. All in all, this movie is great, and an improvement on the usual Disney theme, but the misguided message of sexy = liberated for women, and consumerism are still very prevalent.

Aside from the adorable characters and great music, the only other good thing is that one sister saves the other. There is cheating, using people, and shunning from parents all through it. It is not a movie that teaches your child that they can count on you and that it is ok to fall in love. It teaches that its ok to entertain feelings for another person when you are committed, and that people will use and abuse you if you give them the chance. Very very sad and very disappointed that people are so blinded by the glitz and publicity and don't really care about the messages that our children are seeing.

The short animated film (Mickey Mouse) at the beginning was "modernized" to be more graphic. My 4 year old son was so upset by the short that he did not want to stay for the main feature! He said it was too scary and mean. He especially did not like the character popping out of the screen. He also said that he thought Mickey Mouse was supposed to be "nice"? Not for preschoolers! What was Disney thinking? They trashed a classic with the "modernization".

Overall the movie was excellent. Great music, nice humour, strong storyline. Transient scary scenes for my sensitive kids included the boat containing the girls' parents going down at sea, the wolves attacking Kristoff's sled, the Ice Monster, a bit of fighting. There was blessedly little social aggression and name calling relative to many movies (except from Hans at the end). There were many mature themes around unintentional harm (Elsa of Anna), death (of the parents, a character sentenced to death, attempts to kill characters, a character who almost dies), and the fragility of relationships that were confusing for my 4-year-old, over the head of my 2-year-old. My husband and I thought the the vintage Disney pre-show that included Pete lusting after, grabbing, and assaulting Minnie Mouse before having a variety of violence visited upon him by Mickey and friends was really awful... but we might be those parents who overthink these things. Our kids seemed to find the physical comedy of it quite funny.

My son's words as we left: "If this was a book and I was a judge, I'd give it a medal!" (referring to the Caldecot medals his class has been learning about.) We really enjoyed this flick. We went with another mom and son dup and both boys had a wonderful time. Hearing after this was a "Disney Princess" movie, the boys were shocked and argued it couldn't be, because they enjoyed it too much! *Spoiler Alert* Having the movie focus so deeply on the love between the girls and showing the primary heroine effectively save herself through loving her sister was a phenomenal break from the passive love stories of the past. This is movie worth seeing with your kids, no matter their gender, and then discussing the impact of love and family. Side note: just today (almost a week after seeing it), my son asked if we can buy it on dvd when it comes out so that he can show it to his dad. :)

I had seen the trailer for this movie several times in 2013 while at the theatre for other releases. The actual movie was a surprise for me, I did not expect it to be what it turned out. I found the trailer showed it to be more of a comedy with the snowman playing a large role. In fact, it wasn't as much a comedy as I thought it would be. I also had no clue that it was a musical (maybe I missed that in the trailer). There was definitely more of a dark edge to this. ** SPOILER ALERT ** ... at one point we see one character leave another one to die. That's somewhat intense. It's a good movie, enjoyable. I had a 5 year old who was 'okay' with it, but if I'd seen the movie ahead of time, I might've waited until he was a year older, or at least prepped him ahead of time for some of the scarier content. FWIW, he said he enjoyed the movie, and didn't seem scarred for life :) My 7 year olds had no issues, and enjoyed it.

I read a number of reviews to see if this was appropriate for my nearly 5 yr old son. It seems it is popular for all ages. It shocked me that many people did not report the violence against women in this movie. Yes there are wolves, yes there is a freaky ice monster, and uhum there are 2 scenes where women are targetted for gruesome killing- once with 2 men attacking with cross bows and the other was a sword attack. This also reflects back to us the present state of how women are still persecuted. If this is a topic of exploration great, but if we are just feeding this to little girls... hmmm... questionable dont you think. Also my great concern about this myth is that Elsa is not helped to understand her powers by an elder, she is left alone to feel isolated and depressed. What message is that sending our kids? This movie overall is a Disney romp that feeds drama addiction and whilst having redeeming features - sisterhood and a cute snowman with the best moral line in the story, it does need a lot of debrief about the characters. And i agree with some else- Whats with the doe-eye big boob tiny waist stylisation for the main character? We are feeding our girls poor body images from very young! This is not for 4 and 5 year olds this is for 7 or 8 yr olds or older...