Frozen

Sandra and I took our kids to see Frozen on Wednesday. It was, in a word, delightful. 

It's a musical, which may not be clear from the trailers they've put out. Also, it's not about the relationship between the snowman and the reindeer, which the original teaser may have led you to believe. In fact, that particular short scene (the one in which the snowman and reindeer are both trying to get the carrot) doesn't appear anywhere in the film. 

The film is stronger for this. It's a great scene, and makes a wonderful short, but there just isn't anyplace in Frozen where it would properly fit.

We saw the film in 3D, which wasn't really necessary for the telling of the story (and which set us back more than a few bucks with as many tickets as we were buying) but that was the showtime for which we could find seats and fit in the intersection of busy schedules. The 3D was fine, and was especially cool with the snow and ice effects.

It's not a perfect movie, and Sandra and I discussed some of their storytelling decisions afterward. We agreed about some of the problems, but completely disagreed about how to address them. Then Sandra expressed disappointment that a particular song wasn't reprised, and I pointed out that it almost certainly was reprised as a leitmotif during the finale, but that I couldn't actually remember it happening, though I was sure it did happen because no composer worth his salt would fail to use that trick.

Frozen clears my Threshold of Awesome and comes in at #9 for me for the year. Your results may vary wildly from mine, however, because I'm a sucker for a strong musical (I bought the soundtrack [and yes, Christophe Beck totally reprised the theme in question during the finale]) and I have a pair of daughters whose personalities I could see echoed in the film's characters.