- The movie is based on the Hans Christian Andersen tale “The Snow Queen.” It sticks pretty closely to the original story, aside from the characters, plot, and lack of religious overtones.
- This is the first Disney animated feature to include three princesses as main characters — Anna, Ella (who becomes queen), and the secret surprise princess seen briefly after the credits.
- With the release of Frozen, Disney is one step closer to having an animated feature to represent each of the countries in Epcot’s World Showcase. The Emperor’s New Groove, Mulan, Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, Pinocchio, Pocahontas, Aladdin, Beauty and the Beast, The Great Mouse Detective, and Brother Bear cover all but Japan, and that will be taken care of when Big Hero 6 is released next year. After that, the company will concentrate on making features themed to the various areas of Future World.
- The film had a short production schedule, so instead of going to Norway to study the environment, animators were sealed in a commercial meat locker over a weekend.
- A live reindeer was brought into the animation studio to help with the development of Sven’s dialogue.
- Over the years, Disney has tried many times to bring an adaptation of “The Snow Queen” to the screen, but the movie kept being derailed during the character-design process. A breakthrough came when John Lasseter suggested that if they stopped making character maquettes out of ice, they might not keep melting away before more progress could be made.
- The title was cut from The Snow Queen to Frozen because the film was running too long.
- Frozen is Disney’s first computer-animated feature since last year’s Wreck-It Ralph.
Tags: Frozen, Liefacts, The Snow Queen