Frozen (2013)

The cold never bothered me, either.  That line will make more sense after you see Frozen.  Despite being a California native, I've often wondered if I was meant for colder climates.  Then again, spending much of my youth stocking a cooler for hours at a time might have thickened my hide a bit.

Before I get started, allow me to rant for a second.  Dear parents, if your kids cannot get through even a two minute trailer without screaming out loud several times (and not even necessarily at the images on the screen), perhaps you should wait a few more years before bringing them to the movies.  It's not fair or courteous to the people sitting around you.

Before Frozen began, we're treated to a clever, "meta" short film framed around a classic Mickey Mouse cartoon.  It develops slowly, but once its 'twist' is revealed it was a lot of fun to watch.  It's no Paperman, but still a good short.

In just the opening scene of Frozen I realized I was in for a much different movie than I thought.  Based on the trailer, I expected some corny movie about a snowman and a reindeer (it's interesting to note that neither character shows up until around the halfway point).  Instead, Frozen is a classic story about a princess and true love.  It's a familiar and somewhat cliched story.  You could call this a weakness, but the classic versus cliched debate is splitting hairs in this case.  Both written and directed by Chris Buck and Jennifer Lee, they've added some twists and updates that worked very well and kept it fresh.  Frozen also has very strong central themes that make this the kind of film that parents will actually encourage their kids to watch.

Frozen is about two sisters, Elsa and Anna, who've grown apart over the years, and have been isolated from the outside world.  There's much more to their relationship, but I don't want to spoil anything since I was so pleasantly surprised by how the story developed.  I want you to be able to enjoy it the way I did.  I'll give you this one little tease to go on though.  If your favorite character from the X-Men is Iceman, with maybe a little bit of Emma Frost thrown in, then you're going to be in for a treat.  During many scenes in Frozen my mind would wander thinking about why they haven't been able to accurately portray Iceman in an X-Men film yet.  Future X-Men films may want to use Frozen as a template, because they really nailed it.

While I'm not exactly the biggest fan of musicals, I really loved the songs in Frozen and it's one of the best aspects of the film  They were cute, clever and funny.  By the second song, I was already in love with Frozen.  Yes, you could say that Frozen managed to thaw my icy heart.  Elsa's (Idina Menzel) defining song "Let it Go" is a highlight of the film, and the animation was perfect for it.  I can still hear the song in my head.  I wouldn't be surprised to see Oscar nominations for Robert Lopez and Kristen Anderson-Lopez for their original songs.  I expect that many copies of the soundtrack will be purchased this holiday season.

The animation is fantastic and some of the designs and scenery will likely evoke thoughts of things like Lord of the Rings or even Game of Thrones.  The character's look was also very appealing.  Despite all the ice and snow, it's still very vivid and colorful.  I actually thought the 3D was very good as well, and it doesn't get in the way.  I still don't think you need to make huge effort to see it in 3D, but it's not a complete waste if that's all that's available to you.

Frozen also features great voice acting.  I couldn't place the voice for Anna for much of the film, and was surprised to see it was Kristen Bell.  I never really noticed her voice before, but was impressed with how warm and effortless it was, and it turns out she's a great singer, too.  The entire cast is excellent and I applaud the filmmakers for not going with a bunch of big name actors, but rather ones whose voices fit the parts better.  I was very impressed with Jonathan Groff and Santino Fontana, as Kristoff and Hans respectively.  Josh Gad is perfect as Olaf the snowman.  I was surprised to see Alan Tudyk's name in the credits, and he's proving to be quite the chameleon as a voice actor.  However, the prize goes to Idina Menzel as the hidden gem here.  He voice is absolutely amazing!

Frozen is a classic Disney musical that everyone can enjoy.  It features gorgeous animation, great songs and wonderful voice acting.  It's clever, funny, energetic, and has the kind of heart I normally would expect from a Pixar film.  Disney has really stepped up it's game with their animated films in the past few years.  This is my favorite animated film of 2013 and was an absolute joy to watch.

4.5 (out of 5) Death Stars

The Internship (2013)

My old, cynical self watched the first 20 minutes or so of The Internship with my arms folded across my chest, without so much as a smile on my face.  It's not that The Internship wasn't funny at all, it was that nearly every laugh during this time were all things I've seen in the trailer.  Then I thought, is that really the movie's fault?  Everyone else is laughing, and I'm betting these people don't see nearly as many movies as I do.  Would I be laughing more if I hadn't seen that trailer like 20 times this year?

After The Internship blows its trailer-wad, I warmed up to it a bit.  Don't get me wrong, it's not a great film, but I found myself chuckling a few times.  The humor's a little one-note though, and some gags are repeated a few too many times.  It's easy to say that the film is really trying to get by on the charm of Vince Vaughn and Owen Wilson.  I'm sure that's what Vaughn thought when coming up with the story and co-writing the screenplay (co-wrote with Jared Stern).  The Internship hits all the typical beats, and busts out every underdog, and some rom-com, cliche they could throw at you.  Even the soundtrack has a cheesy, familiar feel to it.  Director Shawn Levy's resume doesn't exactly strike you with the number of huge hits, and he really doesn't take any chances here.  It's all very paint-by-numbers.

The Internship recycles so many plot elements that you'll have the whole movie figured out within that first 20 minutes.  I realized around that point that I was basically watching a retread of any high-school or college comedy where competing cliques or frats go at each other.  It's like a mix of Revenge of the Nerds, only the jocks are just type-A nerds, and Old School, where the dean is replaced by a snooty, disapproving boss (Aasif Mandvi).

Watch salesmen Nick (Wilson) and Billy (Vaughn) find themselves out of work after their owner (John Goodman, who's in everything these days) decides to close up shop without warning.   Unsure what to do next, Billy decides to dream big and takes a chance at getting an internship at Google.  The condition of the internship at Google is that they are grouped up and given a series of challenges.  The team with the best score gets guaranteed jobs.  Nobody wants to get paired with the old dudes, so Nick and Billy end up with a group of cast-offs.  Even the cast-offs aren't wild about being grouped up with fast talking guys with no tech skills.  Do you think the group will eventually come together and rally?  Oh, the suspense...

On a side note, I live fairly close to Google (as well as use their blog software), but I've never heard anything about their actual internships being as cutthroat or competition based as in the movie.  My research shows that while they got the culture part right about Google, the competition is mostly a fabrication likely added for dramatic purposes.  Everyone I've ever talked to has said it truly is the most amazing place to work.

What needs to be said about Vince Vaughn and Owen Wilson at this point?  They give you exactly what you expect from them: Vaughn's hypercharged, stream-of-consciousness rants, and Wilson's aw-shucks charm.  They are pretty much playing the same characters they've always played.  At one point there's a reference to the fact that they've known each other since they were kids, and I couldn't help but think that wasn't that also the case in Wedding Crashers.  They might as well have named the characters the same and just called it John and Jeremy go to Google.  The next film can be John and Jeremy join the Army and it can be a retread of Stripes.

The rest of the cast is fine.  The group rounded out with Dylan O'Brien, Tiya Sircar, Josh Brener and Tobit Raphael.  I thought Raphael was funny, in particular.  Max Minghella effectly plays the main antagonist, and you want to just punch his character in the face the whole film.  Rose Byrne also stars as Owen Wilson's main crush.  I could have used a little more Byrne in the film, but that's probably due to my crush on her.

The Internship isn't reinventing the wheel, and for some of you this may feel all too familiar.  I do think that it's a crowd-pleasing film, but a lot of it is going to come down to whether or not you're tired of Vaughn and Wilson's act, or this formula in general.  I warmed it up to it as it went on, and got a few laughs out of it, so I guess I can't quit these guys just yet.  This hasn't been a good year for comedy, but I'm guessing this is going to likely to be the most successful of the Summer due to it's mainstream appeal.  I call it a matinee.

2.5 (out of 5) Death Stars

(Note: Originally I gave this 3 Death Stars, but upon reflecting, I'm knocking this down a bit.)