Consider Giving Olaf's Frozen Adventure The Cold Shoulder

The reaction my audience at my screening of Coco had to the pre-movie holiday special Olaf's Frozen Adventure, a 21-ish minute long short originally intended for release solely on ABC, was intriguing to me, as quiet confusion slowly morphed into people, who were realizing this thing was going on much longer than the typical five-minute PIXAR or Disney Animation short, leaving in hordes to go to the concession stand. Those who left the auditorium didn't miss much as Olaf's Frozen Adventure is a middling creation and I say that as someone who actually enjoyed both the original Frozen and the character of Olaf The Snowman.

Frozen Fever Review

Frozen Fever is a short film playing only on Cinderella in it's theatrical release. I originally was just going to write a paragraph about this short, but decided I had more than enough thoughts over it to warrant a separate review.

Disney's two animation studios (Walt Disney Animation Studios and PIXAR) have been using short films as a way to continue the adventures of some of their most beloved films, like Tangled and Toy Story, for a while now, but Frozen Fever may be the most hyped of these shorts. It's been prominently pumped up in ads for Cinderella, and why not? Frozen is the fifth biggest movie of all-time, it's not exactly a shocker that Disney thinks audiences might have an appetite for more adventures with Elsa and Anna.

Cinderella Review

A Cinderella Story

It's interesting to look at how the treatment of fairy tales in pop culture has changed in such a short period of time. At the dawn of the 21st century, Shrek became a phenomenon, and soon, a flood of content was made revolving around lampooning fairy tales. Then, in 2010, Tangled and Alice In Wonderland brought well-known fairy tales to life in a far less cynical manner to huge box office numbers. This had led to such popular entities like Once Upon A Time, Frozen, and the subject of this review, Cinderella, which treat fairy tales with more reverence.

Frozen 2 Confirms That Disney Won't Let It Go

You know what? Frozen's awesome. I know the backlash on the film (which gets really vicious, sexist and nonsensical) has overtaken it's reputation and reduced the feature to be known as "the flick with that one song" in it, but a revisit of the film last fall confirmed to me that the 2013 feature is actually extremely well made and engaging. The songs are well-written, Olaf is excellent comic relief (it's smart how his gags never derive from being loud or obnoxious, but rather from his sincere optimism) and the emotional moments of the film are excellently executed.

American Snipers Lack Of Depth And Quality Is Reinforced By Its Crude Defenders (Editorial)

Some movies that make big bucks at the box office aren't really surprising in their financial glory. Was there anyone who really didn't think the last Harry Potter movie wouldn't shatter box office records? But then you've got your Avengers, your Frozens, those movies that wind up making way, way, way more money than anyone on the face of this Earth could have predicted. American Sniper is one such film, breaking every box office record in it's path and demolishing all expectations.

Fred Claus Is A Mean-Spirited Misfire Of Gigantic Proportions

Welcome to 25 Days Of Christmas Pop Culture! From now until Christmas Eve, I'll be tackling one piece of Christmas pop culture! It could be a book, movie, TV special, song....so long as it's festive for this time of the year, it'll be checked out in this daily column!

The success of Tangled begat Frozen. The success of Shrek begat Puss In Boots. When a movie studio finds financial favor in a certain property, original properties taking cues from that successful feature are just as common as sequels. So it's not hard to imagine Warner Bros. taking one look at all the money fellow Time Warner owned movie studio New Line Cinema made with Elf and wanting their own family Christmas movie with a big comedian. They decided to also take a cue from 2005 smash hit Wedding Crashers by reuniting Vince Vaughn with that movies director, David Dobkin.

With Do You Want To Cook A Meth Lab, Breaking Bad And Frozen Come Together At Last!! (From The Interwebs)

Some things were always meant to come together. Peanut butter and jelly. Rolls and butter. Chocolate and more chocolate (I'm hungry as I'm writing this). I never would have thought Frozen and Breaking Bad would come together so well, but the Internet has a tendency to surprise me. Below, check out a parody that merges the two entitled Do You Want To Build A Meth Lab?

New Into The Woods Trailer Shows Off Songs, Characters, Bizzare Johnny Depp

Hollywoods treatment of musicals in things like trailers has always been peculiar. Very rarely are the actual songs from the film depicted in the advertising materials, a weird predicament considering the epic musical number Let It Go became one of the most beloved pieces of Frozen. After the smash hits Les Miserables and the aforementioned Frozen, the two big musicals for this Christmas have reversed this trend, with Annie trumpeting its tunes in its trailer, while Into The Woods makes up for its musical free teaser with this theatrical trailer that boasts plenty of singing. Check it out below!

Editorial: The Modern Disney Animation Resurgence Is Nothing Short Of Fantastic

An awesome image Wired made for their magazine to celebrate recent features
from Walt Disney Animation Studios. Hooray for Bolt and Winnie The Pooh
getting some recognition! 

With Big Hero 6 on the horizon, many have shifted their attention to Walt Disney Animation Studios, and specifically their numerous recent achievements. Seriously, the studio has been on fire lately, churning out one entertaining feature after the other. As this awesome and in-depth Wired article notes, the last few years have restored luster to the company, with the phenomenally successful Frozen just clinching that the company has reformed itself.

Final Trailer For Big Hero 6 Is Full of Laughs, Actions And Emotion

One thing that I think is a major factor in Walt Disney Animation Studios resurgence is the much more effective marketing used for their features starting with Tangled. Starting with that 2010 film, trailers for the studios films were extremely memorable and also very well-made. The short trailer for Frozen last summer that simply showed Sven and Olaf engaging in shenanigans was despised by many on the interwebs, but I myself found it more than amusing and any time it played at a movie theater, that thing just went over like gangbusters.

A Frozen Theme Park Ride Is Coming To Walt Disney World

Frozen has become such a cultural phenomenon in only ten months time, with $1.1 billion generated at the worldwide box office alone, plus untold amounts of cash in merchandising and home video. So in an event that shocks nobody, Frozen is going to have its own attraction at Disney World starting in early 2016.

Disney Unleashes Animated Superheroes In New Big Hero 6 Trailer

Baymax, the lovable robot hero of Big Hero 6

Disney is one of my absolute favorite things in the world. My first word was Disney, several of my favorite movies are their classic animated features, and their recent theatrical offerings like Tangled, Frozen and especially Wreck-It Ralph have been amazing. Now, they've released a new trailer for their next big adventure, and it truly is amazing. Check it out below!

Space Jam Review....Why Is This Movie So Popular?

If You Wanna Slam...You Probably Grew Up In My Generation

What is Michael Jordan standing on in this thing??
That circle can't possibly hold him, can it?

Four months back, me and a bunch of friends sat down to rewatch a movie that we knew had shaped not only our own cinema sensibilities, but pretty much our entire generation. Was it the only movie to do this? Of course not. But a movie where Michael Jordan faces off against a Danny DeVito voiced alien is likely to remain one of the more memorable features to have that kind of impact. We popped in the VHS, and it started.

So, I Was On Netflix: Free Birds

Not since Beverly Hills Chiahuahua has a movies
poster had such a true claim

Each Tuesday I review a film that can be found on Netflix Instant Streaming. This week, what happens when time travel and turkeys get mixed together. Spoiler Alert: an awful movie happens.