Spotlight on The Snow Queen

In light of the fact that Frozen is unfortunately not my favorite movie, I wanted to watch another adaption of the same fairy tale, The Snow Queen.  I had heard wonderful things about this Russian animation, so I found it on youtube and watched it.  But I wouldn't be me if I didn't post about it.

Снежная королева (The Snow Queen) 1957

This movie sticks quite close to the original fairy tale and tells of two children, Kay and Gerda, who grow up next door to each other and love each other deeply.  When they are told the story of the Snow Queen, Kay makes fun of her, so she curses him and comes to kidnap him.  Gerda then goes on a journey to save him.  The movie was made in Russia in 1957 by the Soyuzmultfilm Studio and an English dubbed version was released in 1959, the same year as Disney released Sleeping Beauty.

This movie was beautiful.  The animation was stylized and so pretty, but also quite well done.  The movie was enjoyable and proved that yes, you can do the story with the snow queen as your villain and make it likable.  Hayao Miyazaki cites this as one of his early inspirations to become an animator.  I'm going to be brief, for once, and just say that I would definitely recommend this movie (honestly, click the link up top... it's barely over an hour long, and so worth it).  But seriously, look how lovely.