Guilty Pleasures #24 - The Snow Queen

Today I’m talking about the Snow Queen

No, not that one

Not that either

How many of these things are there?! No, I’m talking about the BBC 2005 adaptation of Hans Christian Anderson’s tale. Why this one? Because I own it on DVD and literally for no other reason.

Also bear in mind, I tend to do review summaries as I watch them so I’m good with details, this is the first time in many years I’ve watched this film. So let’s dive in

So, we open with credits in a snowy landscape with some very eerie music. It’s all CGI, most of the movie is filmed in front of a blue screen. We see a small boy, Kay, struggling with the cold and playing on his recorder, which he got from… who knows

A mother and daughter pass him by, Gerda, the daughter worries for him so the mother gives her money to give him. He doesn’t thank her the rude b*stard. Gerda looks out the window at the storm and we get a speech about how snow is cold and evil or something… Gerda heads to bed and wonders if he can let Kay stay for the night out of the cold. But the mother just wishes her good night and leaves. Gerda gets up and throws him a blanket, at least he can be somewhat warmer in that.

In the land where awful looking CGI doves carry a b*tch in a sleigh overhead. The b*tch, the Snow Queen approaches Kay, offering her hand until the mother comes out and lets him in the house, she’s not heartless after all.

Sometime later, 2 kids are joyriding a carriage with their toboggans as Kay and Gerda play. As we get our first eerie song, Kay chases after the carriage for some reason. The mother comments about how these two have become best of friends because this thing has to tell as we don’t have the budget to show.

That night, Gerda and Kay are looking out the window. As we hear about the Snow Queen for the first time (you know aside from her showing up a while back) Kay says he’s seen her, calling her beautiful and wanting to see her again.

And so the night progresses on and Kay sees some bright light, he opens the window and some particularly aimed snow hits his eye, hurting him and causing him to become ruder. The next morning, he approaches the snowman he and Gerda had crafted together and smashes it with his toboggan before walking away.

Gerda treats this to mean… I have no idea. Two boys are playing Star Wars with sticks, Kay joins in and lays eyes on the snow Queen, he uses a rope to attach his toboggan to her sleigh. Gerda catches up rather too quickly and asks the boys where he’s gone. She falls in the woods, upset about losing the friend she’s only known for 5 minutes on screen. Oh and the toboggan falls in the river, with Kay now taking a ride in the sleigh.

Spring arrives, not particularly good looking spring but... A fisherman picks up Kay’s toboggan. As we get, what else? Another eerie song. He brings the toboggan back to the mother and because no other toboggan looks like this she presumes it to mean that Kay is dead. I hope Hans had a better explanation than this. At least the give it a distinct marking if you’re doing this.

Gerda stands in the cemetery as an old woman comforts her by saying that Kay might still be alive, possibly. Gerda struggles to sleep thinking of Kay, man it was winter then, now it’s spring, GET OVER IT!

Gerda decides to go on an expedition to rescue him because that’s totally the sane thing to do. She sits by the river wishing it to talk and suddenly she’s able to speak to a Raven. OK, that settles it, she’s gone mad. The Raven says that Kay is not dead and to try looking down the river. And continuing her trend of being totally not crazy, she follows the advice of a talking bird, taking the Fisherman’s boat and going down the stream. Accompanied by yet another eerie song.

She falls asleep until she reaches an enchanted garden because… why not? A lady with cakes greets her, having been forewarned by the force or something that she was coming. OK, she’s clearly a version of the wicked witch, can we get on with this? And now she can talk to flowers now, goodie. They say that Kay is captured in a palace. The Raven attacks the Wicked Witch and Gerda goes running.

Gerda cuts herself on a thorn as she runs through the woods, the Raven says a palace is nearby and takes her to it. One of the statues comes to life, only those invited can be allowed to pass. She says he’s looking for Kay and the statue claims that a boy came through and is to wed the King’s daughter.

She runs through the palace into the wedding ceremony but finds the prince is not Kay. Security really is sh*t in this Royal Palace. She tells her tale to the palace and this line occurs

“And in her eyes, they can see the fire that only true love can inspire”

WHAT?!! WHAT?!!WHAT?!!

No, I don’t for a moment believe they’re in love, because they’ve had all of 3 scenes together, all of maybe 10 minutes. You want me to be invested in this relationship but give me no reason to be.

Gerda explains her situation, the King suspects that there may be something else at work. A magician created a glass to make everyone appear ugly because… reasons, the mirror shattered and caused chaos and fragments as small as a grain of sand are still floating, one very conveniently went into Kay’s eye and… how does this make him the Snow Queen’s puppet. Was he already infatuated with her, wouldn’t the mirror have ended that. The Snow Queen likes him because she likes a heart of ice or something.

And now we get the bullsh*t about love being greater than everything and bla bla bla.

The next morning, she’s taken by carriage to the border, now wearing some more appropriate attire. More eerie music follows. They enter ‘a dangerous place’ and the horses stop, there’s a woman lying in their path. It’s a trap, robbers set upon them but one of the girls of the tribe saves Gerda’s life so she can have a friend or something…

After talking the girl around, the girl tells Gerda to take her moose when the fire dies so she can escape. She tells her to follow the Northern lights and find the ‘Old Woman’s hut.’ Gerda fares north by the second of the male lead and really less interesting songs. She begins to pass out from the cold as we get another eerie song introducing the Lapland and Finland woman (just one woman)

Gerda is taken into the hut and given food and warmth. And I’ve just realised that no-one’s telling her to head home, where she should be because she’s just a child, and she’s not in any way prepared to go up against someone like the Snow Queen. She says she can get Gerda closer but only the Laplander can get her into the palace.

OK, so montage time, why the f*ck are there whales in a river. Tunnel of sound and making a jump no human being could possibly make, adding to my theory that’s she’s really having a psychotic breakdown. So, they arrive at the Laplander’s home (they really couldn’t afford to pay anyone beyond cameos, could they?)

The Laplander appears to be some kind of Sorceress and gives Gerda a powerful potion to take her to the Snow Queen. She tells her to be careful thanks to the Snow Queen’s power, not telling to her go home. Gerda drinks the potion with more eerie music playing in the background.

She, the moose and the Raven are taken to the palace by the power of an acid trip. 3 bears attack, the Snow Queen knows they are there but the moose has it handled. She enters the palace with more eerie music. The Snow Queen stands before Kay’s unconscious body and damn almost kisses him. She spots Gerda and knocks her backwards with an ice blast, then another. She’s reminded of the love bullsh*t and is suddenly able to project some kind of light blast, seemingly obliterating her.

A tear destroyed the fragment because the plot says so, restoring Kay to his slightly less rude self. The palace collapses and they make their escape. Now all they have to do is head home, should take a few… years, give or take a couple of says… Oh, they’re home again in the next scene, my mistake.

And that’s the end of that…

So that was the Snow Queen. The effects don’t hold up, the acting is stilted, particularly by the younger cast, the music is weird, the plot has some pretty major flaws with a resolution that’s way too easy and is utterly insane. I don’t give a sh*t though, I still enjoyed this film.

There’s a certain charm to movie with a moderate to low budget. Whilst the writing in Starship Apocalypse proceeded to drain the charm right out of it the Snow Queen retains that charm in spite of its flawed plot.

Admittedly some of the plot flaws could’ve come straight out of the book, I haven’t read it for this review so I can’t compare it to that, but I can say that’s it’s a basic but charming story that didn’t need to be stretched beyond what it was, even now I felt there was padding. Did we really need to have the Lapland/Finland Woman AND the Laplander?

Rage Rating -45%

For updates and exclusive extras click here to like my Facebook page

For more reviews click here

Images/clips used in this review are from The Snow Queen (2014), Faerie Tale Theatre, The Snow Queen (anime) and The Snow Queen (2005) and belong to their respective owners. All images in this review are subject to fair use