10 Animated Disney Films That Made Big Changes To The Source Material

2. Frozen

Based Upon: 'The Snow Queen' by Hans Christian Andersen Following on the recent tradition of Tangled, Frozen is only a loose adaptation of The Snow Queen. Even going as far as to label it "inspired by". However the plans for Disney to adapt the tale stem all the way back to Walt Disney himself in 1943. The project was shelved until 1990 but was again scrapped in 2002, until 2008 when new Disney chief John Lasseter was approached by Chris Buck. It took seventy years and several different teams to look at the story before it arrived on the silver screen as the record breaking Frozen last year. The big problem came from the Snow Queen herself, and trying to find a way to humanise her to have audiences relate to her. Eventually the decision was made to change the Snow Queen from the villain of the picture to make her the older sister of protagonist Anna. The theme of the ending of Anderson's work remained with Frozen's idea that "only an act of true love can thaw a frozen heart." In The Snow Queen, Gerda saves Kai by kissing him, melting his heart and burning away the mirror shard while his own tears dislodge the shard from his eye. This obviously needed changing for the sister dynamic, but Anna's sacrifice for Elsa and love being the cure is a running theme throughout.