Disney’s Frozen turns into a Marion Cotillard thriller in Ice Tower

I am not sure Disney’sFrozen franchise will ever truly deliver what I want to see: a hypnotic thriller built between two powerful-yet-possibly-delusional women, refracted through the prisms of ice. Maybe thecurrently slated Frozen 3 and 4 could very well meet my demand, but… signs point to no. Thankfully, there is The Ice Tower.

The latest from painterly director Lucile Hadžihalilović, The Ice Tower stars newcomer Clara Pacini as Jeanne, a 16-year-old orphaned after the death of her mother who finds refuge in a film studio where Cristina (Inception’s Marion Cotillard) is filming an adaptation of Hans Christian Andersen’s The Snow Queen. The two become entangled, mesmerized by one another, and based on the trailer… Hitchcockian vibes.

Hadžihalilović, whose previous films include Evolution and Earwig, is not one for plot-heavy thrillers. Based on reviews out of the 2025 Berlin film festival, The Ice Tower falls right in line with her oeuvre, full of dream logic and lush photography. The artifice of the in-world movie set adds to the interior spectacle — it’s all haunting in a way an actual rendering of The Snow Queen wouldn’t be. Instead of Olaf, we get Gaspar Noé, the French provocateur and Hadžihalilović’s IRL husband, as a film director. Not a bad substitute.

The Ice Tower opens in limited release on Oct. 3., two whole years before we’re supposed to get Frozen 3. So you have room for it in your life if you feel like you only have room for one Snow Queen story per year.