MOSCOW, April 1 (RAPSI, Ingrid Burke) – Alleging that a teaser trailer for Disney’s latest animated blockbuster Frozen was a flagrant rip-off of her own short film, The Snowman, a California animator has filed a federal claim against the film giant.

The Frozen teaser trailer emerged in June 2013, months ahead of the film’s November release.

“The FROZEN teaser trailer is substantially similar to The Snowman, and it is almost identical to the original elements of The Snowman,” plaintiff Kelly Wilson asserts in a complaint filed with a California federal court Friday, noting that the protagonists in each short film are “equally complex” snowmen.

The teaser featured Olaf the snowman – a comical sidekick in the full-length film – facing off with a reindeer for his carrot nose, which had fallen on slippery ice.

According to Wilson’s complaint, her film featured an “awkward” snowman facing off with a group of rabbits in order to save his nose, which had also fallen on slippery ice. The Snowman was created between 2008 and 2010.

In both films, shenanigans ensue, and viewers were left with important lessons about competition, sacrifice, friendship, and gratitude.

While the film clips certainly can be distinguished from one another, Wilson attributes this primarily to the teaser trailer’s brevity, and to the fact that Frozen is 3-D, wheras The Snowman is 2-D.

Still, “Both works are about: (1) a snowman competing with animals for a carrot nose on slippery ice; and (2) the formerly adversarial animals acting out of friendship to return the carrot nose to the snowman,” the complaint argues.

Wilson alleges that Frozen’s teaser trailer and The Snowman are nearly identical in a variety of areas, including their shared plotline, themes, mood, characters, and sequence of events. This sentiment was followed up by a frame-by-frame comparison, conveying a number of apparent similarities between the two clips.

“Defendants copied a substantial portion of The Snowman and used it as the FROZEN teaser trailer, and the depiction of the character Olaf the snowman in other FROZEN trailers and throughout the movie FROZEN substantially copies original elements of the snowman character expressed in The Snowman,” she went on to argue.

Frozen proved to be an enormous success, winning two Academy Awards, earning upwards of $110 million worldwide the week of its release, and ultimately drawing in over $1 billion in global box-office revenues.

The complaint asserts that numerous reviewers and observers have called attention to the fact that the teaser trailer has little to do with the film itself. “I thought the movie was about a snowman and a reindeer fighting for a carrrroooottttttttt,” bellowed the daughter of Slate reviewer Dan Kois, as quoted in the complaint.

Wilson claims that she sent Disney various copies of The Snowman in a series of job applications she submitted with the company between 2009 and 2012. Her film was screened at several film festivals and disseminated on the internet as well.

Asserting one claim of copyright infringement and one for declaratory relief, Wilson seeks a declaration that Disney infringed her copyright, and a payout of all profits that Disney has allegedly accrued as a result. She seeks future damages and legal fees as well.