Hey, everyone. Capone in Chicago here.
To be honest, there isn't a whole lot to say about Adam Green's latest work (following HATCHET and SPIRAL) beyond, "Just go see it as if your life depended on it." Anything more might ruin the fun of discovering the small but remarkable FROZEN, a movie that has about the simplest plot summary in a long time: Three people are trapped on chairlift at a ski resort only open on the weekend...and it's Sunday night...and it's really, really cold. If you're a winter sports enthusiast, I bet you just got goose bumps. I'm not, and I still freaked out a little watching FROZEN. Oh, and please consider this entire review a giant SPOILER WARNING!!!
The three people in question are best buddies Joe and Dan (Shawn Ashmore and Kevin Zeg), as well as Dan's tag-along girlfriend Parker (Emma Bell), who Joe likes but resents her presence at the traditional guy's ski weekend. He likes her a little bit more when she bats her eyes at the guy running the chairlift and gets them all free rides without tickets. Through a series of all-too-believable events, the one person who knows the three are doing one last night run abandons his post and the lift is shut down with them left hanging about 50 feet off the ground. What most impressed me about Green's script was everything that happens to the threesome from this point forward. Every action they take to seek rescue or save themselves is probably exactly what normal-thinking people would do. And the results seem all too believable and messed up. And what about inaction? Think about what would happen to your body if you just sat there hoping somebody would come by. Bathroom breaks? Ha! How about frostbite, sun exposure during the day, and might there be a critter or two in the woods below looking at you like a meat piñata (if you've seen the trailer, you know the answer already)?
I didn't immediately recognize Bell and Zegers, but Shawn Ashmore I knew from THE RUINS as his supporting roll as Iceman in the X-MEN movies, and he's quite good as a de facto hero of the film and the only character who is willing and/or able to do what is necessary to get off the lift without killing himself (or so it would seem). But FROZEN isn't as much about action as it is about suspense and character development. I loved watching all of the interpersonal drama between them basically vanish when the crisis sets in. Primal fear takes over and bad decisions are as likely as good ones. Panic sets in early and the reality of the situation soon follows. And that's about as much of the movie as I'm willing to talk about, because it's such a small, short experience that saying much more would be criminal.
With this film, Adam Green has gone from a filmmaker who knows how to mimic the style of the films he loved growing up to a full-bore director of fear-based movies, that tap into what scares us most and follows the path of human behavior that leads us to destruction as often as it leads us to safety. Taking nothing away from the three fantastic young actors who give us three distinct personas loaded with flaws and a few ideas on how to survive. Like OPEN WATER from a few years ago, FROZEN isn't as concerned with detailed backstory (like JAWS, which this film has been compared to in some reviews) as it is dealing with the here and now. And the here and now of this movie filled me with terror and anxiety, the kind only real life can embed in you. Good luck getting FROZEN out of your head.
-- Capone
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