Winter of Frozen Dreams

WINTER OF FROZEN DREAMS starts off strong, with a murder and its subsequent cover-up. Then, it all bogs down quite a bit, leaving Thora Birch with little to do as main character Barbara Hoffman. Keith Carradine's cop-near-retirement role is also pretty flat, but then no one in this movie is overly dynamic.

ON A PERSONAL NOTE: I nearly drifted off several times during this movie, which is something I never do when Ms. Birch is on the screen!

A rather bland "thriller" with few actual thrills...

Thora Birch made a vivid impression with her talent, her carefully flat affect and her poetic appearance in "American Beauty". Now, in "Winter of Frozen Dreams", all three qualities are back on display. Her ghostly complexion haunts the film, in which she is the centerpiece femme fatale.

The film, set in a small town in mid-winter, has an unusually strong sense of colour and a very successful handling of visuals overall. Both the anti-heroine and the landscape from which she emerges are carefully pictured and scorchingly cold.

Keith Carradine wins out with dialogue, as the jaded detective about to retire. His character follows the trail of Thora Birch with one wry remark, sometimes laugh-out-loud funny, after another.

As a portrait of a brilliant psychopath, the film kept me rooted to the spot as I studied Birch's careful depiction.

Having read the book on which film was based, I was initially unsure as to how the film makers would be able to piece this story into a mere hour and an half. After all, it is very difficult to meld all of the details of this intricate story into a concise, yet still intriguing film. In my opinion this film pulled it off brilliantly.

I particularly liked the casting. Thora Birch was great and has really come into her own as an actress. Why she is not a bigger star, baffles me. Keith Carradine was fun to watch, as he has been in so many of the roles he has had in his long career, and Brendan Sexton is certainly a young actor to keep our eye on.

What impressed me most was the fact that this film looks like it was shot in the time period it is portraying. It does not look like some glossy Hollywood piece trying to represent a period in which most of those involved probably barely remember. I did however find the use of heavy color saturation to represent the flash backs difficult to follow at first.

All in all, I really enjoyed this film. It is not your average Hollywood fare and that is just the type of movie I want to see.

Thora Birch is a pretty good performer. I don't know how she got roped into this project, perhaps boredom? Clearly, not for the money.

Overall, the acting is a bit above average. The story is solid, with a few nice twists. If you are into it for only average plus acting and a neat little screenplay then maybe this is your thing.

But, where the movie truly suffers is in production. Bad lighting, lousy camera work, below average editing, all those little things that might have completed the project nicely are just not very good.

I wonder if the stated budget here is correct, $1,000,000? To be honest, these days that is a bit beneath chump change for a film. But, if that number is true then another mystery solved, Why is Winter of Frozen Dreams so not-very-good? You get what you pay for.