The Thaw

After reading some of the comments on this movie, I was more than pleasantly surprised at how good this smart little bug feature was A definite step up from the usual B movie sci-fi horror crap that's been out in the cinemas this year. There were decent squirm effects and gore and a nice touch of tongue in cheek humour too. The cinematography was cool and eerie and the brooding atmosphere had echoes of The Thing and Near Dark (although it's nothing like The Thing) I thought the acting and direction were assured. I Liked the twist at the end too. Don't listen to some of the other reviewers on this forum as I doubt that they have actually seen the film.

It had some brief moments of entertainment, but overall it was Luke warm at best. The producers must've blown their budget on hiring Val Kilmer to fill some dead spots in the movie. Kilmer kind of walks through this movie and plays a dopey doc that wants these parasites to infest mankind just to make a point about global warming. Supposedly this movie takes place very cold (or somewhere in Canada.) Unfortunately, there isn't a lick of smoke we can see exiting their mouths in a supposed subzero climate. As a matter of fact, there was barely a drop of snow to be seen anywhere. Oh yeah, global warming. Throw in a bunch of 30 something year old grad students that are supposedly the most brilliant of their class and viola! LOL! Whoever the actress was that played Kilmer's daughter, should be given a Golden Turkey award for most pathetic portrayal of a confused daughter to a wacky mad scientist. I mean bad!! This movie delivers thrills for a buck at Red Box, but it's not worth a penny more.

The End.

There are many films which warn of Global Warming, this is one. In this movie called " The Thaw ", a research scientist, Dr. David Kruipen (Val Kilmer) working in the Artic discovers a prehistoric Wooly Mammoth frozen in ice. The bad news, as it begins to thaw, he also releases a deadly contiguous parasite which devours any host within hours. Into this hostile environment, a group of research students have come to help him including his daughter. One by one the students become aware of the parasite's deadly effect as each is exposed. Soon the entire station is under attack from the deadly creature and it becomes alarming just to survive. There is a substantial list of criticism aimed at this film, beginning with it major star. Val Kilmer is perceived as a major attraction with some of the finest movie roles in his past achievements. Time has elapsed and we now see him in shallow low budget films such as this one and ask why? The story is grudgingly plausible, but there is much lacking. Was this suppose to be a ecological awakening or a standard horror movie? In either case, it fell short. It does have a few interesting points in its favor, but are tiny in comparison with its detriments. As a result, Mr. Kilmer has traded his star status for trinkets and simple Waupun and like the film, it's sad. **

A Ghosthouse Underground film with Aaron Ashmore from Smallville and Val Kilmer from Batman Forever. Batman, Jimmy Olsen and friends take on a prehistoric parasite that distroys every living thing in its path. A parasite that bites people and lays eggs under their skin. The parasite was frozen underground until now. N...ow it is unleashed and it will devour anything in its path including a pollar bear. With the threat of global warming is it possible for something like that to be unleashed. This film is a great companion peace to Cabin Fever with all of the infections, the big differerce is that people are infected by reanimated bugs not tainted toxic water. Both films are made to make statements about the polluted world around us. This film was amazing with all of the visual effects and make up. People cutting off limbs and getting strange infections after bugs have planted their eggs under their skin. A film full of scum bags and backstabbers fighting for their lives. A absolute guilty pleasure

Why was Val Kilmer in this one? It makes no sense to me. I know he's growing old and his last castings were not the best, but still.

The film is a classic isolated monster/contagion movie, featuring most clichés you would expect. Brave and good looking chick, check; black and Asian representation, check; cowardly hysterical jerk, check; scary but completely implausible premise, check; mad scientist, check; brave guy that saves the girl, check. Actually, the formulaic concepts were so absurdly respected that when there was a scene where they would cut some guy's arm off to stop the contagion, they didn't actually show the cut. Same goes for when the girl had to strip to check for contagion. No problem showing flesh crawling bugs, though.

I could debate the reasons why the film made no sense to no end, but I will tell you just this: prehistoric bugs that come out of the thawing ice will NOT make me think harder about global warming. This theme is largely responsible for why the movie sucked so much.

Bottom line: couldn't even give it an average 7. The effects and the atmosphere (if you ignore the actors completely) are the only two good things happening here.