⭐️ 1/2 (out of 5)
Emma Thompson has had an illustrious career and has proven her versatility as an actress by jumping from genre to genre with relative ease. Dead of Winter draws her back into the frigid waters of an action thriller set in the northern lakes of Minnesota. An unlikely action hero who manages to do it all in coveralls from her old, green pickup.
Not long after her husband passed away, Barb (Thompson) travelled to the lake they loved and fished as a couple to scatter his ashes. Yet, while she is on the ice, the resourceful woman of the North hears a gunshot and witnesses a young woman being kidnapped. When she investigates a local remote cabin, Barb comes upon a couple who have their victim held hostage in the basement. Upon this discovery, the recent widow must do all she can to save the woman and try to bring the couple to justice.
Lake Hilda becomes an unlikely metaphor for this storyline, as it causes slippage, harbours unpredictability beneath its ice, and contains the potential for a multitude of holes that could lead to destruction. Director Brian Kirk (21 Bridges) delivers a film that struggles to get off the ice, with its slippage in the storyline, an unforgiving view of the people in this area of the country, and enough plot holes to make this screenplay teeter on the brink of sinking into the abyss. As this film neglects to remember where the location is and how viscous the environment can be, and how a woman who has lived there for all of her adult life would make the mistakes she continues to make, it is mind-boggling.
How Emma Thompson and Judy Greer got attached to this project is almost as confusing. Neither actress fit into this narrative comfortably and fails to be convincing as the protagonist or antagonist from the beginning to the ridiculous conclusion. The only redeeming element of this frost-bitten storyline is the endearing love story woven in between Barb and her husband. Yet, each time these flashback moments are injected into the movie, they feel out of place and struggle to create the emotional spark needed to warm the viewer to this kidnapping caper.
Dead of Winter lives up to its prophetic name, set in the frozen wasteland of Northern Minnesota (filmed in Finland). Winter is brutally showcased while the story is dead in the water under sheets of ice, where it should remain.
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REEL DIALOGUE: Kidnapping
You shall love your neighbour as yourself. - Matthew 22:39
Despite being the most incompetent kidnappers in recent film history, this topic still needs some attention. Kidnapping is considered one of the most egregious sins against society. It has been an unfortunate part of the human experience throughout history. The realities of Dead of Winter show the impact of this criminal act on a family and the anguish it causes all involved.
In the Old Testament, it was a crime that would have been punishable by death, ranked in association with murder. In the words of Jesus, this topic is addressed broadly by his second commandment in Matthew 22. A portion of scripture that should cause all to evaluate their motives and consider how their decisions affect others.
