{"id":277,"date":"2010-09-23T15:53:06","date_gmt":"2010-09-23T15:53:06","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/filmgaze.com\/blog\/?p=277"},"modified":"2010-09-23T15:53:06","modified_gmt":"2010-09-23T15:53:06","slug":"frozen-4","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/filmgaze.com\/blog\/action\/frozen-4\/","title":{"rendered":"Frozen – 4*"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>For a thriller to be effective these days it has to have a situation that we could all potentially find ourselves in. Ok, so not everyone skis, but everyone can imagine being left behind in a public environment that changes mood from active and populated during the day, to terrifyingly desolate when the lights go off. Frozen<\/em><\/a> by Hatchet<\/a><\/em> director Adam Green<\/a> captures and plays on those primal fears of isolation, where a \u2018fight or flight\u2019 survival reaction kicks in. It\u2019s this drive to stay alive that propels this gripping tale forward and makes for an agonising and nail-biting watch.<\/p>\n

Only one thing that doesn\u2019t seem that tangible and niggles throughout: Are we to believe that there is not a single mobile phone between our three teens, Parker (Emma Bell<\/a>), Joe (Shawn Ashmore<\/a>) and Dan (Kevin Zegers<\/a>), who find themselves stranded on a ski lift several feet up in freezing conditions, after dopey ski resort staff mistakenly clock off for the night \u2013 and the week. Don\u2019t know about you, but there aren\u2019t many youngsters, let along teens that don\u2019t have a mobile as an extension of their person nowadays. Even some reference to a lack of a signal would at least have crossed that particular rescue possibility off the list, surely? That said Frozen<\/em> does get the old grey matter working and thinking up all possible rescue routes, including the inevitable wire scaling. It\u2019s not that this is clich\u00e9d as such, but like the characters, you can\u2019t help thinking through the situation in real time. The slow realisation of the seriousness of the situation doesn\u2019t hit home, until the lights go out. We know they are in dire straits, the question is, how will they get out of it \u2013 and prove us right or wrong? That\u2019s the power of this fairly linear plot.<\/p>\n

Green ticks the boxes in terms of cast \u2013 three attractive and fit youngsters in the prime of their lives. But that alone does not guarantee success. Bell, Ashmore and Zegers give believable, panic-stricken performances, from unity one minute, to bickering the next. Even though Green sets them up for their next challenge \u2013 or fall (to the wolves) \u2013 this doesn\u2019t distract from the tension that expertly builds up and literally reaches breaking point. The special effects and injuries are superb, accompanied by some tummy churning crunching, smashing and squelching sound effects that don\u2019t leave anything to the imagination. As the acting is on the mark, we feel their pain and the freezing elements.<\/p>\n

Perhaps Green could have been more ambitious, though, without conforming to the standard simpering, girlie girlfriend (naturally, dressed in baby pink). We are also exposed to the clich\u00e9d rallying line of \u2018he died so we could live\u2019 that causes eyes to be raised to the ceiling. Apart from these small gripes (and the lack of a mobile in the vicinity), in terms of a terrific example of escalating terror, Green absolutely masters it. Obviously, Frozen<\/em> is bound to make you think twice, before merrily taking to the ski slopes \u2013 which is exactly what it should do, but it sustains the interest right up to the last minute and quite literally leaves you hanging. This is a must-see for fans of this genre.<\/p>\n

4\/5 stars<\/strong><\/p>\n

By L G-K<\/p>\n

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For a thriller to be effective these days it has to have a situation that we could all potentially find ourselves in. Ok, so not everyone skis, but everyone can imagine being left behind in a public environment that changes mood from active and populated during the day, to terrifyingly desolate when the lights go … <\/p>\n

Continue reading “Frozen – 4*”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,187,6],"tags":[189,190,188,192,191],"class_list":["post-277","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-action","category-horror","category-thriller","tag-adam-green","tag-emma-bell","tag-frozen","tag-kevin-zegers","tag-shawn-ashmore"],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/filmgaze.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/277","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/filmgaze.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/filmgaze.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/filmgaze.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/filmgaze.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=277"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/filmgaze.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/277\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":281,"href":"https:\/\/filmgaze.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/277\/revisions\/281"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/filmgaze.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=277"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/filmgaze.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=277"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/filmgaze.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=277"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}