Theatrical Review of Frozen River

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In Screenwriting 101, the first thing you learn (after proper formatting) is that your protagonist must have a clearly defined goal. They must want something, and the audience must know exactly what they want and why they want it.

First time writer/director Courtney Hunt wastes no time in letting us know exactly what Ray Eddy (Melissa Leo) wants: she wants to buy a double-wide trailer (with three bedrooms and a Jacuzzi tub) so that her two sons can have a better place to live. However, the final payment is hard to come by not only because Ray´s job at the local discount store pays peanuts, but also because her husband has left her once again, most likely to gamble away their savings on bingo and scratch cards.

The film generates a tremendous amount of mileage from its setting, a patch of upstate New York that is separated from Quebec by a stretch of Mohawk tribal territory that spans both countries. Ray searches for her husband on the reservation where he usually runs and hides (either there or Atlantic City), but instead finds a young woman driving her husband´s car. She follows the woman back to her trailer where Ray eventually pulls a gun to demand her keys back. But the woman, who we soon learn is named Lila Littlewolf (Misty Upham), promises Ray a good price for the car if they visit a friend of Lila´s.

Soon Ray finds herself immersed in a smuggling operation, transporting illegal immigrants from Canada into the U.S. on an unprotected stretch of border on Mohawk land. The trip is perilous not only because of the threat of law enforcement hovering just outside of the territory, but also because the trek requires a grueling trip across a stretch of ice that threatens to collapse if they take the slightest misstep. Ray may not have known what she was getting herself into, but the money´s good so she decides to come back for more, and more, and then more.

Melissa Leo first made her mark as Det. Kay Howard on "Homicide: Life on the Streets" and has excelled in several supporting roles since then. She shined in Tommy Lee Jones´ modern Western "The Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada" (2005) and was just about the only redeeming feature of Alejandro Iñárritu´s tedious "21 Grams" (2004).

"Frozen River" is her first real crack at a starring role, and she doesn´t disappoint. Although Ray´s "goal" is annoyingly simplistic (and hammered home every two minutes), her character is quite complex. For a hard-working mom who is willing to sacrifice everything for her kids, she is hardly the most sympathetic character in the world. She uses threats of violence to get whatever she wants (she once shot her husband in the foot, which might explain his occasional absences) and has a vicious racist streak that almost leads to tragedy on one of the smuggling runs. Unfortunately, Hunt takes the easy way out at the end, softening Ray´s less appealing qualities and showing us that she has "learned something" (the next thing you learn in Screenwriting 101), but that´s a minor distraction from a strong character and a strong performance.

Misty Upham, in her first major film role, has a lot of work to do to match Leo´s performance but holds her own with aplomb. Like Ray, she´s a character with plenty of warts. Lila is a lazy young woman who only really exerts herself when coming up with excuses for why she can´t do anything. She didn´t even fight hard to keep her baby daughter, now living with her mother-in-law. Upham plays unease without the typical collection of quirks or histrionics. Lila doesn´t have a plan or even a place where she really feels she belongs.

The third major character is the film´s setting which Hunt uses to great effect. In "Frozen River" the snow works both as a background and as a major player in certain scenes. The repeated drives across the ice become increasingly harrowing, and you can feel how hard it is to breathe in the frigid air. Even more poignant is the interplay between Mohawk territory and the nearby towns. Tribal land is its own country, one that crosses the U.S./Canada border but belongs fully to neither nation.

With strong characters and a vivid setting, it´s unfortunate that the story isn´t quite up to par. One reason Hunt has to make Ray´s goals so crystal clear is that her actions are so inexcusable and occasionally downright stupid. The biggest groaner is the film´s "one last big score" moment when even the dream of that double-wide (with three bedrooms and the Jacuzzi tub) is just barely enough to keep us on Ray´s side. Ray´s not only looking to score easy money, but she´s trafficking people who aren´t exactly heading for the American dream, and it´s tough to believe that anyone would do that just to get a double-wide for the kids unless she was really an awful person. Which she may well be. And which may actually be one of the film´s strong points. I need more time to think about that one.

For a Sundance Grand Jury Prize winner, however, "Frozen River" is surprisingly fresh and avoids most of the indie clichés. Even the cross-cultural relationship (an indie trademark if ever there was one) between Ray and Lila isn´t played for cute effect, and any bonding between the two women is hard-earned rather than pre-determined. When I first left the theater, I was bothered by the film´s faults, but have since thought more about its considerable assets. Even with the heavy-handed approach to character motivation and a mildly disappointing ending, the strong performances by Leo and Upham as well as the deft use of setting make "Frozen River" one of the more memorable American independent films of 2008.


7/10 on the DVDTown scale.

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