Frozen - dir. by Adam Green (2010)

Adam Green is a talented guy. Most known for his 2006 send-up of 80's horror films, Hatchet, over the past few years, he's demonstrated talents for very different types of scary movies. His 2010 thriller, Frozen, is as different from Hatchet as a film can be, and features no monsters, slashers, or pyscho-killers. The villain is this one is Mother Nature herself, and it's one of the better man vs. nature films out there.

Whereas Hatchet and its sequel, released last fall, combine dark humor with over-the-top gore, following the basic A-to-B of the slasher genre, Frozen packs its punches with intense, real-life situations, and is, in some places, rather difficult to watch.

On a Sunday night, three college kids convince a ski lift operator to let them go for one more trip down the hill, before the resort shuts down for the week, not to re-open until the following Friday. The lift operator gives in to their request, then leaves his post to use the bathroom, asking a co-worker to cover for him. The co-worker thinks everyone's off the lift, and shuts the operation down. Leaving the three students stuck in their chair, at least fifty feet above the ground, with no one in sight, the resort lights turned off, and a hail storm on the way.

Some criticism has been thrown at the film, some folks bothered by the actions of the kids on the ski lift, questioning the rationality of their decisions; decisions which, in some cases, inch them unnecessarily closer to death. But no one claimed at the beginning of this film that any of these kids are particularly smart, and, without giving away the action of the film, I would suggest that plenty of people I know--possibly even myself, in a situation that awful and nerve-wracking--who would likely attempt some of the same idiotic maneuvers these guys attempt to pull off.

Emma Bell (recently seen in AMC TV's The Walking Dead) nails the role of the girly-girl relying on her boyfriend (Kevin Zegers, who you may have seen in the remake of Dawn of the Dead, Wrong Turn, or TV's Gossip Girl) to protect her, even when it should be perfectly obvious there's nothing he can do for either her or himself. The most rational character, as played by Shawn Ashmore (The Ruins, X-Men: Last Stand), even goes to some lengths to save this girl and protect her from the reality that it's very unlikely any of them will make it out of the ski chair alive.

There are some nature elements aside from the cold and the hail storm that these kids face, but I'm not going to go into detail here, so as to avoid ruining some of the film's surprises. It's a grim story, well-directed, and very intense, and another win for Adam Green, in addition to the two Hatchet movies and the equally different psychological thriller, Spiral (2007). All of these are worth checking out, with Frozen being the best of them.