Ice (1998)

'Ice', although sometimes falling into silly action flick clichés, often surprised me and left me feeling that behind all the petty arguments and pointless bullet-fests was some real in-depth insight and intelligence often neglected by such films. Nonetheless, Ice serves the post-apocalyptic genre well, at least on a character-driven front. During the first act of the movie I found myself often wondering where all the people had gone to, what the government was doing, how all this really came to be and everything else large in scope. However as the film continued I realised Ice wasn't a film made to chronicle how mankind as an entire unit would survive such a natural disaster. Ice wants to show how it could affect people individually and how it would make us question our once so importantly and seriously taken tasks. Tasks that we carry out each day which are so often miles away from what we would need to carry out our most basic instinct which is to survive. It is scenes usually -sometimes too often- built around the burning of possessions in order to heat the group that tackles these themes and helps redeem the film on an intellectual level.From a technical standpoint, Ice was clearly under-produced- ridden with few good (although the majority were decent) performances from the cast, mediocre effects (although some did impress me), and an overall quality that screamed TV-Movie! Nevertheless, it's the script and the sometimes effective direction that saves Ice from being crushed under such problems. Ice was going to get an 8 from me, right up until the last 5 minutes. Sadly however, the ending let the film down: as was a problem at a few important moments, the story was too neglectful of the bigger picture, lacking scope and perspective and so the eventual climax to the film seemed underwhelming. Overall however, the film surprisingly entertained me throughout and was a lot better than I had anticipated.

This made for the small screen movie in the disaster genre may have been full of questionable scientific facts but accepting things as you were given them, then the acting and general tempo were okay. There are some movies where it is best not to ask too many questions just sit back and be entertained - this was one of them. The lack of big star cast did not seem to detract from the effect and though clearly shot on a small budget (the snowflakes were so fake!) it was reasonable nonetheless. A group of miscellaneous stereotypes, the white macho law enforcer, the black criminal with the chip on his shoulder who's not so bad once you get to know him, the mad professor who's not likable at all, the ex and the new lover with the new boyfriend. Plenty scope for character development, though much of it was predictable. As a huge freeze-up almost in no time seems to plunge Los Angeles into Arctic frigidity people seem to die frozen at the wheels of their cars or anywhere else as if completely unexpected. Our super-heros seem to be able to move around with relatively little extra clothing only the occasional leg wrapping or blanket as a token towards the predicament.The general "plot" is that a rescue ship is being sent to pick up our disagreeable scientist and our group seem to think this is the best option they have of escaping from the freeze-up so a purpose and direction is created, however thin and questionable it may seem. We seem to accept much science fiction which is far more questionable, take the Star Wars nonsense for example, yet here we have a plausible scenario. The sun could throw a wobbly and the effects on our planet could be life-threatening, I have no problem with the subject matter. I would not buy the DVD however but have seen a lot worse than ICE.

This is the worst film I have EVER seen, I should sue the people involved cause I cracked a rib laughing at it so hard. The gaping plot hole and 2d characters had me in stitches.... not to give anything away but the supposed evil scientist I couldn't take seriously because he is a clone of Dr Smith from 'lost in space' the supposed hero was a racist, pretentious cop who had rage but a surprisingly short memory.... I only watched this movie ten mins ago but I already can't remember anything outstanding about the other characters except the terrible acting! Please tell me I'm not the only one who sat through this movie just to laugh?

!!!! CONTAINS POSSIBLE SPOILERS !!!!!!Though I`m not much of a SF fan I really like the speculative fiction genre where an ecological disaster befalls humanity , a great example being John Christopher`s haunting 1956 novel THE DEATH OF GRASS which was turned into the 1970 film NO BLADE OF GRASS . ICE however isn`t up to much. The idea of solar flares causing a new ice age to envelope the northern hemisphere just doesn`t ring true . Neither does the fact that the captain of the Submarine works out that Doctor Kesseler`s group are not who they say they are but still allows them on his ship . Obviously the screenwriter doesn`t understand this type of survivalist genre where human nature descends into its most primitive and barbaric. Despite being an extremely unpleasant film THE CRAZIES manages to convey the horror of killing in order to survive life threatening circumstances as does NO BLADE OF GRASS . Here ICE ends on they all lived happily ever after as the survivors sail on the sub to a new life in a warmer climate where no doubt the natives will welcome them with open arms . Seeing as this TVM has the feel of a pilot I`m glad it didn`t get commisioned as a series