Movie review: Frozen River

Popcorn & Tang for breakfast, lunch & dinner.

by John P. Meyer

When we first meet working mom Ray Eddy (the weatherbeaten and wonderful Melissa Leo) - protagonist of Courtney Hunt's writing/directing feature debut, Frozen River - she's attempting to talk the manufactured housing sales agent into offloading the brand new double-wide from the semi rig that's brought it out to her snow-spotted property. Problem is, Ray doesn't have the downpayment she owes on delivery, because her no-good husband has absconded with the ferreted-away funds.

Leaving little Ricky (James Reilly) to whine and moan as he watches his promised new house being driven away. It's like snatching candy from his expectant hand.

Between putting in her hours on the retail floor at the dollar store, Ray picks up the trail of her errant spouse at a bingo parlor located on the nearby Mohawk Indian reservation. Her husband's no longer there, having taken off on the 'Hound for parts unknown and leaving his car behind.

Imagine Ray's surprise and consternation when she tracks her rust-spotted sedan to the mobile home of a young Native American woman. Lila (Misty Upham), a worker at the bingo parlor, claims she thought the car was abandoned when she found it in the parking lot after hours. Ray's not buying it, and she uses a gun from the glove compartment to solidify her right of ownership.

But while Ray's struggling to rig a tow for the car, Lila gets the upper hand and forces Ray - at gunpoint - into a smuggling operation involving a drive across the frozen St. Lawrence River into Canada. Just like ice road truckers (though without the fancy under-ice camera shots), Ray navigates her four-door towards the prescribed destination.

Noting the large quantity of greenbacks that changes hands in the course of this seemingly simple operation (the human cargo is delivered back across the river to the owner of a kitschy north woods-flavored motel), Ray determines to deal herself in on this action. As she puts it, "All I know is that Wal Mart is closed and I got nothin' for under the tree."

Bottom line: there's no way she'll be able to take delivery on the new double-wide by Christmas without the sort of cash influx that her participation in this criminal enterprise can provide.

Ricky's not the only kid at home craving a visit from Santa. Disaffected teen T.J. (Charlie McDermott, last seen as the primary redeeming feature of the magical realist muddle Disappearances) is also struggling through the family's hard times, and has found his own way of alleviating some of the fiscal pain. His approach is likewise extra-legal, but all he needs to work it is a phonebook.

In the course of carrying out their desperate (and lucrative) enterprise, Ray and Lila develop a reluctant mutual respect. Further, they discover a similarity in circumstances that bonds them in ways neither expected. Before this wintry drama is completed, we'll have realized how connected their destinies truly are.

An outstanding supporting performance is turned in by a playing-it-uncharacteristically-straight Michael O'Keefe as a state trooper who makes repeated suspicious appearances on the periphery of the human trafficking activities. Also threatening are the ruthless characters on the Canadian side of the operation, who are not above changing the rules of the game to enrich their coffers at the expense - and peril - of the amateur transporters with whom they deal.

But the primary danger faced by our culturally-divided female enterprisers is the uncertainty of the elements in command of their playing field. Will the ice road hold? Will a blizzard strand them in the middle of the frozen river?

The power of Frozen River lies in its all-too-believable demonstration of the ease with which one's ethics can fly out the window when survival of the family is at stake. It's a lesson that society's disenfranchised understand all too well.