The Ice Road

 This review may contain spoilers!

 

The Ice Road follows Mike and Gurty McCann, down on their luck brothers with a history of long haul trucking who join a risky mission to deliver essential rescue supplies for a group of trapped miners. However, this mission is immediately set upon by the severe dangers of the infamous ice road and industrial sabotage. The real initial strength of this film is how tense the tone becomes the moment the trucks swing out onto the ice road, you really understand the scale and severity of attempting to navigate this perilous terrain. The tone is only enhanced by the very sudden and unpredictable character deaths that occur throughout the film; alongside an antagonist who isn't allowed to kill our protagonists through traditional means so as not to implicate his employers. While I wasn't a massive fan of the cinematography I do want to pay special mention to those first scenes out on the ice road; the stark and unforgiving landscape was captured so well that I thought we has shifted to more of a horror survival film. The score for the feature was pretty good, the harrowing theme for the ice road did so much work and the high-paced action tracks in the final act sounded thrilling.

 

Liam Neeson, who played Mike McCann, works well as the rugged and downtrodden protagonist of the film; Neeson's performance showing grief for the fate of his onscreen brother is one of his best performances in the film. Amber Midthunder, who played Tantoo, is a nice rebellious freedom fighter and activist; Midthunder's explosive persona is a real fighter who charges into any obstacle in her path. Benjamin Walker, who played Tom Varnay, rises above some of the fallacies in the script to present a pretty intriguing antagonist; shedding a cowardly facade Walker instead becomes quite the cunning and proficient saboteur.

 

However, the best performance came from Laurence Fishburne, who played Jim Goldenrod. This character wasn't in the film for a great deal of time by any means but he carried the first act of the film and really kept you engaged. Fishburne is a very soft spoken and calm figure, yet there is no question of his role's authority. There is a quiet firmness in how Fishburne delivers his lines that convinces you of his character's experience and knowledge. I really imagined how high the stakes of the film were not because of the plot or mine setting, but because of how urgently Jim Goldenrod reacts to developing events. The scene in which Fishburne exits the film is surprising and deeply alarming, one of the best moments in the feature by far.

 

Liam Neeson has done so many small budget action features in recent years, some of which have been sleeper hits and some of which have really flamed out. This is an unfortunate example of the latter in what has been a weak 2021 for Neeson's filmography. The Ice Road presents a concept that is deeply thrilling paired with a plot that is so dull it saps the life out of the more intense elements. The story begins with a group of miners becoming trapped in what becomes quite a shallow fight for survival. This storyline has a lot of stereotypical features: fears about oxygen, morse code and an internal struggle about whether some survivors should die so that others may live. Any time the film cuts to these characters is when the action seriously lapses. The main story is quite a steady journey with a very dull introductory first act, a second act that has some mild if not predictable plot twists and a final act that devolves into a hodge podge of repetitive action sequences. The film does not know how to engage you from the start, none of the characters are very interesting and the film doesn't pull out the stops early to really make this situation life or death. The final act of the feature just feels like they gave up somewhat, the main antagonist keeps repetitively popping up and engaging the characters in a new action sequence conflict that grows pretty tired quickly. I also thought the twist that the mining corporation was secretly trying to sabotage the rescue mission was quite the stretch; in fact the elngths they were willing to go really got away from the scope of the plot. I also thought this was a film that had main native American and disabled characters but really had no idea how to strongly represent them. In particular, I thought the callous indifference and abusive tendencies Mike presented towards his disabled brother Gurty was poor writing. The cinematography for the film had a lot of washed out or poorly framed shots, for an action thriller there were only a few key scenes that looked good. The editing set quite the slow pace, and the final act boasted some poor visual effects. 

Marcus Thomas, who played Gurty McCann, brings out a performance that shows little understanding or ability to present a disability; more than this I really didn't see much chemistry between Thomas and Neeson for a lot of the film. Holt McCallany, Martin Sensmeier and Chad Bruce, who played Lampard, Cody Mantooth and Shift Super Mankins respectively, gave quite a generic portrayal of trapped survivors in a disaster scenario; I was never really engaged by the high stakes struggle or conflict these characters went through. Matt McCoy and Bradley Sawatzky, who played GM George Sickle and VP Operations Jack Tager respectively, were quite underwhelming as behind the scenes antagonists; McCoy in particular tends to wards the melodramatic with his ultimatum proclamations throughout the final act.

A relatively empty plot and bland visual style points to another small scale action film bust for Liam Neeson. I would give The Ice Road a 4.5/10.