The Ice Storm
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Movie Reviews of The Ice Storm
Movie Review: Icy and beautiful
Summary: 5 Stars
I, personally, was not alive in 1973. But the immensely underrated Ang Lee gives a glimpse into the 1970s suburbia when society went through a dramatic shift. A good thing? Don't be so sure. Lee strips away the illusions to reveal the loneliness and coldness in the wake of the sexual revolution.
The Carvers and the Hoods live next door to each other in an affluent suburban neighborhood. On the surface, all is well. But self-absorbed Ben Hood (Kevin Kline) is having an affair with the icy Janie Carver (Sigourney Weaver). Similarly, his precocious daughter Wendy (Christina Ricci) is "experimenting" with Janey's sons, the spacey Mikey (Elijah Wood). To make things worse, Ben's wife Elena (Joan Allen) is experiencing a bit of a crisis herself -- she suspects her husband is cheating on her, and she longs for the freedom and lack of care she had before her marriage.
After Ben finds Wendy and Mikey in a compromising position with a Nixon mask, and Elena clues in about Janey, the parents venture to what turns out to be a wife-swapping key party (the women take men's car keys out of a bowl and go home with covers New Canaan, their relationships will reach boiling point... and a tragedy will unfold.
I don't know how common these attitudes were in the 1970s, but undoubtedly they were a lot more common than people would like to remember. Such things as key parties seem almost alien now. Tobey Maguire's Paul Hood serves a vital function in this movie -- he's very normal, not into any sort of transitional weirdness (except pot smoking) and so can serve as an alter ego for the viewers.
Lee did a good job not just with the exquisite direction and the camerawork. He also doesn't overemphasize the sudden shifts in what was allowed and what wasn't -- in one scene, the adults calmly discuss watching "Deep Throat." As they speak, there's the nervous awareness that it was unacceptable for upper-middle-class suburbanite not long ago. They have drugs, free love, self-seeking... and they don't have the slightest clue what to do with it.
Lee overdoes it a little with the ice metaphors. The dead leaves and trees were a lot better. But he does do an expert job showing why loveless sex and distant families will only leave a person lonely. The families here talk a lot, but they don't speak. Even a simple question like "How's school?" or "What are you doing?" is enough to weird out the kids -- that's how far they are from their parents.
He tempers all this heavy stuff with humor, such as Janey coldly telling Ben that she doesn't need "another husband" prattling golf stories at her, or the sickish Nixon-mask sex scene. There are a lot of "seventies" things sprinkled through the movie -- makeup, toe socks (toe socks?), TV shows, hair, and Weaver's zippered jumpsuit. But Lee doesn't really smack you in the face with it.
Kevin Kline is as good a serious actor as he is a comic one. When someone leers that he wishes people had brought their young daughters to the key party, Kline's expression is worth a thousand words. Weaver and Allen are both excellent as icy women with some warm feelings, and the kids are great: Ricci mixes sophistication and vulnerability as the Nixon-obsessed Wendy. And Wood gives off a sort of ethereal feel as the spacey but sweet Mikey, a boy obsessed by molecules.
This is far from a feel-good movie, but it gives some undefined views into human nature, what is good for us and what isn't. Ang Lee took what could have been a disaster, and made it as cold and beautiful as an ice storm.
Movie Review: Ang Lee's Look at the 70's..It's A Winter Wonderland
Summary: 5 Stars
This review refers to the 20th Cent Fox DVD Edition of "The Ice Storm"......
The beauty of Ang Lee's storytelling, is that we never get the same story twice. His films are always a fresh take or a first look at era's past and present. Fresh off his success with "Sense and Sensibility", Lee steps ahead into the turbulant and oft confusing times of the 1970's with "The Ice Storm".The story based on a novel by Rick Moody deals with two upper class suburban families dealing with the changing times and the changes in their lives, all amidst the arrival of a wintry ice storm.He has chosen the perfect cast and adds just the right amount of nuance and subtle comedy to this drama to make it a perfect film.
Ben and Elena Hood(Kevin Kline/Joan Allen) married in the idealistic 50's, now find themselves growing apart and their relationship getting cold as the sexual revolution of the 70's is all around them.Ben growing restless has an affair with the neighbor Janey Carver(Sigourney Weaver), Elena wants to feel the freeness she felt as a young girl. While trying to fit into this new world, they decide to participate in a "Key Party"(who you go home with at the end is anybody's guess).The teenagers(Tobey MaGuire, Elijah Wood, Christina Ricci) are also trying their hand at experiencing life so to speak.As the events of the evening unfold, a freakish storm arrives that seems to blow new life into all of them, their lives will be forever changed with the passing of the storm and the dawning of the new day.
Ang Lee captures the mood of the Nixon era expertly. Kevin Kline, Sigourney Weaver and Joan Allen are perfect in their performances of the dysfunctional adults trying to cope with the times. Tobey Maguire, Christina Ricci, and Elijah Wood have all surely stepped up their careers from their brillant portrayals as the precocious but curious kids."The Ice Storm" will take your breath away.
20th Century Fox has made a beautiful transfer to DVD.It is presented in vivid colors and a sharp picture in the original theatrical widescreen(anamorphic 1.85:1). Depending on your set up it may be enjoyed in either 5.0 surround or Dolby stereo(English or French). There is a short featurette on the making of the film, the theatrical trailer and subtitles in English and Spanish.
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It's amazing that Oscar missed this little gem, it was just one of those that got lost in the wake of "Titianic" that year. If you have not seen this yet and like a good emotional ride, this film will take you on that ride.And then you'll want to buy another ticket and go again!.......Thanks and enjoy...Laurie
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Movie Review: It's time to warm up to this chilly film...
Summary: 5 Stars
A lot of people I know compare this film to `American Beauty', and I totally understand why. Both films explore suburban family life in a way that is honest and flawed and completely exploitive without ever appearing overdone or, well, exploitive. I completely adore both films, but while `American Beauty' excels in really capturing the insecurities and eventual demise of the middle-aged man, `The Ice Storm' takes a different route (albeit similar circumstances) in that it exposes the moral breakdown of the average family.
Both films involve a family unit, complete with children, and both films expose a marriage on the rocks (complete with an affair) as well as childish rebellion and self discovery on both sides of the spectrum, but to be `The Ice Storm' works a little more in that it actually feels invested in every character.
Outside of Spacey, `American Beauty' loses some footing.
Ben and Elena Hood are seemingly happy parents with a daughter at home and a son off in school, but when their son Paul comes home for a visit they begin to visibly unravel. Both Paul and his sister Wendy are beginning to explore their own individuality, which as per usual involves some sort of distorted intimacy, and this coincides with their parents beginning to acknowledge their own inadequacies. Ben has been fooling around with Janey Carver, the mother of Mikey, Wendy's current flame. Elena is most likely privy to the affair, even if she refuses to admit it to herself, but what is even more pertinent is that the children here all know and understand far more than the parents want to believe.
What is so beautiful (tragically so) about `The Ice Storm' is that it exposes the messes we parents make while we falsely believe that our children are too young to understand all that they are witnessing.
Sigourney Weaver's character Janey is the perfect example of this very idea.
Across the board the film is filled with stellar performances that really ignite on contact. Kevin Kline has rarely been better (and when you consider that he also starred in the uproarious `In & Out' this same year you really have to hand it to him) and Joan Allen is all sorts of stellar as Elena, giving her a true sense of uninformed (or should I say unacknowledged) dread. Tobey Maguire, Adam Hann-Byrd, Christina Ricci (OMG amazing here), Elijah Wood and Katie Holmes all astound in their roles (some great child acting here); but it is one name that resounds loudest and that is Sigourney Weaver. Her understanding of the unaccepted flaws of Janey is just marvelous. That final scene, after the party, alone in the house and then suddenly aware of the truth; it's just a heart-stopper.
In the end I must say that `The Ice Storm' is one of the most sublimely done films on family tension I've ever seen, exposing the heart of human frailty without coming across as preachy, contrived or clichéd. It is honest, dark and surprisingly inspired, and the final moments (where eyes are opened for the very first time) add a layer of hope that is much needed in the world we live in today.
Bravo.
Movie Review: growing up IS hard to do...
Summary: 5 Stars
You can tell just from the first shot in The Ice Storm that it will completely envelop you. The crackling sound as the train comes to a stop on a cold Connecticut night, the beautifully poetic score by Michael Danna, the twinkling trees and landscape revealing a calm after the storm. You have a feeling that the beauty is masking a lot of desperation and vulnerability. It is a really bold piece of New American Cinema. Tackling the same old issues, but in a way that is startlingly fresh and revealing.Kevin Cline is great as a fumbling, bored NY businessman who finds a tragic way to rock the family suburban lifestyle. And Joan Allen is amazingly sparse in her portrayal of an early 1970's housewife who finally confronts her husband's infedelity. Tobey Mcguire (who also narrates the film) and Cristina Ricci, as their children, give equally delicate and involved performances. Sigourney Weaver is given her best role here, as the swinging wife of Jamey Sheridan, who is supposedly the genious that helps develop silicon from sand. Rounding out the cast is Elijah Wood as their troubled son, and Adam Hann-Byrd as his younger and more eloquent brother.
Overall, It's an beautifully interwoven story of the miscommunications between two neighboring families. And it really confronts the overtone of the early 1970's era, by setting up parallels between the harsh political climate (a la Watergate) with what is hapenning between the two families. But I think the most meaningful and touching aspect is how we see love (or at least a sexual awakening mistaken as love) blooming between 2 teenagers in a way that is heartbreakingly real. I really appreciated how they made the experiences between these young characters appear genuine, loving, and meaningful. It isnt often that a film captures what love feels like for someone so new at it. I think one of the delicate ironies of the film is that, despite their youth and inexperience, these people's children probably have a better understanding about what love is really about than they do.
I think the film is also about a loss of innocence, but not necessarily a loss of sexual innocence. It shows how sometimes children are thrust into adulthood because of traumatic events in their lives, and they often times loose a part of themselves in the process. The ending is truly devastating, but so poetically rendered and realistically fleshed-out. It really makes you feel an incomprehensible sadness that is never really resolved before the film ends, which is infinately refreshing. As we all know, there isn't always a fitting way to console the heartbroken. So maybe its best to just leave it at that.
It probes deep into the intricate concepts of love, family, betrayal, and loss. It is as delicate a film as they come. Surely the best film Ang Lee has ever done. And i think greatly overlooked as possibly one of the best films in the past decade.
Movie Review: Brilliant master piece and yes superior to American Beauty
Summary: 5 Stars
First of all, I must agree with carolyn5000 for her comment on The Ice storm's influence on American Beauty. In my opinion Alan Ball simply did a bad rip off of The Ice Storm for the American Beauty script. "Storm"'s scrip is masterfully written by James Scamus whose delicate and yet skillfully brutal handling of the subject matter was simply revitting. The characters are carefully laced together in a way that makes them seem to belong to the same world of New Caan, CT and yet give each of them his or her own very private world. So full of life and vigor and yet so faithful to the cold rigid subject matter. Schaemus never loses a moment and there was never a second to allow me to leave my seat in the theater to go get popcorn or do anything. This is what good scripts are made of. The Cannes film festival used to give screenwriting awards on a discretionary basis and The Ice Storm was the first screenplay to receive that award in over 15 years. Ball's Script? Well, I teared up at the end of my reading Scahmus' screenplay. This is rather strange considering how screenplays are written. On the otherhand, I wanted my money back at the end of American beauty and had no interest in reading the script. A rip off is a rip-off no matter how you dress it up.Everyone of the actors is brilliant. Watching Joan Allen's gut-wrenching chill of a performance is monumental compared to that slush-lug-lug overstated overacted performance so failingly delivered by Anette Bening in American Beauty. Kevin Kline easily gave one of his and that year's finest performances. He takes his own talents over the edge playing Benjamin Hood. The film's last moment between these two will live forever in my mind. Segorney Weaver gives a performance that is reborn with every line. I can only imagine how tough a time this film editors had with editting her performance for the screen. The rest: Christina Ricci, Elija Wood, Jimmy Sheridan, Tobey Maguire, Adam Hanabyrd and Alison Janney are all at their absolute best. I would be more detailed about them if I had the space because everyone of them is bringing many diminsions to the story through their actting. Lee is a masterful long underrated director who should have been getting nominated for oscars for years. I am glad that this director's immense versatility and screen vision are finally receiving due recognition. I can't say this enough, but this film is easily one of the greatest family dramas ever made. Too bad it was released in the year of the Titanic or else it would have had so much more of an impact. My true concilation lies in the fact that it had it's impact on myself and a host of other fortunate souls and in today's movie world of the generic bland movie spectacle being looked upon as art by the masses, that's the best once can hope for.