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Rating:  -
"The Ice Storm" DVD:
It's the 1970's and it's the upper-middle-class suburbs and it's Thanksgiving. Our story here shows us a slice of life of two different families: the Hood family (Kevin Kline, Joan Allen, Tobey Maguire, Christina Ricci) and the Carver family (Jamey Sheridan, Sigourney Weaver, Elijah Wood, Adam Hann-Byrd). They are neighbors, they are friends, the children are friends, the children might even be dating. And, they all are so cool that they have a good coating of ice on them. They struggle to break free and to move and to feel something, but they pick the worst possible ways to do this: alcohol, drugs, affairs, and "key parties" (random partner-swapping at parties for the alleged grown-ups). Meanwhile, the kids are left with near-total freedom and absolutely no meaningful standards for their behavior. Everyone pushes the limits on everything, in an effort to prove they are alive and not totally numb.
I had to think about this review quite a bit before writing it. I wanted to give it five stars for how well it portrayed this story, these characters, and this social-temporal niche. I wanted to give it one star, because it was very painful to watch, and I wanted to smack everyone in the film until they woke up and started behaving themselves.
I also want to add that I take issue with the editorial review, that this film "sums up America in the early 1970s by focusing on the arrival of the sexual revolution in the 'burbs." I was a teenager in the 1970's, but not in New England, and I grew up in a "blue-collar" neighborhood; life bore very little resemblance to the lifestyles of the characters in this film. There was some teenage drug use, but the parents would have made them suffer for it, if they were caught. There was teenage sexual acting-out, but the parents would have made them suffer for it, if they were caught.
Anyway, now that I'm back down off my soapbox, I will say that, putting the pain and frustration aside, I give this movie four stars for how well it portrayed its story. And, I'll never watch it again.
Rating:  -
It's ironic that the warmest and most humane of movie directors, Ang Lee ("Sense and Sensibility," "Brokeback Mountain") is the director of the icy-cold (weather, of course and tone) and surgically precise "The Ice Storm."
Lee's innate humanity makes itself known in his handling of the characters here: he never judges, he never points a finger...he shows, he doesn't tell. It is a slippery slope though as the Rick Moody source material veers towards condemnation of this particularly randy and supposedly "swinging" group of mid 1970's couples and their children.
The wasp adults: a cold, cold, man-eating Sigourney Weaver as Janey Carver, a very sad but trying to be hip and lacking the wherewithal to pull it off, Joan Allen as Elena Hood and a "not-there" Jamey Sheridan and pseudo-hip but really just horny Kevin Kline as their respective husbands Jim Carver and Ben Hood...form the odd quartet of 30 somethings, probably used-to-be 60's hippies either in deed but most likely just in thought. Both couples have two children: also in various stages of rebellion and angst.
The signature scene in "The Ice Storm" is the Key Party: a ritual party in which the husbands put their keys in a bowl and at the party's close, the women pick a set of keys thereby choosing the man with whom they will have sex that night.
Lee's camera swoops and swirls around all the guests as we catch snippets of conversations: affairs are concluded, gossip is exchanged, discrete and not so discrete flirting happens, much liquor is consumed and gallons of white lipstick is applied...Lee let's us in on all of it. And he does it without rancor, without an agenda and always with his patented warmth and love.
Arguably the best film of 1997 ("The Sweet Hereafter" is it's equal that year also), "The Ice Storm" is ultimately a tragedy of Classical Greek proportions: the world of this film is icy cold as are many of its inhabitants but Ang Lee's blazing humanity warms and soothes revealing an open wound of despair, indecision and loneliness.
Rating: -
The Ice Storm is a startling look at 1973 America and how lost so many people (parents, children, neighbors, etc.) became during this transitional time. The free-love of the 60s spill over into the 30 and 40-somethings of a sleepy Connecticut community and runs smack into the dysfunctional family of Ben and Elena Hood (Kevin Kline and Joan Allen).
Ben is having an affair with his neighbors wife, Janey Carver (Sigourney Weaver, ALIENS), and the boredom they both feel during their "love making" is palpable. They want something different to happen, but what that "something" is remains unobtainable. And the two's lackadaisical attitudes toward sex, family, and the times seep into their everyday lives; even into their spouses' and children.
Ben's wife Elena gets caught shoplifting from the local pharmacy. Janey's husband Jim goes away on long business trips and returns with funks of depression because of what he witnesses going on in his family.
The children of Ben and Janey are also settling into this bizarre behavior. Some of them explore sexuality in often strange ways, or run out into storms and play on ice-covered roads. Others blow things up with M80 firecrackers, or smoke pot and drink to numb themselves out.
But all of these people's lives will change in an unalterable way during one evening; an ice storm has hit and the cold outside bashes against the cold each character feels inside. Some will live, some will die, and others will never be the same.
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The attention to detail on the 70s in director Ang Lee's movie is astounding. The sweater-vest outfits, paneled station wagons, and boxy homes were excellently filmed.
You can also feel the dark undercurrent running through the characters' lives: the grayish landscape cinematography against the quiet homes that harbor secrets.
The cast was absolutely perfect, too. Kevin Kline (one of my favorite actors), Sigourney Weaver, Joan Allen, Elijah Wood, Tobey Maguire, Katie Holmes, Christina Ricci, and Jamey Sheridan all pull in stunning performances.
Having gushed over how well done the movie was, I do have to comment on its pacing. If you thought SIDEWAYS was snail-like, this movie may make you feel as though grass could grow faster.
Director Ang Lee has had some serious success in Hollywood as of late (BROKEBACK MOUNTAIN, 2005), but this earlier work is an excellent way to see how he's grown in the intervening years.
Rating:  -
Its been too long now that I ve been putting off seeing this film. But with Ang's recent, brilliant, Brokeback Mountain, I upped this and several of his other pictures to the top of my must see list. For whatever reason my expectations had made this movie more about a storm (literally)and more like a typical MI:2 action film. Instead, its far more like Brokeback, a simple movie about characters and people dealing with their problems.
Thats I believe where the similarities end though. None of the performances stuck out at me, with the exception of Joan Allen at times. There is a really nice moment with her and Kline in their kitchen after dinner. The story just never really involved me all that much either. I liked all of Maguires situation and really felt his pain, but in the end never got anything out of what transpired. Perhaps all the built up sexual frustration and exploration throughout the film just doesnt resonate with me?
In the end, a good picture with decent performances, subtle symbolism and an otherwise well made, but unsatisfying meshing of tales.
Rating: -
In a movie jam-packed full of actors who have gone on to acclaim, director Ang Lee presents a dark winter in the suburbs during an ice storm. The movie perfectly captures the look and feel of the 1970s-even the pacing seems completely appropriate. The characters are in the middle of a sexual revolution-married men and women are having clandestine and unfulfilling liaisons, teenagers are experimenting, and the hipsters in the neighborhood are holding a wife-swapping "key party." All the action comes to a head during a tragic and dangerous ice storm. This is a dark drama and a brilliant commentary on the human condition.
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