Director/screenwriter David Gordon Green adapts Stewart O'Nan's popular novel to the screen in this feature, which tells the parallel tales of a teenager named Arthur (Michael Angarano) and his onetime babysitter Annie (Kate Beckinsale) -- whose turbulent relationship with her estranged husband, Glenn (Sam Rockwell), leads the small-town waitress down a troubled path. Arthur is a high-school student from a dysfunctional family, and does everything in his power to avoid hanging around the house
while mom and dad quarrel. When he's not practicing his trombone and performing with the high-school marching band, Arthur can usually be found bussing tables at the local Chinese restaurant and flirting with older waitress Annie. Annie used to be Arthur's babysitter, and is currently struggling to separate from her former high-school sweetheart, Glenn. But being a single mother isn't easy, especially since the troubled Glenn wants nothing more than to clean up his act and reunite his family. Back at school, Arthur and pretty classmate Lila (Olivia Thirlby) have been bonding over their mutual love for all things geeky. Though the casual friendship shows promise of evolving into something more when Lila expresses her true feelings for Arthur, he can't help but becoming distracted by his chaotic family life: his father is moving out of the family home, and his mother is doing everything in her power to maintain some semblance of normalcy. Realizing that happiness is fleeting as his family becomes shattered and Annie experiences a series of distressing encounters with Glenn, Arthur gradually begins to fall for Lisa despite his growing cynicism concerning long-term relationships. Later, on a cold winter morning, Glenn and Annie's past catches up with them in a blinding flash, and the lives of everyone they know are suddenly and irrevocably changed. ~ Jason Buchanan, Rovi
So when the film's moment of horror arrives, it's not with suspense but instead the sort of dully anticipatory inevitability that drains as much energy from the story as from the audience.
It's a movie that keeps its distance from the characters, so much that we can shudder at what we fear is to come but aren't really allowed to mourn the innocent trapped in this downward spiral.
It's well-made. Searingly acted. Potent. And by the time it was over, its climax realized at the water's edge of insanity and grief, I felt beaten about the head with sticks.
The writing and the performances are such that as things go from bad (sad motel-room affairs) to worse (a 4-year-old gone missing), the film's characters get inside your skin, your soul. It's enough to make you want to cry.
There's still a lot of excellent work in Snow Angels. The first hour is utterly engrossing. But there's also a lot of wasted potential, which is too bad.
Impressive for the mood it creates, the film may not totally satisfy, but the characters are richly depicted and reflect the snowy winter chill that surrounds them
Green is a director who takes his time with characters, allowing their different sides to self-illustrate in naturalistic settings as he simultaneously paints their worlds.
Rockwell, who brought a sense of desperate unease to his roles in 'The Assassination of Jesse James' and 'Confessions of a Dangerous Mind,' does the same here, with results that are at once frightening and pathetically sad.
"It's easy for...for us to block out the things that upset us. That's what I do. That's what most people do. But it's important that you feel through this." Hmmm. Ah...well. Where to begin with this one?I had high hopes for Snow Angels. I'm a fan of Sam Rockwell, Olivia Thirlby, and Kate Beckinsale, and was looking
forward to seeing them all in an indie drama that seemed promising from all the reviews I've read. Needless to say, my expectations were not met.Snow Angels had an odd way of becoming less interesting and more muddled as it went along. It's like the writer became less certain of what he wanted to do and the story's message as the movie progressed. The beginning was promising, but by the the time the film meandered to its close, I was thoroughly confused about what the point was of all the interconnected characters and their actions.I quite enjoy "different" movies, as a rule, but Snow Angels did little for me. None of the performances were noteworthy enough to overcome a story that seemed to lack a central theme after it reaches an emotional highpoint near the middle of the movie. This one left me scratching my head, and not in a good way.
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