The Frozen Ground Reviews

A vague and forgettable crime thriller that would have benefited from more character development or at least a grounding of the narrative in one central protagonist.

Full Review | Original Score: 1/4

A standard police procedural with few surprises.

Full Review | Original Score: 2/5

The Frozen Ground hits the familiar notes.

Full Review

Nicolas Cage sleepwalks through another macho, tediously formulaic b-movie.

Full Review | Original Score: 1/5

An odd mix of formulaic thriller and true-life story, resulting in something sporadically successful but often uninspired.

Full Review | Original Score: 3/5

Based on a true story, it's very thorough in its depiction of Alaska's strip bars, but apparently not nearly as interested in character or psychology.

Full Review | Original Score: 2/5

Unfortunately, with a confusing script pocked with plot holes, The Frozen Ground misses an opportunity to create a lasting testament to their memories.

Full Review | Original Score: 5.8/10

Taste and good intentions are only going to get one so far with a script this tone deaf and direction this ugly and monotonous.

Full Review | Original Score: 1/4

The scenes where Cage grills Cusack are the best thing about this very average thriller.

Full Review | Original Score: C-

The movie's late-night cable feel and skeevy salaciousness grinds everything to a snowy slush.

Full Review | Original Score: 1/5

Are we mourning the loss of these women or delighting in their downfall, relishing their abuse? Cheap thrills destroy whatever pure intentions launched Ground, chaining the effort to the most banal of B-movie pursuits.

Full Review | Original Score: D+

The whole film, really, comes from a freezer. Thaw first; then reheat the bugaboo murders, the twitchy killer, the trail of script clues that would lead a moose to the truth in moments but must take 105 minutes to occupy a movie-picked police force.

Full Review | Original Score: 2/5

Unfocused, flitting back and forth from separate Cage, Cusack, and Hudgens arcs without forming them into one vision.

Full Review | Original Score: 2.0/5.0

Choppy and chilling, it's destined for a quick burial in the icy tundra.

Full Review | Original Score: 5/10

The movie's only fresh element is the wintry setting, which shrouds everything in a mood of weary fatalism. Otherwise, it's the same old, same old, efficiently discharged and utterly disposable.

Full Review | Original Score: 2/5

Although writer-director Scott Walker seems committed to not overly exploiting his lurid subject matter, the movie is just too dreary, disjointed and generically creepy to be persuasive.

Full Review | Original Score: 2.5/5

Ultimately, the cumulative effect is deadening, just another chapter in an endless battle between overtasked and underpaid good guys, and cowardly baddies.

Full Review | Original Score: C

Might we call this dubious entertainment? Hardly: it's not even entertaining.

Full Review | Original Score: 1/5

It's let down by a disjointed and frustratingly unfocussed script, coupled with some laughably sloppy dialogue.

Full Review | Original Score: 2/5

First time writer/director Scott Walker claims the whole thing is based on conversations he had with the real life woman who, as a teenager, helped police capture Alaskan serial killer, Robert Hansen. You can't hear her voice.

Full Review | Original Score: 2/5