The Ice Harvest (2006)

Out in the Cold

By Jeffrey M. Anderson

Buy The Ice Harvest on DVD

A great cast, starting with John Cusack, Billy Bob Thornton and Oliver Platt, a script by Oscar-winning veteran Robert Benton, with Richard Russo, and direction by Harold Ramis ( Groundhog Day) still don't add up to much more than a shrug. Cusack plays a mob accountant who, along with thug Vic Cavanaugh (Thornton), decides to make off with a couple million dollars of the mob's money and skip town in the middle of a frozen Christmas Eve night. The pair are supposedly waiting for the roads to clear, but they keep finding more and more distractions; hitmen looking for them, drunk husbands, nasty ex-wives, and the promise of romantic ecstasy from cantina manager Renata (Connie Nielsen). The film has its moments, and the actors shine (especially Platt), but it all feels rather routine and low-energy.

DVD Details:Focus/Universal's DVD comes with a Ramis commentary track, alternate endings, making-of featurettes, and one hilarious outtake in which Thornton performs a scene as his old Sling Blade character Karl Childers.

Starring: John Cusack, Billy Bob Thornton, Connie Nielsen, Lara Phillips, Bill Noble, Randy Quaid, Oliver Platt, Brad Smith, Ned Bellamy, Mike Starr
Written by: Robert Benton, Richard Russo, based on a novel by Scott Phillips
Directed by: Harold Ramis
MPAA Rating: R for violence, language and sexuality/nudity
Running Time: 89 minutes
Date: April 11, 2006