• Starring: Charlie McDermott, Melissa Leo, Misty Upham
  • Summary: Frozen River is the story of Ray Eddy, an upstate New York trailer mom who is lured into the world of illegal immigrant smuggling when she meets a Mohawk girl who lives on a reservation that straddles the US-Canadian border. Broke after her husband takes off with the down payment for their new doublewide, Ray reluctantly teams up with Lila, a smuggler, and the two begin making runs across the frozen St. Lawrence River carrying illegal Chinese and Pakistani immigrants in the trunk of Ray’s Dodge Spirit. (Sony Pictures Classics) Expand
Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 28 out of 30
  2. Negative: 0 out of 30
  1. 100
    Sometimes two performances come along that are so perfectly matched that no overt signals are needed to show how the characters feel about each other. That's what happens between Melissa Leo and Misty Upham in Frozen River.
  2. There is nothing sentimental or picturesque about the performances or imagery. The word that best describes both is elemental.
  3. If we're going to be honest, we need to look inside and ask ourselves: Do we really want to see a listless movie about a woman whose dream is to move into a double-wide trailer?

See all 30 Critic Reviews

Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 14 out of 18
  2. Mixed: 0 out of 18
  3. Negative: 4 out of 18
  1. [Anonymous]
    10
    My third favorite of last year after Happy Go Lucky and WALL-E.
    • 0 of 1 users said yes
  2. Lyn
    9
    Melissa Leo truly deserved her Oscar nomination for a gritty performance that feels real from the shabbiness of her clothes to the crunch of the snow beneath the tires of her old car. One of those films that leaves you thinking later, "I wonder what happened to those people" . . . even though, of course, they were fictional. "Frozen" as well as the river in their own crises and quandaries, the characters make you root for them to break free. Expand
    • 1 of 1 users said yes
  3. MurielG.
    2
    I live on the reservation depicted. Not only were some scenes too dark - many facts are left out and the reality of Akwesasne here is again stereotyped. The only true pictures of here were the bridge - The movie mocks our tribal police, puts us all in rundown trailers, and made our Bingo Palace (which is eluded to by name in one scene) look rundown and the center of vandalism. And , of course the Mohawks are depicted as not caring about terrorist threats when they are smuggling people - "Only" the white woman in this film shows any concern or recognition of such threats - yet she is so stupid she throws a baby in a satchel out the door in case it may be something dangerous like(anthrax? or a bomb) she never looked to see what was in it. Another thing I have yet to see a big rig cross the "ice bridge" here. Parts of the film did hold my interest, the mention of our traditional Longhouse only puts traditionals down for not giving their children Santa Claus. What they are and what they truly represent, which is (I am sure) the key to continuation of life on this planet is a shame - so many people seeing this film have and will think what they saw represents this Nation (the Mohawk Nation). It never tells of all of the good honest & hard working people that live here nor how it was taken from our ancestors forcing a very few of our people to take some wrong actions. That would be a better focus for the movie. Unfortunately, the racism that we experience, does exist. The wrongs done to our people were done by the same terrorists they fear (themselves) when they took over our continent - do a film depicting that! ONe of your reviewers even sees this movie as the Mohawk woman and the white woman as correcting the past??? HUH??? How may I ask. Expand
    • 1 of 1 users said yes

See all 18 User Reviews

Trailers

Related Articles

  1. Ranked: The Best Women Film Directors (and Their Films)

    Ranked: The Best Women Film Directors (and Their Films) Image
    Published: July 17, 2010
    Even in a year where the directing Oscar went to a woman for the first time, female filmmakers still don't receive the recognition that their male counterparts do. We look at the top women directors and their films, including the two best-reviewed live-action films of the summer.

Recommended Products

    • Release Date: Jul 3, 2009
    Tony Manero Image
  1. Before I Forget Image
  2. Mrs Henderson Presents Image