Against the Ice

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I admire how this film doesn't lean on Hollywood troupes like shaky cam, extreme close ups or slow motion, instead using very simple techniques. Also the characters aren't over the top or cliché but feel quite real. But saying that I didn't enjoy this film. The story hop, skips and jumps its way through time. Some scenes are hours apart others months and months but the film makes no effort to show the time passing. If you miss the text on screen showing you the time lapse you could easily think the events happened over a long weekend. There is a reason troupes become troupes: they work. Although I appreciate the simplistic approach it makes the film very dry and hard to swallow as a lot of the events lack any impact in their telling. Even when something exciting does happen the action is clipped short and we are catapulted off in to the future. The film makes crossing Greenland look like an absolute breeze and gave me the impression even I could give it a crack. Apart from the opening scene the explorers look fresh as daisy's and Greenland feels more like a big 19 century Spa than a hostile wilderness. It was nice to have professional, level headed characters not falling apart at the first sign of trouble but the big scary captain is an absolute delight most of the time and notably less annoying and demanding than most of my co-workers. With no real tension or energy this film becomes more of a bland transfer of information than a story. "Hey Ivor tell them about that time we were on the ice and we got attacked by a bear" "Oh yeah, we were on the ice... and we got attacked by a bear." I wanted to like this but found it quite boring, and its aversion to action frustrating.

The story is quite compelling and the scenes are sufficient. There are moments of excitement and also moments of where the audience shared their waiting in insanity. However, there are just too much unnecessary fluff that dragged the runtime. There is no reason this needed to be 1 hour 40 mins. I think a good 20 mins could've been trimmed off and made it leaner and pacing better. Literally towards the 1 hr 20 min mark I was like, hurry up already.

This is based on a true story. It tells the story of the Dane Ejnar Mikkelsen's Alabama Expedition from 1909-12 with Iver Iversen (who volunteered). The purpose of the Expedition was to search for the three missing scientists Ludvig Mylius-Erichsen, Niels Peter Høeg Hagen and Jørgen Brønlund from the Denmark Expedition to Northeast Greenland from 1906-08. The movie is not bad but its not good also, what save it, is the fact that its a true story, and its boring... almost sleep 30min in...

I had a feeling looking at the trailer whether this was going to be a hot or miss... It's incredibly boring and lackluster, I switched it off after 45 mins.

Incredible story, but I think I would die of absolute boredom. That is a long time to be stuck on a desolate frozen piece of land. As for how that story was portrayed on film. Very much so-so. They still did it justice and all, but it honestly just seemed void of any real tension. The cinematography is pretty decent, but asides from that there's nothing that really stands out. If you enjoy survival movies, or the arctic like I do than it's alright, but if you don't it's sure to be a bore. 'Arctic' with Mads Mikkelsen was better.