Have you ever been so obsessed with a TV series that you’ve literally rushed to IMDB to watch other movies featuring that show’s cast of actors, expecting only half of it? Because that’s how I watched The Walking Dead’s Emma Bell get trapped on a ski lift atop a snowy mountain in the 2010 film Frozen. Before you ask, there were no zombies in sight.
Not to be confused with Disney’s cutesy musical tales filled with snowmen and show tunes. However, while I don’t doubt Bell could pull off “Let It Go” if he wanted to, director and writer Adam Green’s psychological horror “Frozen” dares to ask the question. What happens when simply climbing a ski slope becomes a claustrophobic nightmare? As Amy Harrison on The Walking Dead, Bell doesn’t have as much time to shine as Norman Reedus or Andrew Lincoln, but her shocking performance as Andrea’s zombified sister still stuck with me. In Frozen, she only has a few inches to move around for most of the movie, but it still took my breath away.
Frozen follows Bell as Parker O’Neal, Kevin Zegers as Parker’s boyfriend Dan Walker, and Sean Ashmore, aka Iceman from 2000’s X-Men films, as Dan’s grumpy best friend Joe Lynch (named after Green’s horror filmmaker friend of the same name). After an impromptu ski trip (filmed at Snowbasin Ski Resort near Ogden, Utah), the trio’s already rocky relationship (Joe is not a big fan of his best friend’s girlfriend, Parker) is tested when the ski resort staff’s negligence leaves them stranded halfway down the icy slopes with no way to get off. To make matters worse, the ski area will be closed until next weekend. That means it would be a full five days before they could escape. In the middle of winter. I also didn’t have my cell phone as it was stuffed in my locker. Drat, who knew that responsible thinking would be the undoing of these young people?
Image: Anchor Bay
I like movies that do a lot with little things, like The Blair Witch Project (1999) and Saw (2001). Frozen fits that criteria, as the movie takes place in one place and much of it focuses on a dangling ski lift. The banality of the setting makes things even scarier. Who would have imagined that this situation would happen to us? My friend group has detailed lists on how to fight boogeymen like Ghostface and Michael Myers, but if you ask them what they would do if they were stuck 75 to 50 feet above the slope of a snowy mountain, they’d probably say “cry.”
Most of Frozen’s scares are fueled by the horror of the situation, with Belle and Ashmore leaning against the flimsy rails of a ski lift enough to turn my stomach every time – the film’s narrative beats rely primarily on the characters’ interactions with each other. As established, Joe doesn’t really like Parker because of how much time Parker takes away from him and Dan. Parker, on the other hand, yearns to be “one of the guys.” Dan is in the middle of all this, trying to mediate both relationships, and almost succeeding – until it becomes clear that something has to be done to escape the elevator or all three will die of hypothermia.
A more shallow movie would settle for clichéd characters you’d want to see bite the dust (ahem, snow). But the arguments and bickering between Bell, Ashmore, and Zegers feel realistic enough to heighten the horror of Frozen. We value them and their connections. Dan’s embrace of Parker’s tearful face and his soft promise to keep him alive was as heartbreaking as Joe’s weak promise to marry the girl who gave him her number at the ski resort. Even as the crew clashed, I found myself rooting for their survival rather than waiting for a gruesome death sequence. The chamber drama culminates in Dan’s decision to put himself in danger to ensure both Joe and Parker escape. I cried, I’m not going to lie. The tension has also increased. Will Joe and Parker be able to put aside their differences and work together? Despite its icy surroundings, Green’s Frozen is filled with a warm heart that makes its horrors all the more stinging.
Photo: Anchor Bay/Everett Collection
Greene’s character work is arguably the strongest aspect of Frozen, but don’t expect warm fuzzies throughout. While it wasn’t well-received by some critics (Variety slammed the acting, saying the dialogue was “worse” – boo!), Green clearly tapped into viewers’ anxieties that other viewers didn’t even know existed. I’m not the only one who watched this movie with my hands over my eyes. When the film premiered at the 2010 Sundance Film Festival, some audience members reportedly fainted from the strain.
It’s true that Frozen and The Walking Dead are two very different IPs, and my obsession with one led me to the other. Still, I’m happy to say that there are only two horror movies that have instilled in me an irrational fear of anything. Those are Final Destination 5 (I’m happy to wear glasses forever, thank you) and Frozen. I’m one of those people who just blinks when I see gore and gushing fountains of blood on screen, but what do I think after watching this movie? I never ride the lift at a ski resort.
Frozen is streaming on Tubi and available for purchase on YouTube, Prime Video, and Apple TV.
