Icetastrophe

Because nothing says Merry Christmas like a freak cold snap caused by a freak meteor that runs hot and cold until it hits our atmosphere and splits into two convenient parts. The cold part hits main street nowhere and causes “flash freezing” on a level heretofore never seen. One of the first victims is a kid given to playing with dynamite. Santa becomes the next victim. Ho-ho-ho! The level of supreme dopiness depicted in this sci-fi flick is truly unbelievable. And everyone is so serious! You’d think they’d never had a meteorite land in the middle of their town before. Sheesh! Surprisingly, they also manage to toss in a subpar romance of forbidden love between the town nobody and the whiny daughter of a rich idiot used to running roughshod over everyone. The number of people he “accidentally” gets killed is astronomical! Thank goodness a passing science student (Jennifer Spence) just happens by in time to help the handyman hero (Victor Webster) save almost everyone who wasn’t iced by HUGE ice crystals. I don’t know what the world would have done without them.Fortunately, I have a wacky sense of humor and thought this movie was hysterical. Most will not, it’s an acquired taste. You can’t dress up crap with fancy FX and expect it to shine. A plausible plot would have helped. I first saw this on the Syfy Channel so I knew exactly what I was buying. This was no pig in poke!

SPOILER ALERT: The kindest thing to say about this movie, is that it apparently takes place in an alternate universe where they have different laws of physics. A meteorite about the size of an office desk lands at the ground-breaking ceremony for a new shopping mall. Everyone who touches or approaches the meteorite has all the heat sucked out of them, turning into a rigid block of ice, then shattering. Giant ice crystals erupt from the ground in an ever-expanding circle of destruction, necessitating the entire town to be evacuated. Apparently the office desk-sized meteorite can absorb an infinite amount of heat energy, without ever reaching equilibrium? (Despite the friction-generated heat of descending through the atmosphere, and apparently absorbing all the heat energy from objects totaling upward of one hundred times its mass.) There is, indeed, a scientist on the scene. We know that she is a scientist, because she is the only one in the movie wearing glasses. She is introduced as an astrophysicist. For a long time, I suffered through this movie thinking they were never going to offer any scientific explanation of the ice-storm phenomenon, but then the astrophysicist informed us that a subatomic chain reaction was taking place. Despite the vast quantities of energy apparently involved, lighting an ordinary campfire or torch will protect you from being crystallized and shattered by the special effects team. Subsequently, it transpired that there are actually two meteorites (twins, one good and one evil). One causes things to freeze, and the other causes the winter landscape to turn into a lovely springtime glade. Only by bringing the two meteorites together, can the balance of nature be restored. (The lady scientist's words, not mine.) There are also dynamite explosions, an avalanche, and snowmobile racing (chills, thrills, spills). We are also treated to a subplot involving the selfish and evil shopping mall promoter and his pompous, punch-throwing son, who attempt the thwart the "Romeo and Juliet" junior league romance between the rich girl and the son of the employee who just got himself fired. Naturally, they receive suitable comeuppances in the course of the movie. There is actually nothing technically wrong with this movie. The production is actually very competent, and the actors valiantly act their hearts out, despite any absurdities they might have noticed in the script. I can't honestly say that I enjoyed it, but I got a good laugh out of the silly science. It's kind of like a RiffTrax, waiting to happen.

I've seen this movie several times over the years, and love it just as much each time! Glad to see it now on Prime.It's sometimes called "Christmas Icetastrophe" when it's been shown on Syfy, but in case you don't know, it's the same movie no matter what it's called. One does have to not take it too seriously, though, and certainly don't try to make sense of the science, it'll drive you nuts if you do that, but for pure entertainment, this is great. Despite the fact that the hero, Charlie, is constantly thrown into ridiculous perilous situations over and over again with the lady science student, this movie is not about any kind of romance between them, which is surprising considering that is always the way these kinds of stories are written. The one thing about this movie that really bothers me, though, is the stupidity of the teenage girl who for much of the movie, is lost in the mountains with her boyfriend, complaining about how cold it is, yet she never puts on her hood! She has a coat on with a big fur lined hood, yet not once does she put it on. It was so ridiculous for her to even accept the young man's coat, who had on about the same thing that she'd had on, and still she didn't put that hood on. The one thing I kept thinking was that someone needed to tell her that leaving her head uncovered to show her hair hanging down wasn't worth freezing one's behind off.

3.5/5 I've seen a lot of disaster movies and this is decent as far as quality goes (Both acting and effects), but the story and logic are where it falls short. The only acting issue I had was that the teen girl who was cold the entire time seemed to be overdoing it (despite not wearing her hood and leaving her scarf behind tangled on a tree branch) and her boyfriend who takes off his jacket to give to her doesn't look cold. Aside from that, I wasn't bothered by the acting. The issue is the logic and science of the story. There is a meteor that splits in 2 as it crashes to earth rather than burning up in the atmosphere. One half of it is really hot and produces heat and the other half is really cold and produces cold and ice. Somehow they were joined together in space and when they split and crash into the earth the cold piece lands in a town and causes issues with people and buildings freezing and icicles popping up everywhere. The hot piece lands in the middle of the mountains and just melts the snow. As far as logic and science goes, there really isn't any that is realistic. If you can accept that and the fairly predictable plot it is a fairly enjoyable movie. It isn't great, but it is better done than a lot of the movies in the disaster genre.

très bon film et service rapide