Whiteout: Review
A Russian plane crashes at the South Pole in 1957 after one of those classically idiotic gun fights in a plane that can only end badly for everyone involved. Do movie characters never watch movies? Fifty years later, U.S. marshal Carrie Stetko, played with a boring earnestness by Kate Beckinsale, is stationed at the Amundsen scientific research base in Antartica — the coldest place on earth! After a hilariously pointless opening shower scene — Beckinsale hiding her nakedness in hot steam, thereby totally eradicating any pleasure that could have been eked out from such gratuitousness — a body is discovered out in the snow in the middle of nowhere. She has to solve the case before the entire base is evacuated because of a severe winter storm. She has some skeletons in her closet — cut to a flashback in a warmer color palette of her killing her chubby partner who sold her out — hence why she is working in Antartica. That’s pretty much the only character background work in the film. So far, so dull …
But sometimes such B- movie who-dunits can be saved either by so-bad-it’s-goodness ( see one of my all-time favorite guilty pleasures Deep Blue Sea) or a great unexpected twist (see one of my all-time favorite guilty pleasures Deep Blue Sea). Unfortunately, this film makes it immediately apparent to anyone who has functioning synapses who the killer is right from the start. Here’s a clue: he’s probably the most well known of all the actors and usually plays a good guy — TWIST ALERT! Not really. Still, they could have at least played with the audience a bit more and thrown a few more red herrings our way — or at the very least fitted in a few better action chases in the snow. People shuffling at a snail’s pace through a virtual white out didn’t really set my heart racing. And to cap it all off the final reveal is perhaps the biggest damp squib of a showdown in recent history. It should have been called WASHOUT instead of WHITEOUT.
Much more interesting than the movie itself was the audience of four that came to see it. They were:
“Mr 24 inch pizza eater” — How did he get that in I wonder? Did he bribe the usher with a slice? And was he aware that the sound he made chewing could probably qualify as noise pollution.
Sitting directly in front of me was “Mr Encroaching Personal Space” who managed to lean so far back in his chair I could see the dandruff falling off of his scalp onto my lap like my very own personal fake snow machine.
Also in attendance was “Mr Running Commentary” who filled the silent pause between trailers with humms and haws as if he had been hired as the theater’s official arbiter of taste. And worse still he then took it upon himself to loudly — and wrongfully— accuse secondary characters of being the killer. At one point he even had the temerity to shhh me after my chair creaked when I shifted position. This wasn’t helped by the fact that the writers had decided in their infinite wisdom to give Kate Beckinsale’s character her very own running commentary of the brain freeze detective work she does throughout the film.
And, last, but certainly not least, there was me — sitting there like the normal, inconspicuous citizen that I am. Except I was sipping on a quart of milk. Which seemed like a good idea at the time — y’know … for calcium and shit — but probably made me seem a little unhinged. I wasn’t even eating cookies.
So, here’s my advice: don’t go and see this film. Instead, stay at home, drink some milk and eat some cookies. You’ll be much better off.
RATING: 1 OUT OF 10.
(25 votes, average: 2.80 out of 4)
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