Sunday Confidential

Hello! I missed you all so very much. I hope your Thanksgiving holiday was as yumtastic and full of family and friends as mine was. Today I bring you a movie review of The Ice Harvest. Ordinarily I would avoid such a task, because most of the time when people are talking about movies, my only contribution is to say, "I haven't seen it." But I have seen this one, and there seems to be a bit of disagreement on whether it's worth your hard-earned pennies, which was perfectly demonstrated by my own movie companions, who were the b.f. and his parents, whose pennies were generously sacrificed for all of our admission fees. And the results? B.f.'s mom said, "I'm asking for my money back." B.f.'s dad said, "I preferred Pride and Prejudice." B.f. said, "I thought it was pretty funny." I said, "How did that stripper do that thing with the pole?"

In my opinion, The Ice Harvest was funny but only if you can stomach a lot of graphic violence and naked people, and find murder, betrayal, and deception potentially humorous. Which I do. Or did, in this case. Part of what I liked about The Ice Harvest is that it felt novelistic, tightly constructed, which is not surprising, because it was based on a book. And it's not nearly so slapstick as I expected from the trailer. Billy Bob Thornton is serviceable and John Cusack more than serviceable, and he does an admirable job of portraying a character who knows what an asshole he is and regrets it enormously, but is barely aware enough to see what's going on around him, much less resist his many vices. So, in sum, I recommend The Ice Harvest. But don't go with your boyfriend's parents.