Frozen River [Blu-ray]

Melissa Leo plays the character of Ray in this fantastic independent film. Married to a gambling addict who has run off shortly before Christmas, Ray is a single parent being hounded by creditors. All she has in the house for her two children to eat is Tang and some chips. She works at the 'Lucky Dollar' store and has been hoping for two years for a promotion that is not going to happen.

Melissa and her two children live in a single-wide trailer that is falling apart. Her dream is to get a double-wide. Circumstances lead her to meet and hook up with a young woman from the Mohawk Nation. Together, they engage in smuggling illegal aliens from Canada to the U.S. Ray plans to stop as soon as she has enough money for the double-wide. However,it looks like the police are on to her. Will she be able to make the last runs to get enough money?

Ray and her young friend begin their relationship as adversaries and as the movie progresses they begin to connect, each appreciating the other and developing trust and respect.

The movie shows the bleakness of the reservation and the adjoining town in upstate New York. The poverty is more like a third world nation than the U.S.

I loved the movie. Its understatement let the characters evolve through their actions in dire circumstances. We learn about them by what they do and how they respond to others. There are no special effects, just the beauty of the photography and the depth of character development. This movie is a gem which I highly recommend.

Veteran and extremely underused actress Melissa Leo delivers a powerful, tour-de-force performance as Ray, a mother just abandoned by her lowlife, gambler husband several days before Christmas in Northern New York state. It's cold, very cold; the kind of cold that even the tiniest hole to the outside world can turn any home into a fully functional freezer. This is experienced worse more than anyone by Lila (Misty Upham) early on in the movie after Ray discovers her stolen car in the hands of this young Mohawk girl. Both women have heartbreaking back stories that are revealed throughout the movie and both are in the same boat; their flat broke.

Ray needs to make the down payment on a doublewide trailer for she and her two sons. Lila has reasons too that I won't go into for it will spoil some of the more dramatic elements of the plot.

Lila has already been arrested for smuggling illegal aliens over the frozen Hudson River into America from Canada several times, but she knows there's money in it. When Ray hears of this she jumps in for some fast cash.

The point of this movie is not illegal immigration; it's not really even about relations between Native Americans and whites, though both are depicted. The overall tone of this film is survival and what people are willing to do to survive, to put food on the table and keep a roof over their families' head. Ray has been working part-time at the same dead-end job for over two years but is refused full-time work. Lila pays out money to senior citizens playing bingo at the local VFW. What gives this film even more depth is that these women have so many opportunities to steal money easily (Ray can take it out of the cash drawer and Lila could steal it from the half-blind Bingo players) but neither do. They are both hardworking people willing to risk, not only their lives, but their freedom to perform work that pays; Ray and Lila don't want handouts.

"Frozen River" can be seen as a drama, which it is; but it can also be viewed as a thriller (the last forty minutes or so are as suspenseful as any big-budget Hollywood blockbuster). However, it is ultimately a story of people, people with their back to the walls that are willing to do anything for some breathing room.

Supporting roles by Charlie McDermott (as Ray's oldest son), Mark Boone jr. (as a malevolent human trafficker) and Michael O'Keefe (as a nosy state trooper) are believable and only add to this strong film by Courtney Hunt in the best debut since Patty Jenkins with 2003's "Monster". Her solid directing from her original screenplay (and a miniscule million dollar budget) turns "Frozen River" into one of the best films of 2008 and giving Melissa Leo the chance to shine in the finest performance from an actress this year.

FROZEN RIVER is a gripping drama that features one of 2008's finest performances.

Like Bette Davis before her, Melissa Leo is an actress who puts craft over glamor. She's not afraid to let herself appear totally unattractive on the screen if that is what the role requires. She more than deserves every award she's received thus far.

In this film, written and directed by Courtney Hunt, Melissa plays a middle-age woman whose husband has just left her and their two sons. She's broke, lives in a broken-down mobile home in frigid upstate New York and works part-time at a local variety store. Her dream is to buy a double-wide mobile home, but hubby has gambled away the money for that.

Melissa's life changes when she meets a widowed Mohawk woman (Misty Upham) who survives by smuggling illegal immigrants into the United States from Canada. Seeing this as an opportunity to get her new mobile home, Melissa partners with the woman, but soon finds herself running from the law.

The DVD from Sony Pictures Home Entertainment includes audio commentary by Hunt and producer Heather Rae.

© Michael B. Druxman