Ice Soldiers Blu-ray Movie

Rating summary

Movie		2.0
Video		4.0
Audio		4.5
Extras		0.0
Overall		2.5

Ice Soldiers Blu-ray Movie Review

Not cool.

Reviewed by Martin Liebman February 18, 2014

It's usually space aliens or genetically modified Nazis that are dug up to wreak havoc on the modern world, but Ice Soldiers takes a not-so-chilling page out of a supposedly fictional chapter of the Cold War by pitting a few blonde-haired Soviets against a handful of modern scientists, explorers, and military personnel. The film's novelty more or less begins and ends there. It's basic, forgettable plotting and Action with a story that fits comfortably between "mindless" and "smart." The picture neither tries too little nor tries too hard to build up its side stories or character interactions, but it fails to produce enough action to keep the simple narrative chugging along. An overly long first half doesn't yield a super-action-packed second, and the end result is a passable, but forgettable, time killer.

At odds.

At the height of the Cold War, during the Cuban Missile Crisis, several Soviet super soldiers have been unearthed in the Canadian Arctic. They murder a team of explorers, leave behind a single female survivor, and head out into the vastness and cold of the arctic to carry out their mission of terror in New York City. They never made it. Fifty years later, Malraux (Dominic Purcell) has returned to the area in search of his father, one of the super soldiers. His expedition includes Colonel Desmond Trump (Michael Ironside), Sergeant Joe Gibbs (Benz Antoine), and civilian Jane Frazer (Camille Sullivan). His team discovers the soldiers, and soon come to realize that they're still alive. Once again, the Soviets lay siege to the Americans, leaving Malraux and a new companion, TC Cardinal (Adam Beach), to fend them off and prevent their reign of terror on the modern world.

The films from which Ice Soldiers draws its inspirations seem fairly obvious. It's a blend of Universal Soldier and The Thing (and probably not the coincidentally similar Nazis at the Center of the Earth) but without the action of Universal Solider and without the atmosphere of The Thing. Granted, those inspirations sit in a rather lofty place -- The Thing in particular -- but it's as if Ice Soldiers failed to grasp the fundamental elements that made those movies standouts in their genres and instead focused only on replicating their exteriors. That's not necessarily a bad thing, but the less-than-stellar results speak for themselves. The end product chugs along with some direction but not much rhythm, scattered action but nothing memorable, and acceptable characterization but nothing that stands beyond the average lower-end Action movie hero or villain. Basically, the film does little more than cobble together pieces that fit together, but that fit together loosely and without care for the final, bigger picture.

There's not much to make Ice Soldiers stand out from the crowd on the technical side of the ledger, either. Sturla Gunnarsson's direction feels safely routine, framing the action and characters with care but not much purpose beyond advancing every scene. The film is understandably limited in its production design, forced to deal with an overwhelmingly white backdrop, limited costumes, and only a handful of unique locations. The performances are good enough to drive the story forward but the cast doesn't bother to try to find much nuance or purpose, most of them meandering through the picture and delivering lines with little passion (of course, the script gives them little with which to work). Action scenes lack a real sense of danger, and the film relies more on loud sound effects and music rather than truly intense hand-to-hand fighting, gunplay, or snowmobile chases, all of which feel repetitively stale and monotonous.

Ice Soldiers Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Ice Soldiers thaws onto Blu-ray with a sturdy and accurate 1080p transfer. Despite a sea of white -- lots of snow and bright, empty skies -- there's not much harshness to the image. It manages to remain mostly well-defined without feeling blown out or poorly defined. Snow textures can often look natural and complex in close-ups, while facial and winter clothing detail stand out with commendable exactness in most tighter moments. A few shots look a bit softer than others, but not to any degree to raise alarms. Colors are pleasing, particularly when scattered bright and darker shades alike contrast against the predominantly white backdrops. The image suffers from no major bouts of noise or blocking and shows only very light and sporadic banding. Overall, a good transfer, particularly given the image's constraints.

Ice Soldiers Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

Ice Soldiers heats up sound stages with the sounds of intense, pumped action. Sony's DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 lossless soundtrack features a steady parade of explosive, heavy-hitting action sound effects and music. Gunfire, explosions, whooshing snow mobiles, and other action-specific elements play with thunderous presence and an endlessly aggressive posture. Sounds pour out of every inch of the stage and rarely take a hit in clarity. Musical notes flow with the same power and feature enveloping surround usage and potent low end accompaniment. Cold arctic wind blows around the stage, not so aggressively as to all but chill the audience but rather to positive, environment-defining effect. Dialogue plays naturally and evenly from the center. This soundtrack is easily this release's highlight.

Ice Soldiers Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

Ice Soldiers contains no supplemental content beyond trailers for other Sony titles.

Ice Soldiers Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

Ice Soldiers gets the basics right but does nothing else well. It tells a recycled story made of pieces from better movies, and the end product isn't all that cohesive or interesting. It's visually bland, thematically vacant, and emotionally tame. The action feels routine, the acting uninspired, and the filmmaking limited. It's a passable watch but Action fans can certainly do much better. Sony's Blu-ray release of Ice Soldiers features good video and potent audio. No extras are included. Skip it.