Snow Angels (Missed Movies)

When one considers that much of the U.S. has snow on the ground for a significant part of the year, it is somewhat surprising that so few movies are placed in that setting. There are the Christmas movies.  But where are the movies set in the frigid and dreary months of January and February?

Perhaps because I grew up in the snow and later lived part of my life in areas without snow, I especially enjoy a good snow movie. And there are some excellent movies set in the snow such as the sad The Sweet Hereafter (1997).  There’s also Paul Newman’s fine performance in Nobody’s Fool (1994).  Murder sagas also seem to work well in the snow, as shown by Fargo (1996) and Insomnia (2002).

Snow Angels
photo: Adam Colton (licensed for reuse)

One of my favorite snow movies, though, is Snow Angels (2006).  The film is set in a 1970s small town in Pennsylvania.  The time of year is during the weeks when snow stays on the ground but it seems too cold for more snowflakes.

In the opening scene of Snow Angels, a marching band practices as their director tries to inspire them.  The students suddenly hear gun shots in the distance. The screen goes dark and we jump to “weeks earlier.” So we know from the start that somehow at least one person is heading toward a tragedy.

There are tragic turns in the movie, but I will not ruin the film. The movie focuses on two families. In one, Annie (Kate Beckinsale) and Glenn (Sam Rockwell) are separated spouses struggling with the failure of their marriage while trying to take care of their young daughter.

Annie works with and used to babysit for teenager Arthur (Michael Angaro).  And the other family focus is Arthur’s family. While Arthur is developing a relationship with a new girl at school, his parents are separating.

The acting in Snow Angels is superb and believable. Sam Rockwell may not immediately come to your mind when listing the top actors today, but he continues to make his every movie worth watching. Here, as the troubled Glenn, he is outstanding.  He makes viewers sympathize with someone they probably would not want to be around in real life.

I had seen Snow Angels several years ago.  So I watched it again before writing this entry. I enjoyed the movie the second time too, although it may not be a movie you will want to watch repeatedly.  Although there is a great deal of sadness in the movie, one may also find a little hope toward the end.

The movie is based on the book Snow Angels by Stewart O’Nan. Apparently the book included someone making a literal snow angel, while the movie does not. Still, the title suits the movie in a number of ways.  “Snow Angels” may refer to real angels or to the cold emotions and isolation faced by many of the characters.

If you are looking for a light comedy or uplifting story for this weekend, you should look elsewhere. But if you are in the mood for an intense drama that keeps you enthralled, you may like Snow Angels.

The trailer gives away too much of the movie.  So, you are better off not seeing the trailer before seeing the movie. But if you want to know more before deciding whether to watch the film, the trailer for Snow Angels is here.

“Snow Angel” the Song

Instead of the trailer I will introduce you to an excellent band from Ohio called Over the Rhine.  The band consists of the husband and wife team of Linford Detweiler and Karin Bergquist.

Below is a fan recording of their live performance of their beautiful song, “Snow Angel.” The song is not related to the movie of the similar name. The singular “Snow Angel” is off their album of the plural Snow Angels (2008).

In the song, the singer tells of saying goodbye to her “one and only love” who goes off to war (“The rumors of a distant war / Called my true love’s name”). But the man is killed during the war, leaving the singer heartbroken (“Snow angel, snow angel / Someday I’m gonna fly / This cold and broken heart of mine / Will one day wave goodbye”).

Like the movie Snow Angels, the song “Snow Angel” captures something about the pain and loneliness of winter.  It also reminds us to enjoy our days of warmer weather.

Movies You Might Have Missed is a Chimesfreedom series to inform our readers about good movies that did not receive the attention they deserved.

If you saw
Snow Angels, what did you think? Any thoughts on the very last scene? Leave your two cents in the comments.

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    “The Way Way Back” Way Way Suprised Me (Missed Movies)

    Sam Rockwell Way Way Back Occasionally, I will receive in the mail a Netflix movie where I have no idea how the movie ended up on my list. By the time I received The Way Way Back (2013) and popped it in my DVD player, I was expecting a film about prisoners escaping from a Siberian Gulag camp during World War II before realizing that movie was called The Way Back, a 2010 movie I still want to see. Instead, The Way Way Back turned out to be a surprisingly enjoyable movie about a teenage outcast trying to understand his life one summer.

    The Way Way Back
    , written and directed by Nat Faxon and Jim Rash, follows the awkward 14-year-old Duncan, played by Liam James, who goes with his divorced mother Pam (Toni Collette) on vacation to a Cape Cod beach house with her boyfriend Trent (Steve Carell) and his daughter. Duncan is out of place in the world of adults, and eventually he begins exploring on his own, finding a surrogate family at the local water park managed by Owen, played by Sam Rockwell.

    While I would not describe The Way Way Back as a small independent film, it does use a modest budget to illustrate a realistic story that does not overly play to Hollywood stereotypes. The victories and the defeats in the movie are not overblown, and the story seems honest, while also being fun.

    I suspect that The Way Way Back ended up in my Netflix Queue because I had read a good review and saw that two actors I like, Rockwell and Carrell are in the movie. Steve Carrell plays against type here, portraying someone who is a jerk, while Rockwell uses his quirky charm to full effect. And Toni Collette is brilliant at playing a troubled mom, as she did in About a Boy (2002). The excellent cast also includes Maya Rudolph and Rob Corddry.

    Considering the small budget, The Way Way Back was modestly successful at the box office and created a lot of buzz coming out of The 2013 Sundance Film Festival. But if you missed it the first time around, it is worth a rental.

    Conclusion? If you are in the mood for a modest story with interesting characters and are not expecting an overblown adventure, you probably will enjoy the small coming-of-age tale in The Way Way Back. The honesty of the story and the excellent cast make the movie a nice surprise and a good movie that you might have missed. Rotten Tomatoes gives the movie a respectable 86% rating from both critics and audience members.

    {Missed Movies is our continuing series on good films you might have missed because they did not receive the recognition they deserved when released.}

    What did you think of The Way Way Back? Leave your two cents in the comments.

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    Ambiguous Morality With Casey Affleck (Missed Movies)

    This edition of “Movies You Might Have Missed” features two 2007 films starring Casey Affleck where his character makes a complicated moral choice near the end of the films. Did his characters make the correct choices?

    jesse james coward robert ford The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford (2007): This unusual Western, like its title, is a bit long, but the epic meditation on the Western myth, outlaws, and heroes is worth your patience. Brad Pitt does an excellent job as Jesse James and Sam Rockwell is great as always, but it is Casey Affleck as Robert Ford that forms the heart of the film. With some wonderful documentary narration by Hugh Ross, the movie is also filmed beautifully by director Andrew Dominik. Affleck portrays Ford as a complicated character who worships the celebrity James and then has to make the ultimate decision about killing his idol. The short coda of the film, which covers the time period after James’s death, is one of the most beautiful endings of any Western in cinema.

    Gone Baby Gone Gone Baby Gone (2007): One one level, Gone Baby Gone is a crime mystery. Casey Affleck’s character and his girlfriend, played by Michelle Monaghan, are hired to find a missing little girl by her aunt. But it is not your run-of-the-mill crime drama, as one might guess after learning that the film is based on a book by by Dennis Lehane, the author of Mystic River and Shutter Island. Casey’s brother Ben Affleck stays behind the camera as director and expertly conveys the character of the Boston neighborhood while weaving a morality tale of sorts. The mystery of the little girl takes some twists and turns, but ultimately, as in The Assassination of Jesse James, it ends with Casey Affleck having to make a choice and then pay the consequences for that choice. Gone Baby Gone is one of those quiet gems that draws you in and sneaks up on you. I recently re-watched the movie and liked it even better the second time. If you have not seen it, watch it for your first time.

    The year 2007 was a big one for Casey Affleck with these two outstanding films, as well as appearing in Ocean’s Thirteen. He has not matched that year so far, and did not have another starring role until The Killer Inside Me in 2010. But he has several films in post-production and pre-production now, so we can look forward to some upcoming Casey Affleck movies, even if it will be difficult for him to match The Assassination of Jesse James and Gone Baby Gone.

    Other Reviews Because Why Should You Trust Me?: Rotten Tomatoes gives a 75% critics rating and a 73% audience rating to The Assassination of Jesse James. Meanwhile, the Tomatometer gives Gone Baby Gone a 94% critics rating and an 84% audience rating.

    {Missed Movies is our continuing series on good films you might have missed because they did not receive the recognition they deserved when released.}

    What do you think of these Casey Affleck films? Leave your two cents in the comments.

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    Why Wasn’t Conviction a Best Picture Nominee? (Missed Movies)

    Conviction (2010) had a lot going for it. The movie is a compelling true story and an inspiring tale about family love. It features a murder mystery. One of the characters is a real-life famous lawyer. It has outstanding actors. Why was the movie not even mentioned at Oscar time? Why did it flop at the box office, ranking 150th in box office for 2010 after its October release?

    Conviction Hilary SwankMovie marketers often face a dilemma. To get people to see their movie, they have to tell potential viewers enough about the movie to create interest (or in the case of comedies, the best or only laugh lines — as I recently experienced while watching Cedar Rapids (2011)). But then, potential viewers may feel they do not need to see the movie unless there are other compelling reasons to see it. Plus, true stories are often already familiar. One recent excellent movie that had the familiarity challenge was Conviction (2010), starring Hilary Swank and Sam Rockwell. But the movie is still worthwhile viewing.

    Conviction follows the true story of Kenny Waters, who was sentenced to life in prison for a murder. His sister Betty Anne Waters believed in him so much that to prove him innocent, she earned her G.E.D., graduated from college, went to law school, passed the bar exam, and became a lawyer. It is an amazing story featuring hard work and a lot of luck.

    The reason that Conviction did not do better at the box office may have been that the story was too predictable (although 127 Hours faced a similar challenge), or maybe the story was too conventional. Or maybe the fascinating story lost something when converted to a 107-minute movie. The story is incredible because of the years the sister labored to free her brother while he was in prison. But it is hard to convey time in a movie, and to do so may have required a longer movie. Would it have been a better movie if it were longer, and would people have gone to see a longer movie?

    Or maybe the movie was just cursed. There is a tragic ending to the story not shown in the movie. Other actors (Phillip Seymour Hoffman and John C. Reilly) dropped out of the lead male role, and sixteen hours of crucial footage was ruined by an airport x-ray. Meanwhile, some family members were not happy with the final movie.

    But even if you know the story, should you see the movie? It is still entertaining, due largely to the fine acting by Swank and Rockwell. The movie also features Melissa Leo, who recently won an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress for her work The Fighter, and an excellent performance in a small role by Julliette Lewis. It is unfortunate that more people did not see Conviction because the story shows something that happens in the criminal justice system more often than we would like to believe.

    Conclusion? Although this review points out some problems, these criticisms are an attempt to determine why such a compelling story with great acting did not translate into a big box office or a more perfect film. Conviction still is very good and worth viewing. But if you plan to see it, do not watch the trailer below. Conviction is now available on DVD and Blu-Ray.

    You may know how the story ends, but in case you do not, I will not ruin it. If you want more information, you may watch a local news story about the case and the release of the movie. Also, see the Chimesfreedom review of 127 Hours about how another movie faced the familiarity problem.

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