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By Robert Johnston
By Robert Johnston
“Whiteout,” a movie based on the graphic novel from Oni Press, written by Greg Rucka and illustrated by Steve Lieber, seemed to me, the best choice for my dollars.
There is a crime in Antarctica in the 1950s. One that involves a group of military on a plane, in stormy weather, that crash lands into the ice and snow carrying a mysterious box containing something mysterious that they all seem to think is worth dying over.
Flash forward to present day, at a base that studies Ice Core’s in Antarctica.
We are introduced to the players, the locale, the pressing concern that the sun is setting for six months, and a murder that has U.S. Marshall Carrie Stetko (Kate Beckinsale) looking for details in the case.
Stetko and Dr. John Fury (Tom Skerritt,) get a Pilot named Delfy (Columbus Short) to take them out to where the body rests in the snow.
The investigation is pretty self explanatory, as far as the murder went; a body, looked like it was thrown, or fell, from a high position.
Stetko and Fury are set to leave the base before the sun sets, and having a murder complicates that. Considering that there is so few murders in Antarctica, Stetko had to call it in.
The body was brought back to the base, and upon further investigation, the body was identified to be a man from a nearby base.
They contacted the base, and spoke to a man that told them to go there to investigate. This is where the killer comes in.
Stetko and Delfy take off for the base. When they arrive, the man Stetko spoke to was dead and she was attacked by a man with his face covered. Barely escaping him, she goes outside without her gloves on and catches a mean case of frostbite. She makes it to another room, just out of the clutches of the killer, and passes out.
She awakens to Delfy standing over her, and the killer obviously gone, we see that her left hand is wrapped, as they assess the situation. Delfly explains that Carrie not open the bandages, it’s bad.
The characters learn, because of the murder, they have to ride out an approaching storm that will ground them there at the base for the next six months.
They end up running into FBI Agent Robert Pryce (Gabriel Macht) and he helps them uncover the secret to the murder, and the murderer. Together, they discover the plane that crashed at the beginning, along with the mysterious box that was opened.
When the mystery is revealed you sort of lose interest in everything you saw.
In retrospect, the movie was just okay. Not great, but entertaining. The plot was way too thin for the Dramatic effect that the ice and snow caused.
Being a comic book movie adaption, you sort of go into it thinking it is something else, because all comic book movies have someone with abilities above normal human.
The only thing above normal in this film, was a lack of meat in my steak, so to speak.
This movie could have been a sizzling thriller, but it missed its mark.
As the killer and motivations were revealed, the characters were not believable and
the resolution of the film was ultimately boring.
This sometimes happens when you take a comic book, and turn it into a movie, something gets lost.
Rucka was one of the executive producers, so his graphic novel may be close to this, but the actors and directors help torpedo a film. In a comic book, a person’s own perceptions handle the acting, the directing, and the overall experience.
Some comic book movies, should just stay comics books.
The movie was okay, but wait for DVD.