Whiteout exclusive: it's cold in Antarctica

Whiteout
Directed by Dominic Sena
Starring Kate Beckinsale, Gabriel Macht, Columbus Short, and Tom Skerritt
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Whiteout, the newest addition to the action-thriller genre, attempts to take the viewer to a new level of suspense — humans battling against deadly winter conditions.

After spending some time trying to find a definite "love or hate" feeling toward the movie, my answer is still uncertain. Some parts of Whiteout left an impression, while others felt overdone and tacky. The constant temperature reminders from director Dominic Sena suggested that he was hoping the characters would get a sympathy vote from us for living in such brutal conditions. However, I’ve lived in Edmonton my entire life, and I feel that I know winter well enough. Sympathy was not the emotion I was feeling, just annoyance for being repeatedly reminded of the weather to come.

To help us “sympathize,” in the first scene, U.S. Marshall Carrie Stetko (Kate Beckinsale), attempts to show us how cold it is by stripping off seven layers of clothing before hitting the shower. While this would be highly appealing to the male audience, this did nothing for me but serve as a reminder that I need a new winter coat.

The plot itself definitely had potential: Stetko got caught up in Cold War history as she stayed behind during the unbearable Antarctica winter to solve the continent’s first ever murders — two members of her own unit. Since the rest of her unit leaves to the States, Beckinsale and her co-star Gabriel Match, who plays U.N. operative Robert Pryce, are left to carry most of the film by themselves.

The film does a fantastic job of keeping you on your feet as Stetko and Pryce must race against time and nature. As Stetko progresses in solving the murders, she finds herself in danger of being murdered herself. She has numerous encounters with the murderer, who tries to kill her with an eye-rolling ice-pick. Disappointingly, for the amount of racing my heart did throughout the movie, it's frustrating that the film ends so dully.

Having been adapted from a graphic novel, the film had room for general improvement. Its excessive attempt to inform the viewer about Antarctica and its conditions feel like a poorly orchestrated Discovery Channel documentary. If that’s not educational enough, the viewer also gets a lesson on amputation when Stetko's frostbitten fingers have to be removed, accompanied by lovely bone-crunching sound effects.

Another questionable part of the film are the numerous flashbacks to a previous case in the United States that Stetko had throughout the film. The only relevance it had seems to be to illustrate her lack of trust in people. Although these transitions are smooth, they're unnecessary, since they turn out to be irrelevant by the time the film ends.

Despite the intermittent bursts of action and heart-racing drama, Whiteout could have used a little more heat — and not the kind provided by Beckinsale.