Snow Cake is a well-crafted story set convincingly in the winter landscape of Canada.
Potential loose ends in the story are adequately covered. These include how the central autistic character, Linda managed initially to become pregnant and how Alex comes to terms with past "demons". Such demons are essential to the story and are revived when a truck smashes into the side of his car, killing a young hitchhiker. (Having often driven both the right and left vehicles however, I'm still intrigued as to why Alex wouldn't have taken the main impact of the fatal accident.
That aside, in many ways the movie deserves the four stars' credit as shown on the DVD jacket.
Alan Rickman is excellent as Alex, Carrie-Anne plays an attractive version of Maggie and Vivienne is, perhaps mercifully, released early in the film with no indication of the actress' name on the DVD jacket - all according to plan.
Unfortunately, that leaves Sigourney Weaver's rendition of Linda.
Weaver obviously picks up a throwaway line in the script that describes Linda as "mad" and, from here, anything, and everything, goes. Weaver's portrayal of Linda as the autistic mother is inaccurate, indulgent and emotionally lazy.
Her co-star, English actor, Alan Rickman in "Something the Lord Made" for example, masterfully handles an American accent, arguably giving his central character greater deliberation and depth than may have been forthcoming from an American actor.
In "Snow Cake," Weaver conveniently assumes that Canadian and American accents are either indistinguishable, not worth differentiating, too difficult to try or even beneath her elevated fame.
Sadly, Weaver's portrayal subtracts at least one "star" from a good movie. Judging by this performance, she should stick to her Hollywood day job of bagging the United States and campaigning for the fall of the Bush Administration.
Wot! The Bush Administration's gone! Never mind, there's still Al Gore, more gore - and, of course, there's always global warming movies.
Potential loose ends in the story are adequately covered. These include how the central autistic character, Linda managed initially to become pregnant and how Alex comes to terms with past "demons". Such demons are essential to the story and are revived when a truck smashes into the side of his car, killing a young hitchhiker. (Having often driven both the right and left vehicles however, I'm still intrigued as to why Alex wouldn't have taken the main impact of the fatal accident.
That aside, in many ways the movie deserves the four stars' credit as shown on the DVD jacket.
Alan Rickman is excellent as Alex, Carrie-Anne plays an attractive version of Maggie and Vivienne is, perhaps mercifully, released early in the film with no indication of the actress' name on the DVD jacket - all according to plan.
Unfortunately, that leaves Sigourney Weaver's rendition of Linda.
Weaver obviously picks up a throwaway line in the script that describes Linda as "mad" and, from here, anything, and everything, goes. Weaver's portrayal of Linda as the autistic mother is inaccurate, indulgent and emotionally lazy.
Her co-star, English actor, Alan Rickman in "Something the Lord Made" for example, masterfully handles an American accent, arguably giving his central character greater deliberation and depth than may have been forthcoming from an American actor.
In "Snow Cake," Weaver conveniently assumes that Canadian and American accents are either indistinguishable, not worth differentiating, too difficult to try or even beneath her elevated fame.
Sadly, Weaver's portrayal subtracts at least one "star" from a good movie. Judging by this performance, she should stick to her Hollywood day job of bagging the United States and campaigning for the fall of the Bush Administration.
Wot! The Bush Administration's gone! Never mind, there's still Al Gore, more gore - and, of course, there's always global warming movies.