The Frozen Front

Hi all

I have seen many comments criticizing the English dubbing but having seen the film in French VO I will not allow myself to judge as rajotd.

This film is a loyal historical testimony concerning the brave soldiers (american and french) who fought in the pocket of Colmar and the links between them.

Very well shot and with complete historical realism we note however the small budget allocated to the effects, more real than special ;-)

However, where the film draws all its excellence, it is in the singular story that it tells and in the links between close characters that it brilliantly highlights.

Throughout each scene, the director's passion is felt and during the course of the film we understand how the script has been worked to achieve this result.

Therefore it is a touching, realistic and ultimately both simple and complex film for the story it tells!

The dubbed-in English dialogue is so cliche-ridden, it's hard to believe that it was an accurate translation from the French. Can a screenwriter really be that bad in two different languages? Plus, the voiceover actors are so bad, it just calls further attention to the awful dialogue. On the plus side, the historically inaccurate large white parachute emblems on the front of many of the helmets--the ones that blared out to the Germans, "Shoot here! It's where my forehead is."--was a creative touch.

This is a WW2 film about disgruntled, weary soldiers from different nations in a frozen forest.

There is a lot of "smartness" to this. Some people won't like the disjointed dialog with pauses between lines, but that is how people spoke long ago. The constant "I interrupt the speaker cause I'm superior and he's inferior" dialog has been evolving in Western culture for the past 40 years.

But there was a time when being a brat wasn't praised the way that being a brat is praised today. And you thought the Nazis lost the war?

The only real drawback is how predictable the fate is for almost every character. It follows the Hollywood formula guideline of contriving bullets to only hit characters who are relatable, but never can find characters who are just hateful for no reason.

That, of course, has almost always been the Hollywood formula, although it wasn't preached as much until the mid sixties on into the eighties.

Very contrived, very predictable, but the dramatics are very good, and the characters do feel right for the times due to the constant pauses and lack of dialog among a tired group of soldiers.

They say that war is hours of boredom punctuated by moments of sheer terror. Well, they got the boredom right. Also, it is hard to relate to the characters, who spend more time whining and bickering than fighting the Germans.

Ivan has nothing on this, historically accurate I paid 5 dollars to rent it on iTunes and enjoyed it