Jeanskynebu the audience applauded

Greenes Please don't spend money on this.

ReaderKenka Let's be realistic.

VeteranLight I don't have all the words right now but this film is a work of art.

Steve Pulaski Even if I disliked Thin Ice, I'd still have major sympathy for co-writer/director Jill Sprecher, who seemed to have went through hell and high water just to get this film a release. Thin Ice was originally released to Sundance under the name "The Convincer," in a one-hundred and fourteen minute cut that received strong reception from audiences and critics. However, the studio that purchased the film insisted that the score be redundant, the editing reworked, and the pace of the film increased, making the picture ninety-three minutes instead of one-hundred and fourteen. Sprecher, obviously embarrassed and frustrated, has basically given up on Thin Ice and likely looks at it as a sore spot on her career.That note alone should make one hesitate before publishing something negative about the film. It makes me consider my position as an online film critic deeper, too. Here I am, a viewer of many movies a year (last year almost five-hundred) by choice, and I don't always take into account the effort it takes to make a picture and the stress that numerous people likely go under. Thin Ice is a perfect example of a film I hesitate to review because I feel as if I have not seen the real thing. The ninety-three minute cut has received mixed reception, contrary to the original films near-acclaim.Regardless, I find Thin Ice - in and of itself - a solid crime caper. The story centers around Mickey Prohaska (Greg Kinnear), a third rate insurance salesman in a dire financial predicament, looking to invest in something that will increase his reliability, win back his wife, and get him out of the frigid, merciless conditions the Wisconsin cold has brought him. He teams up with another man to try and sell Gorvy Hauer (Alan Arkin), an elderly, senile farmer, insurance despite knowing the man doesn't have much money at all. When Mickey discovers he has an expensive-looking violin, he has it appraised only to realize it is slightly rare and valued at $25,000.This seems all well and good until Randy Kinney (Billy Crudup), a local con-man with an unstable temper, discovers Mickey's plans and, in the process, kills one of Gorvy's neighbors. Now, in an effort to save his own skin, Mickey must work with Randy to cover up the murder, while trying to turn a profit from Gorvy, and sneakily sell his violin for what soon becomes an unruly amount of money.One film that will cross nearly every mind that watches this film is Fargo, the Coen brothers classic. The entire picture seems like a spin off of the film, from the similar plotpoints to the locational weather to the darkly funny direction the film takes. Despite this, Sprecher and her sister Karen do a bold job of making this film stand on its own, simply because of the way events are piled on each other in a rapid-fire order and how the twist is tacked on at the end.The acting, however, is the film's strongest feature, with Kinnear, Crudup, and Arkin being on top of their game in terms of convincing performances. Kinnear is a great everyman, but he has a way about playing a man who has a bigger, brasher internal view of himself in contrast to the way he actually appears. This kind of character's mannerisms are seen in the wonderful Little Miss Sunshine, where he played a father hellbent on selling success advice in a cheap twelve-step book. Here, he plays a deadbeat husband hellbent on selling insurance in a cheaply wrapped package and achieves the same level of success.Meanwhile, Crudup's character is a tricky one to pull off. He is a character that requires the actor playing him to go from collective to explosive in a matter of seconds akin to a time-bomb. This works tremendously in contrast to Kinnear's "gotta keep everything subtle and cool" persona. Finally, it should come as no surprise Arkin is great here, but the role is made more special because it shows Arkin as something he rarely is - gullible.Ultimately, there are issues in Thin Ice that need to be addressed. The pacing is a bit too fast and the opening is a tad sluggish when it should look to grab our attention. However, these are issues that I am almost certain wouldn't exist if the original cut had been released like it should've been. The product we are left with is pretty solid and an easy thing to recommend, but the entire thing almost feels like a cliffhanger that has no writer to complete it.Starring: Greg Kinnear, Billy Crudup, and Alan Arkin. Directed by: Jill Sprecher.

TxMike The sisters who wrote and directed this movie know their subject. They are from Wisconsin, and their father works in the insurance business. This movie is set in Wisconsin and centers upon a man in insurance, albeit I'm sure far removed from their father.Greg Kinnear really is perfect as the slick Mickey Prohaska, versed in the ways of starting up a conversation to sell insurance, but with a debilitating affliction, he is a serial and habitual liar. He smiles and tells one lie after another, as if that's just the way the world works. Problem is after a while everyone who knows him no longer trusts him.Now, as the movie gets going in the frozen north, and Mickey's schemes start to unravel, with the violin music in the soundtrack sounding strangely familiar, very reminiscent of "Fargo", I really started to feel I was watching a different version of "Fargo", with a little "A Simple Plan" thrown in. Mickey Prohaska could have been the fraternal twin of William H. Macy's Jerry Lundegaard, just working in a different industry. And that feeling lasts through most of the movie, as the trouble gets deeper and deeper for Mickey, until near the end we find out that almost nothing is as it appears to be.David Harbour is really good as the new insurance agent, Bob Egan. But the veteran Alan Arkin brings a special life to the elderly immigrant Gorvy Hauer. Lea Thompson is good as always, as Mickey's somewhat estranged wife Jo Ann Prohaska. Bob Balaban is his usual competent self as antique violin dealer Leonard Dahl. But Billy Crudup shows again why he is one of the better, if under-appreciated, actors today, as Randy the locksmith and alarm system installer who goes completely crazy towards Mickey as debts rise and police get closer.In all it is mainly a very dark comedy, and a lesson, even if fictional, in the pitfalls of trying to lie yourself through life and relationships. I enjoyed it, the story held my attention all the way.SPOILERS FOLLOW: As the story develops it appears to be a simple case of Mickey seeing his way out of debt by conning the old man out of his old violin that eventually is appraised at $1.25Million. But his con goes horribly wrong when Randy has to apparently kill a witness, then he and Mickey apparently dispose of the body in ice covering a frozen lake. But it was all a calculated ruse, the old man, the witness, the other insurance salesman, and Randy were not who they said they were, the whole ruse was to get $1.25Million for a cheap violin by processing an insurance claim after it disappeared. Mickey was caught with his pants down, left the frozen north and, as the movie ends, was trying again in the warm south.

ezriderz You need to know that this is a comedic crime movie with an intricate twist at the end.The good actors and compelling plot held my interest from the start. The two movies that it reminded me of were Fargo because of the cold, snowy weather, and A Simple Plan for it's bumbling low-class crooks. Greg Kinnear plays the crooked insurance agent who plots to steal a million dollar violin from an old man for whom he is writing an insurance policy. Billy Crudup is very effective as the crooked locksmith who manages to get himself tangled up in the theft. Alan Arkin is great as the old man who plays the patsy but turns out to be the real brains behind a con that was so elaborate and intricate that I find it hard to believe they could actually pull it off. But it makes a great fun flick with a twist.Many people don't like the ending. I thought the denouement was clever, but zipped by too fast to really get the beauty of the con. I wish they had given a few more minutes to the ending.

Hollywoodshack I can't believe all the butter up tossed into the laps of the Sprecher sisters when they told critics more than 20 minutes of this film was re edited without their approval. Greg Kinnear is great as an insurance salesman pulled into a scheme to steal farmer Alan Arbus's violin worth 25,000 dollars only to have locksmith Billy Crudup murder the neighbor and blackmail Kinnear into helping him cover up the crime. The snowy streets, ice ponds and backwood bars provided a suspenseful atmosphere to this noir comedy/drama until just 90 minutes in a cheery narrative tells us the farmer staged the whole thing, a management office paid him to do it, etc. It just got me lost it was so long and talky. Like Roger Ebert noted, it was a great drama unfolding in the real and unplanned sense until the hokey voice over arrived. The Sprechers seem to have liked their characters so much they could not give them a negative resolution or denouement of any kind. It seems dad was selling insurance and maybe he wouldn't sign a life story release or they just couldn't hurt his feelings. I kept thinking "Push Billy Crudup into the ice pond, you idiot. Make up your mind about something." Unfinished film project rates a D plus.