A mother deliberately drives onto a frozen lake with her son. The boy escapes before the car crashes through the ice with the mother willingly waiting for death. In Oslo, expert police detective Harry Hole (Michael Fassbender) is approached by adoring rookie cop Katrine Bratt (Rebecca Ferguson) about cases of missing women. The perpetrator leaves behind snowmen at his crime scenes.
This is a disjointed muddle. I desperately try to follow every bit and pieces but things keep falling through the cracks. There are top level talents drawing the short sticks. Certainly, this movie is populated with award winning actors but everybody is wasted on this material. There are some oddly comedic scenes and I'm not sure if it's supposed to be funny. Val Kilmer is on top of that list and the fumigator has these weird jokey scenes. They stick out like sore thumbs. Harry Hole needs a new name or maybe it's another joke. More than anything, there are disconnections in the flow and the storytelling. I can see the popular criticism although this movie is not completely irredeemable. The filming looks good. The director blamed the mess on the shooting schedule but even at its best with all the pieces in place, this is a soapy pulpy rambling crime mystery thriller. The ceiling is not that high and this movie is closer to its floor.
