Dead of Winter (1987)Some acting roles need you to give it everything that you've got--sometimes a body part! Dead of Winter is a psycho thriller about a struggling actress named Katie McGovern (Mary Steenburgen) who is offered an unorthodox audition for a role in a movie by a tightly wound manservant named "Mr. Murray" (Roddy McDowall). The audition will take place at a remote house in upstate New York, where the film's producer, a "Dr. Lewis" (Jan Rubeš), has Mr. Murray give her a makeover and deliver an audition on video tape. Her job is to replace an actress named Julie Rose, who reportedly walked off of the set. But what Katie doesn't know is that she's going to have to give the performance of a lifetime if she ever hopes of getting out of this alive.
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Dead of Winter opens with an ambiguous prologue, depicting a woman in a trench coat picking up a satchel of cash from a bus station (through a complicated method of using a key to get another key, for some reason). Tension builds as the woman is tailed to a parking lot where she (unwisely) stops the car, gets out, makes a call, and returns to meet her fate. And then the wire cutters come out, aimed right at her lifeless ring finger. Cut away to Katie, awakening in bed with her boyfriend, Rob Sweeney (William Russ), on a (reportedly) bitter cold day in New York City, anxious about an audition. ("Reportedly", since there is a suspicious lack of cold breath from anyone outside in these scenes.) There are a few clues early on that Mr. Murray's audition isn't on the up and up, largely because he only seems to notice Katie because of her appearance and then offers her the opportunity for the role with some cash behind it. (Sure, sounds like many disreputable casting directors, but Mr. Murray's motivations are questionable for other reasons.) Yet even audiences with a casual understanding of how the movie making process works should tilt their heads at the perplexing circumstances of the offer and other incongruities, like how Mr. Murray and Dr. Lewis appear to know next to nothing about making movies. This has the unfortunate consequence of making Katie seem remarkably stupid, a quality that no one truly wants in a psycho thriller. Much of the tension in these kinds of movies comes from being able to relate to the protagonist's dilemma, but even if Katie is desperate enough to take on such an unusually risky assignment, she lets too many details escape her grasp early on for the sake of the plot. I'm tempted to refrain from spoilers, but suffice to say that as I can only recommend Dead of Winter as a novelty of the low-budget psycho thrillers of the Eighties, I'll carry on anyway.
The basis for Murray and Lewis' ruse is that they are a part of a complicated blackmail scheme, but it takes a while before Lewis finally spills the beans out Katie's role in it to her. And despite his evidence of lying to her on multiple occasions, she never takes her own suspicions seriously enough to act upon them until it is almost too late. Dead of Winter takes its name from the pervasive snow that her captors use as an excuse for why she cannot use the phone. Other than that, it really serves no other purpose for the plot, and only otherwise contributes to the atmosphere. This is actually the sole saving grace for Dead of Winter, as its (albeit inconsistent) musical score is often moody and sinister enough to keep you interested, shouldering much of the burden of heightening our anxiety where the implausibility of the story falters. Yet by the end of the movie, there are so many things that crop up as unreasonably unlikely (including two people rushing along while afflicted with impediments to their ability to walk) that the climax of Dead of Winter is downright comical. At other times, you could chalk it up to Arthur Penn (who is otherwise a master at his craft) phoning in the direction. For example, there are scenes that seem like they were intended to make sense (like the use of a heart monitor wirelessly keyed to an automatic player piano--no, seriously), yet don't because the cinematic dots just don't connect. There are a few moments that feel genuinely chilling, but with an emphasis on "few" here. Of these, the one that stands out the most involves Katie boarding up her room and passing out, followed by the camera panning over toward a mirror on the wall. Behind the mirror is Murray, cool and menacing, about to go to his dark business. Good stuff, but not enough to build a movie around in and of itself. Ultimately, Dead of Winter will no doubt be forever relegated to that bargain bin of cheapo thrillers that lined the shelves of movie rental stores in the Eighties, and you will more than likely spend the last half of the movie throwing your hands up in the air and/or laughing at its unlikely plot and implausibly stupid characters.
Recommended for: Fans of a dopey, if occasionally moody, thriller with (nevertheless) a competent cast and crew that feels squandered here. Perhaps the most frustrating thing about Dead of Winter is that were it made with more care and genuine interest in the subject matter, this could have been a real classic.
The basis for Murray and Lewis' ruse is that they are a part of a complicated blackmail scheme, but it takes a while before Lewis finally spills the beans out Katie's role in it to her. And despite his evidence of lying to her on multiple occasions, she never takes her own suspicions seriously enough to act upon them until it is almost too late. Dead of Winter takes its name from the pervasive snow that her captors use as an excuse for why she cannot use the phone. Other than that, it really serves no other purpose for the plot, and only otherwise contributes to the atmosphere. This is actually the sole saving grace for Dead of Winter, as its (albeit inconsistent) musical score is often moody and sinister enough to keep you interested, shouldering much of the burden of heightening our anxiety where the implausibility of the story falters. Yet by the end of the movie, there are so many things that crop up as unreasonably unlikely (including two people rushing along while afflicted with impediments to their ability to walk) that the climax of Dead of Winter is downright comical. At other times, you could chalk it up to Arthur Penn (who is otherwise a master at his craft) phoning in the direction. For example, there are scenes that seem like they were intended to make sense (like the use of a heart monitor wirelessly keyed to an automatic player piano--no, seriously), yet don't because the cinematic dots just don't connect. There are a few moments that feel genuinely chilling, but with an emphasis on "few" here. Of these, the one that stands out the most involves Katie boarding up her room and passing out, followed by the camera panning over toward a mirror on the wall. Behind the mirror is Murray, cool and menacing, about to go to his dark business. Good stuff, but not enough to build a movie around in and of itself. Ultimately, Dead of Winter will no doubt be forever relegated to that bargain bin of cheapo thrillers that lined the shelves of movie rental stores in the Eighties, and you will more than likely spend the last half of the movie throwing your hands up in the air and/or laughing at its unlikely plot and implausibly stupid characters.
Recommended for: Fans of a dopey, if occasionally moody, thriller with (nevertheless) a competent cast and crew that feels squandered here. Perhaps the most frustrating thing about Dead of Winter is that were it made with more care and genuine interest in the subject matter, this could have been a real classic.