mich-leclair There is a dullness to this film that leaves one exhausted and somewhat irritated. The art direction is quite dull. The dialogue is repetitive to the point of being dull. The characters are extremely boring--one might even say dull. As a matter of fact, after viewing this, I had a tremendous urge to watch "Mr. BLANDings Builds his Dream House." Don't know why. Honestly, after hearing the actors yak for about a half hour, I found myself saying aloud, "Oh why don't you shut up!"Fans of poor choices will love this film. Others, not so much.

stephen-hoyland For me,they don't come much better than this. I particularly like Science- based and\or Sci-Fi Movies and the more contemporary the better.Like most enthusiasts of this genre, for me a good Science Movie has to have a believable premise - and,with perhaps a small stretch of the Imagination - this one fits the bill. Plenty of "scary-jumpy" moments,small twists and all sorts of things going on prevent us from getting bored The script Is exceptional and my only complaint Is that two or three of the actors - mentioning no names - just weren't right for the part,or - to put It another way - couldn't act their way out of a paper bag! Well worth seeing twice.

steelhyaena Here be potential spoilers, so here be a few carriage returns.When you realize the research station is abandoned, maybe it's best to not go into the lab. If you have to go into the lab, perhaps you shouldn't put your arm around the smellily-dead polar bear. (Is 'smellily' even a word? Is now...) If your common sense and intelligence flee you and you somehow screw up the above... the Thing To Do is actually contact CDC immediately, not play headgames and hide the fact that you have 'bugs in your *euphemism*'.The character of Federico had me swearing through this whole film. As I said, it wasn't the best, but it was entertaining in that 'Thing' kind of 'infectious-isolated' sort of way. Stop hatin'! It's a fun watch.

Paul Andrews The Thaw is set in remote Canadian Artic wilderness on Banks Island where global warming ecologist & activist Dr. David Kruipen (Val Kilmer) & his team discover a prehistoric frozen Woolly Mammoth which has started to thaw due to global warming, inside the Mammoth are hundreds of eggs belonging to a extinct species of insect like parasite creatures that lay eggs inside living host's that are then then eaten alive from the inside when they hatch. Members of the team become infected & Kruipen tries to prevent his daughter Evelyn (Martha MacIsaac) from reaching the base but she refuses to listen to him & along with some research students arrive at the research camp to find it deserted, soon they too become infected & once the realisation of what the insects may mean if they get back to civilisation the survivors try to find a way to destroy them before the entire world becomes infected & millions suffer a horrible death...This American & Canadian co-production was written & directed by Mark A. Lewis & is a fairly effective take on the often used 'various character's trapped in a remote location that are menaced by some sort of horrific threat (aliens, zombies, killers, mutated animals or parasitic bugs like here)' sub-genre that was much better than I had expected. When I was about halfway through The Thaw I kept thinking about how similar the premise & especially the location & general story is to the classic The Thing (1982) with the main exception the script substitutes an alien creature for parasitic bugs which is fine but generally speaking The Thaw obviously owes a lot to The Thing. The script is fairly tight & has a decent pace, it builds-up quite nicely although there's not much of an ending which might have been more to do with a lack of budget rather than a lack of ambition. The character's are alright but apart from Evelyn we learn very little about them other than what they do for a living or are students, having said that The Thaw is a better film for not being bogged down in dull teen talk that plague horror films. Lasting 90 minutes The Thaw has a few nice scenes & is perfectly watchable without ever really excelling at any point, you could do a lot worse.The script also has a prominent environmental message with Dr. Kruipen's misguided plan (in an obvious twist ending that makes little sense) to wipe out mankind & save the planet from destruction, it gets a little heavy handed at times & it's nothing no-one out there doesn't already know & I doubt The Thaw will change the way people think about global warming or other such issues although at least it tries. There's a bit of gore here, there's a nicely handled amputation as a guy has his arm cut off with a meat cleaver, there are various scenes of people with sores & half eaten flesh as well as the bugs do what they do best & eat people. It's unusual to say but the special effects in The Thaw are surprisingly good although not too large in scale, the CGI computer animated bugs look fine as do the on set make-up effects & fake blood.Filmed in British Columbia in Canada this had nice production values & actually looks like a proper film, while Lewis isn't the greatest of director's as he fails to inject much tension or outright horror into The Thaw at least there's no shaky hand-held camcorder photography & no machine gun editing so I have to give him lots of credit for that if nothing else. The acting is alright, although Val Kilmer gets near top billing he's only in it for about ten minutes & looks bored.The Thaw is fairly unoriginal & feels like a slightly tweaked rip-off of The Thing but it's perfectly watchable all the same, it was certainly a lot better than I have anticipated. For those who remember it The Thaw is also strikingly similar to the season one X-Files episode Ice (1993).