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Yes, I know. This is a fairly rote, openly derivative thriller that struts its influences proudly, but it also honors them smartly. In fact, you could be forgiven for assuming you're seeing a spirited salute to John Carpenter's The Thing. But unlike that movie, I never really bought into Blood Glacier’s backstory. There aren’t more than a handful of locations in this movie and they’re against landscape that won’t look much different the day after the apocalypse, anyway. And while the movie initially suggests that human activity was to blame for this, aside from a mildly ironic rant late in the film, the story never pushes that theme particularly hard. Elements of the story are meant to portend the end of humanity but having already failed to convince us with words, the film also fails to show us with images.

But the bigger issue for me was that I never got the intended sense of isolation the characters were supposedly experiencing. This time, our heroes are not in Antarctica, a place we have no trouble visualizing as remote. They’re just in the mountains, evidently where a pair of old people stuffed with ham and horseradish can reach on foot in a few hours. Most of the drama in this story comes not from the location, but from the fact that everyone keeps losing track of the satellite phone, which they could easily use to call for help. It’s definitely harder to root for stupid people, so I’m not sure why this compromise was made.

Benjamin Hessler is the writing credit on Blood Glacier, and I will credit his work with capturing the tone of the movie that so clearly inspired it. A lot of his cornball dialog works as intended simply because the actors delivering it also understand that tone. Liebmann’s performance is nothing less than evocative of RJ MacReady, 15 years older and twice as bitter. In fact, I’m comfortable saying that across the board, the acting in this film is one of the best things about it. And how often do you get to say that about a horror film? Blood Glacier could easily have been a shamelessly derivative knockoff, but instead it comes off as a lovingly crafted homage and a pretty damn solid thriller on its own merit.

That is, all the way up to the new frontrunner for the prestigious M Night Shyamalan Double Facepalm Ending award. Obviously I can’t say much more than that, but I'm willing to say that a movie I'd just invested a fair amount of time being impressed by now felt a little like a fart joke. I did my best to be forgiving, but most of my fellow audience chuckled openly – and not in the way that says “Wow, that’s really clever!” No, it was in the way that says “Did you seriously just give me a birthday cake made out of bat droppings?” I’m comfortable assuming the scene in question was not meant to feel that way.

But look at it this way - if all you have to do is chop three lousy minutes to produce a successful homage to one of the greatest horror films of all time, then the movie works. This is not a must own, or even a must see. But if you enjoy scrappy, inventive low budget horror movies even a little, consider Blood Glacier a big win for audience and director alike.

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