User reviews

Not sure who is my favorite from the 2. But both seem to love the 1-man-show kind of films which have absurd and nonsensical stories.

The Ice Road is...just another Liam Neeson movie. Obviously Nick Cage would have liked to be in this one, but Liam got there first.

Realism went for vacation here. Trucks and truckers after having seen this film are probably furious with these completely wrong and unbelievable scenes.

But, that's the Hollywood magic.

So folks this ain't a documentary but an action film set in cold Canada involving trucks, mines, bad people and ice roads.

In fact, it's an enjoyable action flick.

It needs to be seen with the right amount of patience, to go through all the silly dialogue moments and the unreal truck scenes.

Maybe the cinema experience helps too.

So, switch off and you might actually enjoy it.

5,9/10.

Watchable but predictible and very bad cgi for 2021.

I went into this screening with low expectations, because I had been told it was not a particularly good film. And, yes, some parts are just a bit hoaky, some characters are stereotypes, and there are some inconsequential goofs (dry clothing in the truck cab, after full immersion in the lake).

BUT, all that aside, the movie kept us on the edge of our seats for much of the time. It was an enjoyable evening / after-dinner movie! And, it is frankly much better than quite a few rather lame films that have come out, with thunderous publicity, in the last 18 months.

The plot involves a rescue mission, directed at saving workers in a collaposed mine. There are quite a few surprises (not outlined here, lest the comments become spoilers), so the plot is not particularly predictable. The all-too-common 'hyper-angst' that is frquently used in such movies is kept reasonably in check, so the action, and plot twists are at the forefront. Yes, there are several 'personal' storylines going on that form a backbone of the plot. But, they actually contribute to the suspense, rather than detract from it.

I nearly didn't watch this after reading the scathing reviews on here. I'm glad I ignored them. It not an Oscar winner but then some of them are as boring as hell. Think Gravity! It was a good storyline, reasonably acted, and kept my attention throughout. What more can you want from a film for a relaxing nights viewing. Folk on here are dissecting it like in an autopsy. Ignore all the negative comments and give it a go.

I don't agree with the negative reviews rating it the lowest score possible. For that there are countless worse movies than The Ice Road. I don't know what those people expect from a movie with Liam Neeson? Everybody knows exactly how a movie with him will end. Liam Neeson always wins so that's case closed. I thought the story was entertaining, with some good moments of suspense. Did it look realistic? No, certainly not. But it's a movie with Liam Neeson so what do you expect? I don't care about futile things like that, I just want entertainment, and that's exactly what I got.

Yes it's not "My Dinner with Andre" or "Mindwalk", but is a Liam Neeson, Saturday afternoon beer drinking action movie. It's pure escapism from S-show that is America 2021.

A script full of flaws, ridiculous situations, not believable at all. Nobody reviews these stories before financing? I couldn't even finish it, it was absurd. Poor Liam, this movie is really bad for his reputation.

I like Liam Neeson movies. His rugged 'Mike" character is back at it again. As a Netflix production "The Ice Road" suffers from the same illnesses that plagues many of their studios, mostly due to tight budget limit, such as cheap CGI, no connection to reality at parts, quick production that leaves erroneous shots (truck models that switch etc) and not being able to keep highly-paid actors for the length of the film.

HOWEVER, if you ignore all that and grab some popcorn and a drink, this movie is action packed and is a good thriller filled with relatable, albeit clichéd, characters, such as his mentally struggling brother and the female trucker. I really enjoyed these characters and the overall acting level is excellent from all actors.

As an action movie I think it gives F9 a run for its money and probably overall is better, if you get upset by impossible movie action, this movie is probably not for you, but for pure action flick I give it an exact score of 57 / 100.

It's hard to describe without actually experiencing it, but the dialog in this is one of the strangest things I've ever seen. Imagine if a 5 year Chinese child wrote an entire script for a movie and then a 5 year old Finnish child with some secondhand knowledge of English translated the script and it was phoned in by actors needing a quick paycheck. There's an actual line where an adult explains to another adult what the word "redundant" means. Not in context or for comedy. It's just a random, serious dialog exchange in the film. I've honest to God never seen anything I could compare this to. This not "bad" dialog, it's almost as if the script was auto-generated by a learning computer.

I also don't think anyone involved in trucking across ice roads was involved in this because even from even a basic layman's understanding of the physics all their decisions are dumb..like really dumb. I wish I could say this reminds me of "The core" but it's far far stupidier. This not cheap or lowrent...its compellingly broken. This is Ed wood bad. I suggest waiting until MST3K or rifftrax gets ahold of this. They are going to have a field day.

Some people on here were obviously looking for an Oscar worthy contender. Me, I was just looking for an escape for a couple of hours. It worked. Was it brilliant? No. Was it watchable? Yes. Liam made it better than it should of been. Supporting cast was capable. Yes the CGI was off in some places, but it's Netflix not a big screen release. Watch it for what it is. It'll pass time.

Predictable? Yes. Unrealistic situations? Yes. A simple minded script? Yes. So what! It's Liam Nieson. He can survive anything.... It has lots of action and suspense. If you want to watch a movie that has a lot of fight scenes, explosions, thrills and spills, then this is worth watching. Ignore the 1 star reviews and take a chance to watch it. It really isn't all that bad.

I must admit that whenever Liam Neeson stars in a movie, then it is a movie that I feel that I must watch, because he definitely has a track record of some rather impressive movies these last many years.

However, when I read the synopsis for "The Ice Road", I must admit that I wasn't exactly overly impressed. But still I sat down to watch the movie, as it had Liam Neeson in it, after all.

And I must say that writer and director Jonathan Hensleigh actually managed to put together a good old fashioned thriller. And while the concept may have seemed a bit off, then it actually worked out well enough with having the movie take place in the frigid colds of northern Canada.

The storyline told in "The Ice Road" is one that quickly lets its frostbite set in and director Jonathan Hensleigh doesn't let you go before the movie comes to an end. I have to admit that I was genuinely more than entertained by the story told in this movie.

Needless to say that Liam Neeson does it quite well in this movie as well, of course he did. And he was joined by the likes of Marcus Thomas, Laurence Fishburne, Amber Midthunder and Benjamin Walker for a rather interesting and fast-paced thriller.

"The Ice Road" was definitely a surprisingly good movie, and it was one that provided me with proper entertainment.

I am rating "The Ice Road" a six out of ten stars.

Watching the ice road was like watching a movie in slowmo. The fight scenes were terribly coordinated and dragged out. For such a simple objective the actors spent a lot of time standing around and bumbling about. The script was poorly written and the plot was thin. Shaky science and lame CGI. A poorly made mess.

If I understand it right, the Ice Roads are a real thing. The movie takes it to a new level of course. With cliches that will make you cringe and a predictable plot and twists that you will be able to see from miles away (no pun intended).

Still Neeson makes it worth your while - even when there are certain "woke" ideas woven into the whole thing. Still you can be inclusive and entertaining ... yes there are still flaws and the pacing is ... or rather tries to be as fast as it can be, so you won't be able to notice all the plot holes ... or ice holes? Like the trucks the movie would have to be on a steady speed ... not too fast, not too slow ... anyway, suffice to say that is not the case. But do you really care? Just switch off your brain and go along for the ride ... or do not watch at all. This never pretends to be a masterpiece ... but it is well shot, what more do you need?

This movie didn't need to be made. I'm surprised the eggheads at Netflix didn't just cast Adam Sandler. I'm neither a trucker or a miner, but I'm Insulted on the behalf of both professions.

If you're a trucker you will have a lot to critique.

Many times I thought they should be doing this and not that, but then they used that mistake to create a scene. My wife had to keep telling me "it's just a movie". If you know nothing about trucking like my wife you will enjoy this. Truckers can enjoy this suspenseful, and exciting story if you just put your knowledge on the shelf.

The title and plot synopsis of this film naturally reminds me - and surely many others - instantly of that TV-series "Ice Road Truckers" that I watched on Discovery Channel around the years 2007-2010. To be honest, the TV documentary/series was really cool and fascinating for a few episodes, but it got monotonous quite fast and, after two seasons, only the sensationalist-narrator still seemed to believe that something terrible might happen. Weird, in fact, that nobody thought sooner about turning this concept into an action-packed and spectacularly cinematographed thriller? Because, when it's fiction, you can sacrifice heroic truckers and allow for 18-wheel trucks to sink to the bottom as much as you want!

Who else than the mighty Liam Neeson would you expect in the role of hard-boiled, grumpy, persistent, and heroic ice road trucker? Well, actually, the role might as well have been played by either Bruce Willis, Nicolas Cage, or John Travolta. Since several years, they have all four chosen for a career full of standard but nevertheless entertaining and action-packed thrillers with a lot of violence. Neeson's role? A trucker who - in exchange for a massive sum of money, of course - accepts the immensely dangerous assignment of transporting supplies and an industrial drill towards Northern Manitoba, via frozen rivers and lakes in April (while they're normally only used until March) and reach a collapsed mine before 26 slowly suffocating miners completely run out of oxygen. The deadline is tight, the trip is already perilous, but the plot is further thickened with corporate shenanigans, sabotages left and right, and the fact Neeson must look after his mentally traumatized brother.

"The Ice Road" obviously isn't a great or even highly memorable movie, but it's exactly how I like my Liam Neeson action-movies: fast-paced, occasionally tense, implausible but spectacular, and full of loathsome bad guys in a corporate suit. The best way to describe the film is like a less brilliant version of the great French classic "Le Salaire de la Peur" (or its good William Friedkin remake "Sorcerer"), but then - duh - in a northern hemisphere setting. Sure, you can debate the imposed "woke" influences were needed, or if the vicious corporate tycoons covering up incidents hasn't become too much of a dreadful cliché by now, but you could also simply enjoy the straightforward action footage and the beautiful Canadian landscapes.