After a gorgeous opening shot of snow covered landscape, a car comes into shot which we follow. The car gets snowed in and a local helps the driver find the extremely remote town she is going to be working in - she's a nurse covering for the absent doctor. She gets strange responses from the locals, who she is at the mercy of really. They are polite but dismissive of her (perhaps as a young woman) they are helpful but intrusively so.
This all gives a bit of that Wicker Man feeling of willingly stepping into a world you do not understand and have no control over. She has nobody around her that she can trust, even when speaking to her parents on the phone, they resent her for leaving. There is an oddly oppressive tone, it easily could have been a horror film opening. This is partly down to the performances of the local characters and the setting - you feel the cold, dark, bleak - I found a similar feel in that sense to Let the right one in.
Something happens, just on but almost off screen, as she is being hassled by a local. Indirect consequence of her actions set things in motion for the rest of the film but admirably weren't made obvious, so you only realise it's importance later. After all, in a deep snowstorm, secrets are easily covered. Someone says 'Once this snow melts away, you'll see the paradise under it' - but it never melts, and the tone of danger and loneliness never lifts. I think this film is above all an exercise in tone, which is relentlessly uneasy and like a coiled spring, felt like things could erupt into a blizzard of activity at any moment
- on that criteria, it is a success.
The title is interesting. The community is fearful of reports of a bear prowling around. The snow and the bear are the two biggest threats to life in the land, and both are blamed but in fact neither are responsible for the death of a local. I won't go into details about this but perhaps the real threat to life for someone living here is the other people around you.
Themes of superstition, mob mentality, outsiders in a strange land and man vs nature are all touched upon. The central performance was really good. I liked the somewhat open ended conclusion, an enigmatic final scene makes the film live in your memory, which is crucial.
4 out of 5
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