The Breaking Ice

4/30/2024

No matter how hard a film tries to convey a profound message through imagery and symbolism, if it doesn’t have a cohesive narrative underlying that undertaking, it’s not likely to succeed. Such is the case with this latest offering from writer-director Anthony Chen, who tells the story of three diverse but disconnected twenty-somethings (Dongyu Zhou, Haoran Liu, Chuxiao Qu) seeking to find their way in life in the northern Chinese city of Yanji, not far from the North Korean border. Set in the dead of winter, this unlikely trio comes together through impromptu (and, in all honesty, seemingly improbable) circumstances, quickly and inexplicably becoming bound by a suspect sense of chemistry. After coming together, they subsequently embark on a carefree weekend of dining, drinking, dancing an