Ice Princess Skates to the Top of the Class
Casey Carlyle (Michelle Trachtenberg) is a high school student caught up striving to achieve her mother Joan’s (Joan Cusack) unrealized collegiate dreams. Mom wants her to win a prestigious physics scholarship from Harvard. Casey’s more than happy to acquiesce. She throws herself into an ingenious science project that could send her straight to the head of the class. After all, it’s not like the science-nut teen’s social schedule is exactly overflowing with party invites or date requests.
Besides, the project has a serious upside. Casey’s focusing on the physics of figure skating, analyzing the local amateur skaters practicing at her neighborhood rink. She adores skating; her dreams of floating down the ice like Michelle Kwan or Sarah Hughes are an aspirational fairy tale. Casey even manages to self-finance beginner lessons from infamous skating champion Tina Harwood (Kim Cattrall), a town resident, and everyone who cares to watch can clearly see the spunky 17-year-old is a natural.
There is nothing unpredictable about Disney’s latest teen girl confectionary treat Ice Princess. Just by watching the saccharine-laced trailers you can tell exactly what is going to happen. The film overflows in inspirational sports genre clichés. If it has a single original idea in its head, I sure as heck couldn’t find it. I should loathe this flick with a passion.
Funny how things rarely work out like you think they will. Ice Princess isn’t just a surprise; it’s a wonder. I couldn’t help but bask in blissful happiness as I watched it delicately unfold. Meg Cabot (author of The Princess Diaries books) and Hadley Davis’s story is solidly moving, skating down a familiar track yet still managing to do so with subtlety and without didactically pounding its purposefully melodramatic themes into the audience’s head with a schmaltzy mallet. This drama is an intoxicating treat delivered in the heartwarming old-school Disney tradition. I loved it.
The primary reason for my reaction can be directly tied to the performance of young Trachtenberg. She’s sublime, slipping Casey’s Cinderella ice skates onto her feet with vivacious ease. The young woman is a natural and shimmers brightly up on the silver screen, bringing depth, passion, and a realistic intensity to her character that is all but guaranteed to speak to little girls everywhere. Trachtenberg’s spunky, naturally exuberant portrayal is a total joy.
The rest of the cast is equally solid. Cattrall brings some unforeseen shades of menace to her win-at-all-cost stock character, while Cusack makes more of her thinly written, unintentionally smothering helicopter parent than any lesser actor could have ever dreamt of duplicating. Both Hayden Panettiere, playing the popular girl who is also the coach’s skating prodigy daughter, and Trevor Blumas, as her sexy red Zamboni-driving older brother, are also perfect fits for their otherwise stock characters. But it’s pipsqueak, real-life amateur figure skater Kirsten Olson who steals the show. Nicknamed ‘The Jumping Shrimp,’ she’s a hyperactive dynamo of charisma and unrestrained energy, stealing the movie right out from under her more seasoned costars whenever the opportunity arises.
Ice Princess may not be high art, but who says it needs to be? Director Tim Fywell (I Captured the Castle) handles the material with confidence, letting the scenario’s simple charms and the sterling performances from the ensemble speak for themselves. From top to bottom, this delightful Disney throwback is a class act. While it might not break any new cinematic ground, it sure as heck skates across a frozen pond of enchantment rather marvelously.
Film Rating: 3 (out of 4)
