Save Your Money, Dolls!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

                               This poster that you are seeing for the film version of "The Snowman," turns out to be more compelling than the finished film product.  I am sad to say that all the juice has been removed from Jo Nesbo's novel, and no amount of good casting can save it.

                               It also seems done on the cheap.  The opening sequence, explaining how the child evolved into a serial killer, gives the kid the name (Jonas) of another character.  And he does not kill his mother, as in the novel.  Rather, she dies from cracked ice, in a way similar to Susan Smith wanting to drown her children and herself.

                               The movie is reduced to an over extended treatment of a third rate TV show episode.  The big set piece inside Rakel's house, the iconic ski jump where the killer does himself in, does not even exist in this watered down mess.

                                 Who cares about the actors?  The only one who seems to rise to the occasion is J. K. Simmons, as a wealthy philanthropist.  He is the only one to tries his best to undertake some kind of European accent.  Without his efforts, one would think this was shot on a back lot in Hollywood, with computer generated set backdrops.

                                   Even Simmons' character is compromised.  In the novel, he is a sleazy gossip columnist, and it would have been fun to see him take on this role.  I had even suspected him as the killer, at one point, but that turned out to be a red herring.  Still, there was no reason to clean up this script. It wasn't for Disney, was it?  And even Disney got daring, with Hayley Mills (Love Her Always!!!!!!!) in "The Moon-Spinners!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"

                                   This "Snowman" deserves to melt!  Sooner done, sooner forgotten!!!!!!!!!!