Pam Bales (Naomi Watts) is an experienced mountain hiker who takes a personal trip on the Jewell Trail near Mt. Washington, NH each year as a form of meditation and time for personal reflection.  The weather takes a turn for the worse when the temperatures start to drop, and a blizzard sets in.  As the storm rages on, she comes across an unresponsive man on the side of the mountain with her, who she names John (Billy Howle), and Pam’s training as a trail guide kicks in as she helps the man come to and navigate back down the mountain. 

Infinite Storm is based on a real-life rescue in 2010.  Written by Joshua Rollins and directed by Malgorzata Szumowska, the 97-minute inspirational film from Bleecker Street has some nice vistas but is ultimately ill-conceived and falls flat.  In no way is this taking away from the heroism displayed by real-life Pam, but the structure and execution on the screen do not serve the story well.  Despite the trials of nature, the story is very internal which does not translate well to the screen and feels better suited for a profile in a magazine. 

Rollin’s script is very stingy with the details in a presumed effort to create some interest to carry the first act that finds Pam mostly alone against the winter storm.  The solitary element of these survival stories is always tough for a screenwriter as so much of the strife is internal.  Infinite Storm is no different, but thankfully some of the challenges Pam faces in that first act are interesting enough to keep us engaged.  He structures it in brief time-stamped chapters to show us only the action which is a smart move, and while it proves Pam’s skills as an outdoorsman, it does little to tell us what is actually motivating and driving her. We see the “what” but not the “why” of her journey. 

When she meets John, again, Rollins continues to withhold the details of the characters.  Without any real idea of who John is, it is hard for us to connect to him in any meaningful way other than we realize Pam cares for him on a human-to-human level.  He does little to earn it, especially early on, and actively seems to push us away as he fights Pam’s suggestions and even goes so far to charge at her when she has him out of arm’s reach.  As the film wears on, he does begin to soften but it is hard to say we ever trust him.  With one half of the two-hander untrustworthy and both leads practically strangers to us, Infinite Storm is a really hard film to stay invested in because as a character-driven story, we have no idea who these people are. 

The nature shots in the film are nice enough, though with everything covered in snow after a while they lose some of their luster.  When we are with Pam and John, unfortunately, Szumowska succumbs to the temptation of shakycam, and while it works because the survival story is very hands-on and there is always that race against the clock franticness, it is still very distracting in its overuse. To make matters worse, the camera placement is also very confusing at times as it is purposefully obscuring our view from being able to clearly make out what is happening on screen.   

Infinite Storm is a tough film to enter into given not only the nature of the story but also the structure of the script.  It is an inspiring story for sure, but opening the film with the insistence that this was based on true events adds such a high burden of proof the film must provide to justify why it was made.  Simply put, Infinite Storm does not prove itself and, as such, the film feels very hollow and without purpose.  On a surface level, it wants to drive home a profound message about the fragility of life and how to honor those we love by never giving up, but because Rollins keeps so many details close to the chest and we never really come to know or care for these characters until very late in the run time, we are ambivalent to the lessons they learn.