The corpse of a private school student (played by Thomas Gibson in flashbacks) is found in a frozen river near a small town. The local authorities would prefer to dismiss the case as a simple suicide or an accident, but an honest cop named Abel Grey (Edward Burns) cannot ignore the clues pointing to a more complex truth. Perhaps a female student Carlin (Rachelle Lefevre) knows more about the case? A kind and beautiful female teacher Betsy (Jennifer Ehle) might also be able to help.The film is clearly work of professionals: the direction, photography and music give no reason to complain, but the movie is not without its problems. My main criticism is the lead character Abel who is left a somewhat blank and uninteresting vanilla hero in the end. Some brief scenes casting light on his childhood traumas aren't enough to make him appear as a real, living person, and the handsome but uncharismatic Edward Burns cannot bring him to life either. The other main character, the young man that is found in the river at the beginning, is a much more riveting character and left me wishing I had learned more about his inner life. The redheaded Carlin character would also have deserved more attention at the expense of Abel.Ultimately The River King is a watchable if somewhat forgettable mystery tale. There are occasional highlights, the haunting ending being an obvious example, but overall the film doesn't grab the attention of the audience very tightly and just slips by for the most part. It's not really a bad film though, so watch it if the premise sounds interesting to you.

This film is a highly superior offering from a British director of a film made in Canada, apparently Nova Scotia, during a relentless winter with heavy snow. The evocation of a haunting atmosphere from those dramatic settings is brilliantly done, and helps make this moody piece even more brooding, melancholy, and tantalising. The director is Nick Willing, best known for his magical 'Photographing Fairies' (1997), and rarely allowed to make the transition from television to features, for reasons unknown, as he has so much talent. A very strong performance by Ed Burns gives this film just the bone structure it needs, as he is perfectly cast as a bewildered but determined small time cop faced with a mysterious death of a boy which evokes his own demons of his older brother's suicide. The script by David Kane is strangely minimalist, with dialogue often consisting of rows of three dots. I don't know how this could have been filmed without the director telling the actors what to signify during all the silences, which they do excellently, so that the film almost becomes a silent movie at times. This is facilitated by the superior abilities of Jennifer Ehle, who for years has been one of the leading lights of top quality British TV drama, and who conveys enough mystery and ambivalence with her every expression to be perfect for suggestive thrillers like this. The kids at boarding school give strong performances, and are all Canadians. Rachelle Lefevre is multi-layered as the girl Carlin, and must be as ambivalent and mysterious as Ehle for different reasons. Thomas Gibson is compelling as the ill-fated boy around whom the story revolves, and Jamie Thomas King manages to be Mister Nasty Boarding School Bully with appropriate sneers and arrogance, which chill the spine, and one really can believe him to be capable of murder. The story is was a boy killed, did he kill himself, or did he die by accident? And buried deep in the background, but surfacing more towards the end, is the cop with the troubled past. He is surrounded by completely corrupt colleagues on the local police force who are all taking payoffs from the expensive boarding school to cover up the grisly events. It all works extremely well, is gripping, moody, and well-crafted, and has a haunting after-taste.

"The river king" is not particularly original,but it creates an atmosphere with its snowy landscapes and its frozen rivers.The entire town seems to be wrapped in mystery and to be the center of a huge conspiracy which would involve some grown-ups too:the science teacher's words sometimes recall some of "the skulls" ideology,as they deny any individualism.The movie would have been much better,had the writers concentrated on Gus's personality.The audience needs to know more about the unfortunate student .Too much time is given over to the love affair between the detective and the lit teacher (we know since "dead poets society " that only lit teachers are nice teachers).And haven't we had enough of these "stories in the story" of the cop's youth ,a trick which has been used a hundred times or more?

I like Burns, he does all he can with this part. But, I detest movies with no conclusion, and this one is one of those. You could leave at any time, and know as much as those of us dumb enough to stick it out to the end.Great visuals, good music. Beautiful winter scenes. A couple of nasty guys who you'd like to see put in their place. A nice Streep-clone girlie figure. She's engaged to one of they nasty guys. But, why is she in the story at all? Even a ghost is thrown into the cast.Odd love scenes .... he and she are just talking, then suddenly sucking face like they were magnetized. When they pull apart, you almost miss the "plop" sound from cartoons. They swear off each other, agree to call it quits, and then get right back to swapping spit.I can see why this went straight to DVD .... somebody had the brains to save the distribution and promO costs, and cut their losses.