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Verdict: Pretty but chilly.

Details: Starring Ethan Hawke,Youki Kudoh and Max von Sydow. Rated PG-13 for disturbing images, sensuality and brief strong language. 2 hours, 6 minutes.

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Review: We're supposed to be moved by the star-crossed, cross-cultural love affair at the heart of "Snow Falling on Cedars." But it's a romance as chilly and indifferent as the flakes blanketing its upstate Washington location.

Set shortly after the end of World War II, the movie stars Ethan Hawke as Ishmael Chambers, a small-town newspaper reporter whose latest story is the mysterious death of a fisherman (Eric Thal), discovered tangled in his own net. When Japanese-American Kazuo Miyamoto (Rick Yune) is arrested for what seems to be murder, it stirs up the town's collective memories of its wartime mistreatment of anyone Japanese. For Ishmael, it also stirs up memories of his youthful affair with Hatsue (Youki Kudoh), now Kazuo's wife.

The movie re-creates the deportation of Japanese-American citizens to internment camps and shows authorities confiscating families' firearms and valuable personal property. While this period remains a blight on our history, "Snow" uses the internment as a simplistic symbol of racism to give itself the illusion of importance.

Director Scott Hicks ("Shine") tries to maintain that illusion by filming the best-selling novel in stylish ways meant to distract from the plot's thinness. He presents the story as an impressionistic mosaic, using swift edits that constantly shift between the snowy present and the idyllic love affair of young Ishmael and Hatsue (played by Reeve Carney and Anne Suzuki, who frolic picturesquely through the forest and along the beach).

The film drowns scenes in swelling organ music and chorales that try to goose up audience emotion. It's fascinating to watch if you're the sort of movie buff who goes to the multiplex primarily to see a director flex his muscles and try to jump-start a flat-lining plot. But those expecting an engrossing story might tire of "Snow's" substitution of style for substance. Filled with moody images of slate-gray water and snow-silvered trees, the movie is one of the most visually beautiful in a season full of gorgeous movies. But dramatically, it's terminal.

That's due in part to Hawke's role, a largely passive character who spends much of the film's running time dwelling on the past, or not trying to solve the mystery of the fisherman's death. It doesn't help that the romance between his and Kudoh's characters is something we hear about instead of feel.

The fine but underchallenged cast includes Sam Shepard as Hawke's enlightened father, a newspaper editor; James Cromwell as the courtroom judge; and Max von Sydow as the defense lawyer whose big summation speech manages to stir a little passion into the movie's final act.

— Steve Murray, Cox News Service

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