The Iceman Melteth

Cool As Ice...if by "cool", you mean "laughably" and by "as ice" as in "bad", then yes the title of this 1991 classic is accurate.


Cool As Ice is the story of a loner, Johnny Van Owen, drifting into a small town with his homies after one of their motorcycles breaks down. While there, they meet the locals and adapt to their environment by attending their social functions and dancing occasionally in driveways or the street. Johnny finds time to fall in love with Kathy, the local hottie with a promising future at an undisclosed college. The problem is that Kathy is serious with her boyfriend, Nick, yet unknowingly yearns for something more than the local stud. She wants the mystery and danger of Johnny Van Owen.

Meanwhile, her parents are forced to reveal the secret they've been hiding from her all this time for two brutes threaten to shake the balance of their nice family. As Johnny and Kathy fall for each other, Kathy's father is not so sure about Johnny and questions his involvement, more importantly, his arrival in town around the same time as the goons. It's like Wild At Heart but with sex, action, violence, quirky characters.

Wait...what is this you say? Wild At Heart had all of things. Actually, yes it did. Come to think of it, Cool As Ice didn't have any of those things except for some action. It, however, did have Vanilla Ice, Michael Gross and the actor who played Superboy on the early 90's syndicated TV series. So, stuff it David Lynch. You and your awesome movies are no match for Vanilla Ice and his crew.

Much like the Fat Boys and Run DMC in their movies, this was another movie made for a rapper teetering toward the decline of their popularity. The only difference between this film and those films is that Vanilla Ice's popularity was pretty much over. By the time this film was released in the fall, Vanilla Ice had been beaten up by the media, Jim Carrey and In Living Color, 3rd Bass, Suge Knight and some other dudes on a balcony, the public, life, etc. If the movie hadn't been made, his career still would have disappeared but the film didn't help. The film, however, is so bad that it becomes awesomely bad.

The acting and dialogue alone is pure gold. The only movie made for a musician that could rival this would be From Justin To Kelly (oh yes, it's coming at some point) Both films feature lots of pointless dialogue and paper thin plots but only this has Vanilla Ice. Keep in mind, a good 11-12 minutes of the film are of him rapping. So, take that Kelly Clarkson and Justin Guarini.

Cool As Ice is the cheesefest that Snakes On A Plane should have been. From beginning to end, montages, horrible dialogue, lame music, the lack of knowledge of its own cheesiness and the fact that Gweneth Paltrow almost had the role of Kathy (her father said no thus preventing Cool As Ice from permanently staying in circulation. Just think if Jennifer Aniston had said no to Leprechaun, the world would be damned) help make this the perfect movie for friends to gather, watch and laugh at. In the future, when your kids ask who is Vanilla Ice, show them Cool As Ice and that will explain why his mainstream appeal and career were cut short like a Milli Vanilli concert ruined by a messed up, lip-synced loop.

Word To You Mother!

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