Anyone who can sit though this endless saga of perpetual wild-eyed suspense has got to have about as much nothing upstairs as the creators of this worthless butt stain of an awful movie. The viewer is forced through one and a half hours of a dimensionless young woman trying to find her equally dimensionless brother in a depressing landscape of bad haircuts and shotguns.It would be OK if there were a few suspenseful moments leading up to a meaningful conclusion, but since the character development in this movie is about as neglected as a sweaty gym sock on the seat of a downtown express bus, by the time the determined yet sexy heroine catches up with her worthless idiot of a brother, nobody could care one doo-doo about anything but this movie ending as quickly as possible.

Possible spoiler. Keith Miller has been in jail for a year when the film starts. He robbed a store drunk and then killed a boy on a bicycle. He gets 15 years sitting in a Canadian jail listening to Anne Murray. His daughter Alison (Dianna Agron), the town lesbian, is given guardianship of her 17 year old brother Brandon ( Jared Abrahamson). Brandon spends his time as a miserable teen. When Earl (John Sampson), a man who the whole town hated, is killed, Brandon, the main suspect goes missing and Alison plays Nancy Drew and uncovers secrets about the town. The investigation was "Winterbone" slow. The acting wasn't bad, but the pace needed to be better. Also all of the town secrets come at us at 75 minutes into the film without any real clues. We already have a guy we don't like and know it is going to go to him, but does so in a real idiotic fashion. Guide; F-word. No sex or nudity

Yet another in the long line of disappointing thrillers. No real story , no thrills, not even moderately interesting. There isnt really much more to add other than dont waste and hour and a half of your precious time on this turd of a movie like I did!Siebert put it well - It is a butt stain on a pair of dirty old underpants of a movie!

I didn't like this film. The opening scene was interesting but What follows is and endless series of elongated scenes that move the story along very slowly and very uneventfully. I was solidly bored 30 minutes in and lost anything but very superficial interest in most of what was happening for another half hour which is when the pace crept up slightly.The synopsis is fairly accurate, and nothing executed in the screenplay makes it any more interesting than detailed in this two sentence outline. It's quite a dark and creepy affair, often with low lit scenery and an Erie soundtrack which the film relies on heavily to establish mood and convey tension. It's fairly bland, and even with twists in the plot around 'who did what and why', there are few undulations. Suspense is limited as is the build up of intrigue as the plot unfolds. Even though I didn't like it, I don't necessarily think it's a bad film, more that it lacks some crucial elements to make it interesting. As it is it's inadequate, but it does have some promise, or at least, it does show signs that whoever made it has. I don't like to be unfairly unkind when writing these reviews because I'm only too aware that no one deliberately makes a bad film or one with pitfalls. Often they are due to factors I couldn't possibly fathom, but here possibly a little inexperience could be the culprit, but that's just a guess. Some aspects of this film are very good but the pacing is too slow, particularly in the fist half where scenes are also lacking in interesting content. Still some credit is due as its not a half bad job.I don't recommend it because I don't think it has enough to offer as a suspense thriller, but you could still do worse than watch it in idle time.