Review: 'Infinite Storm' needs more than Naomi Watts' performance against the elements

The drama “Infinite Storm” gives Naomi Watts the one-against-the-wild showcase that Robert Redford had in “All Is Lost” and Emile Hirsch had in “Into the Wild” — but here, it’s not quite enough to fill the bill.

Watts plays a real-life person, Pam Bales, an experienced hiker and climber who one day, in October 2010, went on a hike up her local peak, Mt. Washington in New Hampshire. Her friend (Denis O’Hare) back at the diner in town warns her of the storm the weather service has predicted is coming, and Pam says she’ll be careful and head back well before the storm hits. Pam’s a veteran of the local search-and-rescue team, so she’s confident she’ll come back down safely.

At the trailhead, Pam notices a car with no apparent owner. She starts her hike, and after a while, the snow and the wind turn harsh. That’s when she seeks sneaker prints in the snow, leading to a guy (Billy Howle) who’s unresponsive and improperly dressed for the surroundings and the weather. He’s barely conscious, and unable to give his name — so Pam calls him John.

The bulk of first-time writer Joshua Rollins’ script involves Pam gutting out a way to get herself and John down from that mountain, through howling winds and freezing temperatures. There’s also a backstory, with flashbacks of Pam playing with her two daughters — who, notably, are nowhere to be seen in the non-flashback scenes.

Polish-born director Malgorzata Szumowska does her best work guiding Watts through the physically grueling performance, braving the elements in New Hampshire (or, really Slovenia, where the movie was filmed). Watts gives her all, physically and psychologically, in depicting Bales’ inner struggles and her grit as she wills herself into saving this stranger from the mountain.

Where “Infinite Storm” falls short are in Szumowska’s and Rollins’ efforts to try to retrofit a larger life lesson onto this simple survival story. It doesn’t help Rollins that Hoyle’s character is a cipher, a blank slate onto which Rollins — and, apparently, Bales — could write whatever narrative they needed to make it home. 

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‘Infinite Storm’

★★1/2

Opens Friday, March 25, in theaters everywhere. Rated R for some language and brief nudity. Running time: 104 minutes.