Across a Frozen River, And Across a Border

I’m crouching down and looking out the window at a plane that’s pushing back from the jetway at Bradley Airport. I’m off on another adventure, leaving behind the hussle and bustle of the businesses for a faraway place in South America. This will be a long day of flying, and thank goodness BDL has free Wi-Fi and plugs!

Last night we watched a movie called “Frozen River,” that told the story of Mohawk Indians who smuggle people into the US. The way they do it is over the frozen river, which at first the white woman played by Melissa Leo is leery of. “Semis drive over this,” says the tough, short-haired Mohawk woman named Lily Two Trees. The pair make an unlikely team, brought together because Lily drove off with her deadbeat husband’s car. It seems that this model, with its button latch hood, is prized by the smugglers, who bundle the confused Chinese or Pakistani citizens into its trunk to drive them across to freedom, a dingy motel on the New York side.

Susan needs money to pay for the doublewide trailer that she’s been dreaming of, a few steps up from where Lily lives, in a tiny 20-foot RV which is very cold at night up there near the Canadian border. The men tow the giant modular home to her decrepid trailer residence, but tell her they won’t leave it unless she has more money to pay them. So when Lily tells her that putting these people in their trunk can yield them wads of cash, she goes for it.

The movie portrays the sad life up there, where the Mohawk ‘Res’ straddles a lake, and goes across the US/Canada border. It makes an idea place for smuggling, much to the chagrin of the local state troopers. They are on to Lily and warn Susan, but she needs that final payment so bad, well, it’s worth it.

They’re calling my flight to board, so I’ll just say, well it doesn’t always end up the way you want, yet the film progresses into a somewhat comfortable conclusion. From here on out, Readuponit will be about Chile and Patagonia, I can’t wait to set foot again in South America!