Melissa Leo won a surprise Oscar ­nomination for this unusual, low-budget film. Homicide fans won't be surprised by the strength of her ­performance, as she was a TV series regular in the mid-90s. Here, she is a struggling mother of two, newly abandoned by her gambling-fixated husband, living in a trailer and pushed for cash just before Christmas. A financial solution crops up: smuggling illegal aliens across the border. This is the Canada/New York state crossing, complicated by a Mohawk reservation between the ­territories and giving the film, written and directed by debutant Tennessean Courtney Hunt, a chilly flavour all its own. I didn't always believe in the plot, but I always believed in Leo's character, free of any hint of "acting".