The trailer for the John Cusak film The Ice Harvest depicts a dark comedy from Caddyshack director and Ghostbusters star Harold Ramis. Unfortunately, somewhere along the line the comedy takes a backseat to the dark, steering The Ice Harvest and into one confusing mess of an anti-holiday holiday movie.

The concept is, admittedly, mildly chuckle-inducing – a schmuck of a lawyer steals $2 million (and change) from the mob, but icy Kansas Christmas Eve weather foils his getaway plans (insert shot of Cusak slipping on ice and landing flat on his back).

You’d expect the team of Ramis, Cusak and the always-funny Oliver Platt to pull off the ironic slapstick, but instead they deliver a surprisingly unfunny who’s-conning-who thriller, that, without the humor, is a big blank of a movie.

The Ice Harvest doesn’t seem to know what kind of movie it is – holiday family drama (Platt mangles a turkey leg as he berates his cold father-in-law), noir sex-club caper (Gladiator star Connie Nielson plays the ultra-vamp owner of a strip joint, Cusak’s favorite hangout) or mob drama (Billy Bob Thorton goes postal with a golf club, repeatedly beating the foot locker in which he’s stuffed a hitman – the film’s only hilarious moment).

If the Coen brothers had gotten their hands on this, it would be a black-tinged laugh riot. As it is, The Ice Harvest is plenty black, but limited on the laughs. m