Kate Beckinsale made the most of the big freeze on the Canadian set of her new film Whiteout, even though the temperatures literally took her breath away. The Brit was so unprepared for the frigid conditions in Manitoba and Winnipeg she was left voiceless for a day after sucking in the icy temperatures when she first ventured outside.

She says, "There are so many possible ways to die there of being too cold - like if you've ever had an alcoholic drink and you breathe in a westerly direction, you're gonna die! We all panicked. When we first went outside, all the men had beards full of ice, which I thought was make-up department tests - but it wasn't; it was real. My hair froze to a point just from breathing on it. I thought, 'I'm from England and I'll be able to handle the cold,' but I've never known anything like that. The first day, I wasn't able to speak because my whole throat closed from that first breath."

But Beckinsale found a great benefit to being in a place so cold: "In cold weather they have great things inside to do, so I went to museums and children's theater places with my daughter, who was there for the whole thing. Outside they had a frozen park which was one of the greatest things I'd ever done."

Image © Albert L. Ortega / PR Photos

(This news article provided by World Entertainment News Network)