Aspen - Sci estremo

*** out of ****:

As a skier, I'm a little prejudiced to see a movie about skiing, with such good skiing action, and as someone who always thought of Aspen as one of the country's more overrated mountains, I'm happy to see it portrayed in such negative light (no one would ever make such a movie about Vail or Sun Valley, for example). Anyway, on to the film:

The film centers around two friends stuck in low-paying manual labor jobs, one of which, TJ, suddenly decides to go out and live the American dream. He wants to leave his blue-collar life behind and using his instincts and boldness, attain entrance into the upper echelons of society, in this case, skiing. Knowing he can't do it without his best friend Dexter, by his side, he convinces him in going along. The two embark in Aspen, and fall upon gorgeous women, a job they love, and fame and prestige. Well, at least one of them does. Dexter, although an able skier, does not get the ski instructor job as his friend does, and the two start to drift off onto two different paths. TJ gets all the breaks, and Dexter doesn't, to the point where it tears apart their friendship. One of the big strengths of the movie, was the authenticity and chemistry with which Berg and Gross display as friends, and the interesting, if not somewhat obvious paths, that the two take.

A couple of ladies make their way, into TJ's life on and off, one of which is played very well by Teri Polo, who's drop-dead gorgeous yet down-to-earth in this film, and who provides for one of the films most uplifting moments, when she arrives at Dexter's place right after he's hit rock bottom, and assertively throws his booze away, forces him into the shower, and to go jogging with her, so that he can regain control of his life, even though she always paid a lot more attention to T.J. The story is not afraid to dig into deep levels of tragedy, yet keep a balance, that makes it uplifting overall.

It's set in 1993, but there's a lot of 80s flavor in this. Along with the synthesizer-dominated score, T.J, is to a lesser extent the kind of Tom Cruise/Mel Gibson/Kurt Russell-like hero, who's just booming with masculinity. He's overconfident, he doesn't back down from a fight (including a fight with a comically villanous ski instructor who feels threatened by other good ski instructors, yeah that happens all the time on the ski slopes), he's strong and resilient, he goes full-force after whatever girls come his way, and he's clearly the good guy. On the whole, it's pretty action-packed and filled with plenty of genuine drama that I really do like it.

Bored and not able to sleep, I caught this film on late night television last night. I was intrigued by the opening credits, especially when I saw the names of fine Canadian actor Paul Gross and another favourite Trevor Eve, who starred in the wonderful British mystery series Heat of the Sun. I am also a fan of the old Chicago Hope, and it was nice to see Peter Berg in a very different role.

I am not a ski buff, and this film is not Citizen Kane. However, I found myself enjoying this flawed piece of work very much. Sure, the plot is goofy, implausible, predictable, and full of discontinuities. But I genuinely liked the heroes, took pleasure in their successes, felt sadness in their setbacks. Other reviewers have commented already on the gorgeous location photography and the skiing.

With commercials, this film ran almost 2.5 hours on TV, and I had little difficulty sitting through it. Sure, we all knew there would be a happy ending and the good guy would get the girl, but it still was an enjoyable bit of viewing on the way.

Worth a look if you are not a ski buff but like mindless romance/action. Must-see if skiing is your life.

Like many skiers in Colorado, as a ritual I pull out this DVD every season to get stoked for another year.

The transformative story about a Midwesterner moving to a ski resort and finding himself is compelling and often repeated in reality here in Colorado. Although the acting and details are not all together believable, the story line is strong enough to keep one's interest between ski scenes.

As a retired ski patroller however, the crevasse scene is hard to swallow. I have never seen a water filled crevasse in the middle of winter like the one T. J. fell into while skiing in the back country. Especially near 14,000 feet. But hey, Hollywood is at sea level and it adds to the drama. Despite this naive gaff, the movie has great ski scenes featuring Doug Coombs one of the great extreme skiers. The mountain scenery is also breath taking and was clearly filmed in Aspen.

The avalanche scenes on the other hand look all to real.

We got cable finally when I was ten or eleven and I must have watched this movie with my little sister twenty times. I recall first seeing Teri Polo in this film, and look how she turned out. Also, Peter Berg, an accomplished film director now. His Dexter Rutecki, though probably a poorly written part, was always resonant with me.

Then there was the rival instructor with the accent. Wasn't he in Spandau Ballet? Ah, memories. It gets certain moods right, like being in a Mountain town at the end of ski season. There's great footage of skiing and the story is probably crappy now, but it was enthralling enough for me when I was 11.

Aspen Extreme is in the mold of movies like All the Right Moves, Youngblood etc. nothing special but just a fun little movie. Paul Gross and Peter Berg are two guys from Michigan who go to Aspen as ski instructors (??!) and explore their new vista. Berg of Chicago Hope and Gross of Due South make an excellent partnership, I found myself rooting for them from the beginning. Gross is the pretty boy who captivates both the rich teaser and the super cute radio jockey (played by the captively cute Teri Polo). The movie is humorous for much of the first half, but then takes a darker turn, and tends to drag on in the second half as well. The ski scenes are okay but I felt like I was watching a specialty adventure sports channel, in other words it was overkill. Otherwise it's just a late night timewaster which I expected to be boring but instead was fun and a good little movie to watch with a lady friend. 5 out of 10.