In ‘Vertical Limit’, director Martin Campbell (Goldeneye)
gives us a concentrated dose of high altitude adrenaline. Like so many
Hollywood productions today, the plot is so basic that it seems to be
tailor-made for the comprehension of Forrest Gump. Peter and Annie
Garrett played by the preppy Chris O’Donnell (Batman Forever, The Bachelor)
and the pouty Robin Tunney (End of Days, Supernova) are emotionally
troubled siblings who went their separate ways due to the death of their
father in an extreme family outing.
The two reunite three years later upon K2, the ‘tougher to climb than
Everest’ mountain where Annie is part of an expedition team funded by an
arrogant capitalist played by Bill Paxton (Twister). She gets trapped
with the only 2 surviving members of her team with no hope but to
slowly die on K2. Armed with canisters of highly explosive nitro-glycerin,
Peter leads 5 unlikely mountain climbers to the rescue. Their
intention is of course, to ‘blow’ their way to the survivors with absolutely no
consideration for the rest of the snow-capped Himalayas. The
spectacular opening scene looks virtually identical to the one from ‘Mission
Impossible 2’ and the rest of the story, down to the gratuitous happy
ending, is yawningly predictable.
The brother sister relationship between O’Donnell & Tunney is
unconvincing, spurred by the fact that both are as bland as rice crackers.
Nonetheless, O’Donnell serves well as the wholesome American hero in the
perfect apple pie manner. Tunney is splendidly ornamental which is
characteristically consistent with her previous film roles. Despite
O’Donnell and Tunneys’ acting potential, both are reduced to play
stereotypically uninspiring roles in ‘Vertical Limit’. Upon a brighter note, Scott
Glenn is solid in his role as Montgomery Wick, a hard veteran mountain
climber.
