Cliffhanger: Hang on!

Right its time for another post as I've been busy blogging on my tennis blog because of the Australian open, which is now over.  So..... this post will be on another movie and I've plumped for Sylvester Stallone's action flick, Cliffhanger, which after a streak of crap films saw him come back well with this one.  So with that let's get the hiking gear on and have a look.....

So the film begins with the main character, Gabriel "Gabe" Walker (Stallone) a mountain rescuer who is sent to pick up his friend and fellow mountain ranger, Hal (Michael Rooker) who is stranded with his girlfriend up on a narrow peak in the Rocky mountains.  Hal manages to transfer himself on a steel cable line over to a rescue helicopter piloted by Jessie (Janine Turner) who is also Gabe's girlfriend.  When Gabe fixes the harness for Hal's girlfriend Sarah as she transfers over the line, the harness begins to break and she is left dangling on the line.  Gabe goes to rescue her and he grabs just as her harness breaks off but he loses her grip as her glove falls, Sarah falls to her death 4000 feet below.  After this the story shifts to eight months later and Gabe returns to town since Sarah's funeral, and he is now racked with guilt and no longer climbs.  Gabe asks Jessie if she will come with him but she refuses to leave town as she says this is her home and she is annoyed at Gabe's insistance on feeling guilty over Sarah's death as she feels he did all he could.

Meanwhile the story moves to the US Treasury Department where treasury agent Richard Travers (Rex Linn) is assigned the task of transporting three suitcases of 30 million dollars via plane.  On the plane however Travers turns out to be a turncoat as he kills two of the other agents and wounds an undercover agent who twigs what Travers is up to.  Travers then get's in contact with another plane which is manned by a team of thieves lead by a former military intelligence member, the pyschotic Eric Qualen (John Lithgow).  Travers arranges to transfer the cases by a zip line between the two planes and he goes over himself onto the other plane, however before the cases can be transferred (by Travers pilot who is in on it as wel) the undercover agent shoots the pilot and at the thieves plane.  The agent is soon killed however as Travers has rigged explosives on the plane to blow, however as a result the zip line is broken and the thieves lose the cases which fall among the mountains.  The plane makes a crash landing and three of the group die as a result of the crash.

In the meantime as Gabe is about to leave, Jessie informs him of a distress call, which soon turns out to be from the thieves.  Gabe relucantly agrees to go and help find them and he meets up with Hal while climbing up the mountains, who is still angry at Gabe over Sarah's death for which he blames Gabe, but despite that they move on to the thieves location.  On arriving at the plane crash, Qualen and Travers force Gabe and Hal to help them find the cases which they agree to, however as Gabe helps them find the first one, they attempt to kill him but he manages to escape by cutting the rope he was tied to, just as one of the thieves causes a landslide by using a grenade launcher, one of their party is killed.  Gabe then continues to use his skill and knowledge of the mountain areas to try and keep ahead of them as he rejoins with Jessie they work together to try and find the remaining two cases.  Meanwhile Hal is forced to help Qualen's men and Travers find the remaining two cases, although unbeknownst to them he takes them the long way round to by Gabe some time.  And from here its up to Gabe and Jessie to try and save Hal and find a way to stop Qualen's men and Travers from getting what they want.

After making some medicore films during the late 80s and very early 90s such as "Over the top", "Cobra", "Tango and Cash", and "Stop or my mom will shoot!" Sly returned to form here with Cliffhanger, which is still a very entertaining and suspenseful action thriller.  It also sees a nice change from the cocky action heroes that Stallone had played previously to this as Gabe is morely an everyday good guy, who has to overcome his own guilt at failing to help save his best friend Hal's girlfriend from dying as well as confront his own fears and get back into climbing.  The setting of the film in the Rocky mountains in Colorado also allows for some spectacular scenery (in reality it was shot in the Dolomites mountain range in Cortina, Italy) and the high altitude sequences also add much suspense to the film and its a nice contrast to the city based action films so overly used today and even of the time.

Performance wise things are pretty good in Cliffhanger, with Stallone giving a pretty good account of himself in his role as Gabe Walker, the guilt ridden mountaineer who is forced into a situation where he must fight against a group of ruthless thieves.  Stallone also get's some good dialogue in the film and despite his character being less cocky and flashy then what we've seen from Stallone before, he still get's some good quips.  An example being in the scene where he tells Qualen to meet him at the highest point of the mountain range in the helicopter and Qualen flies up there he sees Gabe and says to him on the radio "I must admit you are some piece of work" and Gabe says "Yeah and I must admit you're a real piece of shit!".  Also in the scene where he is getting the shit beat out of him by one of Qualen's men, Kynette (Leon Robinson, credited as "Leon") who asks him where the money is, he weakly relies "Sissy!  You hit like a sissy!".  And in the scene where Gabe finds the first suitcase of money he burns the money around a camp fire and he says to Jessie "It costs a fortune to heat this place!" and later when Kynette asks where it is, Gabe says "I burned it!  I never could save anything!".

John Lithgow is excellent in his role as the ruthless Eric Qualen, the leader of the thieves, even though he hams it up and puts on a rather questionable English accent, he is quite effective and creepy as the main villain.  Lithgow's most potent scenes comes when he actually kills his own girlfriend, one of the thieves, Kristel (Caroline Goodall) in an attempt to force Travers to help them find their money (with the use of a tracking device).  And in the scene he grabs Kristel and whispers in her ear "Do you know what real love is, Kristel?  Sacrifice!" just before he shoots her and throws away her corpse like a rag dog as he says to a shocked Travers "Now take your toy and find our money!".  Lithgow also get's some other good lines of dialogue such as when he first meets Gabe and Hal who ask what is the suitcases and he says "Suits, socks, 30 million dollars, the usual stuff!".  And after Qualen has his men gun down two young skydivers who Hal knows of he says to Hal "Kill a few people they call you a murderer.  Kill a million and you're a conqueror.  Go figure!".  And when Travers attempts to radio in his own people for a chopper, Qualen grabs him and says "You don't get it, do you?!  We're in bed now, joined at the hip, partners in crime!  You've crossed over, Travers, and there's no turning back".  But my favourite line is near the end when Qualen get's a surprise radio call from Gabe and he says "Walker!  You resilient bastard, so you are still alive!" and as Qualen holds Jessie hostage in the helicopter he says to Gabe "You get the picture, Walker.  I wan't my money, or else I'll find it this little angel of yours can fly!" followed by "Love's a killer isn't it?".

Michael Rooker also puts in a good performance as Gabe's good friend, Hal, who at first holds a grudge against him, but he quickly put his differences aside as he tries to help Gabe escape whenever he can, by slowing down the thieves as he guides them to their cases.  And its good to see Rooker, who usually plays the bad guys in his films, play a good guy for once.  Rooker's best scene in the film comes when he faces off against one Qualen's thugs, Delmar (Craig Fairbrass) who is about to shoot, but when Hal goads him to, Delmar instead kicks his ass and yaks on about soccer.  And in the scene Hal says "Hey Delmar, from me to you, you're an asshole!" and later "In a minute I'll be dead and YOU will always be an asshole!".  And as Delmar is about to kick him off the cliff, Hal manages to surprise Delmar by quickly grabbing a knife he had in his trousers and stabbing it into Delmar's leg and Hal grabs the thug's shotgun and says "Season's over asshole!" just before he blasts him off the cliff.  And as Hal deliberately misleads Qualen and Travers by taking them the long way round, Travers nearly twigs it at one point and Hal says "The fastest way to the case is up the east face.  Of course there's only about twelve guys in the world who can do it. You wanna try it?!".  And lastly Rooker has another good moment when Hal confronts Gabe for the first time since his girlfriend's funeral.  In the scene Gabe angrily says "You didn't love her and you didn't have to explain to her family!" and Gabe says "And you didn't have to look into her eyes when she was falling!  Now drop it!" and Hal grabs him and very nearly pushes him over a cliff edge and he says "No, buddy!! It was YOU who dropped it!". 

Rex Linn is also pretty good in his role as the corrupt treasury agent, Travers, who is in cahoots with Qualen albeit somewhat relucantly, as they both despise one another.  Linn also has some good moments in the film such as in the scene where he transfer between planes to Qualen's plane, but he does it before he sends the money and Qualen angrily asks "Why didn't you send the money first?!" and Travers replies "Somehow I didn't think you would wait for me if I sent it first!".  And Linn's best moment comes when he finally snaps as he tries to locate the last case but instead he finds a bunny rabbit has the transponder device on it and he goes bananas with his machine gun and contacts Qualen and berates him on the radio.  And Linn get's some good dialogue in the scene where he says to Qualen "They beat us!  A couple of fuckin montain rangers beat us!  And I'm finding that pretty fuckin hilarious, Qualen!" and later he says "I gotta go.  I'm goin on my last official manhunt.  Adios motherfucker!!".

The supporting cast are also very good including Janine Turner as Gabe's girlfriend, Jessie, who helps Gabe out in trying to find the cases of money and to try and reach Hal as well as fight off the baddies.  Turner has some good moments in the film, and her funniest line comes when she flies the chopper at the start of the film up the mountains and she sees Gabe climbing and she says "I don't recognise him, but the butt looks familiar!".  Leon Robertson is also good as the brutal henchman, Kynette who in his best scene beats up Gabe and demands where the money is and as he is about to finish off Gabe he get's the film's best line which is "It amazes me in this day and age that a man would put money before the personal safety of himself and his btich!  I want you to go to your grave knowing, I'm gonna treat the bitch RIGHT!".  Craig Fairbrass (who was known in Britain for his role in Eastenders) also makes a decent impression as one of Qualen's thugs, Delmar and his best scene comes when he kicks the crap out of Hal and he says to him "You're a loud mouth punk slag, who is about to die!" followed "Do you like socceer?  Its a great sport!  I was a fucking good striker!".  Ralph Waite also puts in a nice performance as the rescue team's search and rescue pilot, Frank, and he has an amusing scene where he does a painting of what appears to be a banana and he says to Hal "This is a banana eating a monkey!  Nature in reverse!".  Caroline Goodall is also good in her role as Qualen's girlfriend and as she rigs a mountain bridge with explosives, and as Qualen watches her he says "You'll make someone a fine wife some day" and she replies "You should see me bake a cake!".  And lastly Paul Winfield makes a good brief appearance in the film as a treasury agent, Walter Wright who later uncovers Qualen's plot to rob the US Treasury.

Getting onto the direction paragraph (or directing to it!) Renny Harlin, who directed Die Hard 2, does a fine job with Cliffhanger and he skillfully films the spectacular climbing sequences as well as handling the film's violent action and suspense very well.  He also some interesting visual shots such as the scene where we see a distant shot of the mountain where Hal leads the thieves and thousands of feet above we can see Gabe and Jessie work their way toward finding the remaining cases.  The film's music score is also pretty good which was written and composed by Trevor Jones, and it has several tense and dramatic passages which work very well and the film's main theme is also memorable.

As for flaws does Cliffhanger have any?????  Yeah it does have one or two.  To begin with I felt that the story in itself is pretty flimsy and there's nothing really new there, as its just another cliched story of bad guys wanting money, and the hero trying to overcome his own demons and adversity.  I also thought some of the sequences in the film were a bit daft such as the scene where Gabe climbs up the mountain face having just escaped Qualen's men in the harsh freezing snowy conditions, wearing only a T-shirt on top, yet somehow he doesn't freeze to death in the process!  And when Gabe finally reaches the top and the shack where Jessie is waiting and she gives him a jumper as soon as he puts it on he almost stops shivering immediately, which marks a pretty quick recovering from a man who almost certainly would have died from hypothermia due to the exposure of such cold temperatures with only wearing a T-shirt! 

The film's violence is also pretty strong and there are one or two moments that could leave an audience cold (no pun intended) such as the scene where Qualen shoots Kristel or the young skydivers being mercilessly gunned down by Qualen's men.  The censors were also pretty strict on the violence in the film and in America they made several trims to the film's violent scenes and the initial DVD release over here was also heavily censored.  The main cuts to the DVD release in the UK included the scene where Kynette beats up Gabe and where Delmar kicks Hal's ass.  The film also on some levels could also be accused of being a little racist, especially in its depiction of the character of Delmar, who in one scene (also initially edited in the British DVD release) harbours a grudge toward Leon (who threatened him with a knife earlier on) and he says to Kristel "Good, and blow up that black bastard while you're at it.  Save me the time of doing it myself!".  This scene and all the others cuts were of course restored in the UK Blu-ray release of Cliffhanger which is still uncut and rated as a 15, even though at the time those cuts were made in order for the film to prevent it from receiving an 18.   

I also thought the film had a pretty stupid climax with Gabe fighting with Qualen in the mountain rescue helicopter which has crashed and gone over the edge of the cliff and is hanging by the remaining rungs of the  ladder (which Gabe wrapped around the helicopter's landing skids (i.e. the helicopter's feet, I had to look it up!) which are steadily coming loose because of the weight of the helicopter.  And the sudden ending (PLOT SPOILER) with Gabe having dealt with Qualen, they receive a call from the Treasury agents who are enroute to save them and Paul Winfield's character says "Just sit tight for now" and the credits role.  So in this regard you wish you kind of saw some sort of aftermath for the characters having made it safely down, rather than, pardon the pun, just leave them hanging!

But despite all that Cliffhanger is still a very entertaining and suspensful action film which has some spectacular visuals and some good action in it as well, and its well worth a watch if you haven't seen it in a while (or ever for that matter).

So until the next post I shall leave yee there.