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COLUMBIA TRISTAR

MOVIE INFO

Director:
Renny Harlin
Cast:
Sylvester Stallone, John Lithgow, Michael Rooker, Janine Turner, Rex Linn, Caroline Goodall, Leon, Craig Fairbrass
Writing Credits:
John Long (premise), Michael France, Sylvester Stallone

Tagline:
Hang on!

Synopsis:
Sarah was an inexperienced climber. She trusted Gabe to rescue her, but something went wrong high above the valley floor ... Sylvester Stallone, John Lithgow, Michael Rooker, Janine Turner and Ralph Waite star in this high-altitude avalanche of action - a non-stop adventure packed with suspense and capped with heart-quaking terror. For Rocky Mountain Rescue, the mission is almost routine - locate five climbers. With the woman he loves (Turner) and his best friend (Rooker), Gabe Walker (Stallone) braves the icy peaks only to discover that the distress call is really a trap - set by merciless international terrorist Eric Qualen (Lithgow). Now millions of dollars and their own lives hang in the balance. Against explosive firepower, bitter cold and dizzying heights, Walker must outwit Qualen in a deadly game of hide-and-seek.

Box Office:
Budget
$65 million.
Domestic Gross
$84.049 million.

MPAA:
Rated R

DVD DETAILS
Presentation:
Widescreen 2.35:1/16x9
Audio:
English Dolby Digital 5.1
English Dolby 2.0
Spanish Dolby 2.0
Portuguese Dolby 2.0
Subtitles:
English
Spanish
Portuguese
Cantonese
Closed-captioned

Runtime: 113 min.
Price: $14.95
Release Date: 6/13/2000

Bonus:
• Audio Commentary with Director Renny Harlin & Actor Sylvester Stallone
• Audio Commentary with Editor Frank Urioste, Visual Effects Supervisors Neil Krepela and John Bruno, and Production Designer John Vallone
• A Personal Introduction From Renny Harlin
• Making-Of Featurette: Stallone On The Edge
• Deleted Scenes
• Special Effects: How It Was Done
• Storyboard Comparisons
• Photo Galleries
• Theatrical Trailers
• Talent Files
• Production Notes


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EQUIPMENT
Panasonic 50" TH-50PZ77U 1080p Plasma Monitor; Sony STR-DG1200 7.1 Channel Receiver; Panasonic DMP-BD60K Blu-Ray Player using HDMI outputs; Michael Green Revolution Cinema 6i Speakers (all five); Kenwood 1050SW 150-watt Subwoofer.

RELATED REVIEWS

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Cliffhanger: Collector's Edition (1993)

Reviewed by Colin Jacobson (January 11, 2010)

How Renny Harlin ever became a hotshot movie director remains beyond me. I love good action films but I consistently find his works to be generally crass, crude, and executed with little style or flair. A glimpse through his catalog reflects a filmmaker who occasionally creates some decent movies. Both Die Hard 2 and The Long Kiss Goodnight are moderately good, and A Nightmare On Elm Street 4: The Dream Master has its moments. In general, however, his pictures seem lifeless and flat, with little to differentiate his work from any other big-budget action flicks.

1993's Cliffhanger perfectly encapsulates the Harlin method. Virtually every one of his movies seems like it should be incredibly exciting and captivating, and Cliffhanger is no exception. It offered a unique scenario, with its "Die Hard in the Rockies" setup, and it looked like a potentially thrilling setting. Okay, I'm not claiming the Die Hard bent sets Cliffhanger apart, but the mountain backdrop created a variety of possibilities that should have added real flavor to the film.

Little of that appears in the final product. As it stands, Cliffhanger seems like a competently made film but it lacks spark or pizzazz. Some of the action sequences look as though they should be thrilling, but for undefined reasons, they're not.

For me, the phrase of the day is "flat". Almost everything about Cliffhanger seems bland and stiff. It's exactly the kind of action movie that the genre's opponents think of when they disparage them - dumb, awkward and gratuitously violent.

Unlike many people, I've never been on either side of the fence in regard to Sylvester Stallone. I don't particularly like his work, but I don't have any genuinely negative feelings about him. I like action films, so I probably should have been a fan, but unlike Schwarzenegger, Stallone has never made anything of note in that genre. None of his action flicks has ever done much for me. I looked forward to Cliffhanger back in 1993 since I'd liked Die Hard 2 and I thought perhaps Harlin could finally force Stallone to make a truly positive piece of work.

Unfortunately, that didn't happen. Cliffhanger seemed pretty lame when I saw it theatrically, and time has not been kind to it. The movie appears no worse now than then, but it hasn't improved with age. It's still a weak excuse for an action piece.

Despite the presence of a decent cast - with real actors like John Lithgow and Michael Rooker on hand - every character seems bland and forgettable. Lithgow seems especially poor as the least-intimidating baddie on record. Perhaps it was his use of a very phony British accent, but for whatever reason, I thought Lithgow offered no personality and presence in the role. Rooker looks nicely intense at times, but he seems equally forgettable.

As for Sly himself... Stallone is Stallone. The guy appears to have some talent, but he hides it under masses of muscles and prefers to let his pecs do the work. Perversely, I often root for Stallone to appear in a real movie, and while he came close with Copland, he never seems able to overcome his own lunkheadedness. His portrayal of hero Gabe Walker is so light that it's amazing it stuck to the film.

I don't hate Cliffhanger because it's just too bland to inspire strong emotion. I didn't enjoy it but I was bored more than anything else. Even with all the action, none of it seems thrilling or scary or exciting. If there's anything less interesting than a dull action movie, I have yet to find it.


The DVD Grades: Picture B/ Audio A/ Bonus A-

Cliffhanger appears in an aspect ratio of approximately 2.35:1 on this single-sided, double-layered DVD; the widescreen image has been enhanced for 16X9 televisions. Although the picture displayed some problems, it generally looked pretty good.

Sharpness seemed mostly positive. Mild softness crept into the image at times, but those instances were rare and minor. Most of the time, the picture appeared clear and crisp. No real instances of moiré effects and jagged edges appeared, but some moderate edge enhancement popped up at times. The print seemed slightly gritty at times, with periodic instances of speckles and marks, but it generally looked clean.

Colors appeared natural and bright, with no evidence of bleeding or noise. The film stuck to a realistic appearance for hues and they seemed clear and clean. Black levels looked fairly deep and dark, and shadow detail generally was good. Some scenes made Leon overly difficult to see, however. Still, as an overall package, the image of Cliffhanger looked fine, with only a smattering of issues to bring my grade down to a “B”.

Virtually no problems affected the excellent Dolby Digital 5.1 audio of Cliffhanger. The mix provided a tremendously broad and involving soundfield. At virtually all times, discrete audio engulfed the viewer and makes the experience much more exciting than it otherwise would be. The sound designers really had a field day with this one, as they integrated the sounds well. Everything seemed appropriately placed and the entire mix blended together smoothly. It's a simply fantastic example of audio design, with active surrounds that contributed a lot to the presentation.

The quality of the sound seemed equally strong. Although much of it clearly must have been dubbed, dialogue appeared warm and natural, with no edginess or problems with intelligibility. Music was bold and strong and it displayed excellent dynamic range. The effects were the real stars of the show, however, as one might expect. All of the sounds came across as clean and realistic, with virtually no distortion. The track packed a serious punch and bass response seemed excellent. Cliffhanger presented an auditory experience that any listener should find very satisfying.

This is the second appearance of Cliffhanger on DVD. The first version came out back in the early days of DVD before some studios fully committed themselves to making all of their discs as good as they could be. Happily, Columbia-Tristar (CTS) have gone back and reissued a few of their older titles with new features. Jumanji, Little Women and now Cliffhanger all add to their old "movie-only" versions.

Actually, the revised Cliffhanger DVD mixes some new features with others that were created for a 1995 laserdisc boxed set. Two audio commentaries appear, one of them new, one of them old. The old one comes from director Renny Harlan and actor Sylvester Stallone. For all intents and purposes, though, it's just from Harlin. The men were recorded separately and the results edited together later. Stallone pops up on rare occasions and offers some interesting comments - especially in regard to his fear of heights and other acting challenges - but Harlin's remarks dominate the proceedings.

For the most part, the director provides some interesting information. He tends to stick mainly to the technical side of the coin, but he makes his discussion engaging, with only a few dull spots. Harlin even attempts to defend his gratuitous violence.

Even more interesting is the second commentary. This is a newly created track and it features editor Frank Urioste, visual effects supervisors Neil Krepela and John Bruno, and production designer John Vallone. At least Bruno and Krepela were recorded together, but I think the other two were taped on their own. In any event, the results have clearly been edited into a tauter package. Although the focus here also sticks mainly to the effects and other technical facets of the production, I found the track to be quite stimulating and entertaining. Some technically-oriented commentaries can be very dry and overly stiff, but that's not the case here. Each of the participants relates a lot of good information about the project and about the nature of filmmaking in general. I liked the Harlin/Stallone track, but this commentary is stronger.

A variety of other supplemental features appear on this DVD as well. First up is A Personal Introduction from Renny Harlin. This four-minute and 50-second video piece mainly contributes a taped discussion of the film from Harlin, as he explains why he did it and what he wanted to do with the material. We also see brief video interview excerpts of Stallone and actress Janine Turner, plus there's a little footage of Harlin from the set. Most interesting is the clip in which he apparently tries to show Stallone that he can survive the intimidating heights.

Next is a "making-of" featurette called Stallone On the Edge. This 20-minute program offers a very glossy look at the film. It tries far too hard to be cute and witty - and fails in those regards - but it provides some good footage from the set that's interspersed with fairly inane interview snippets, mainly from Stallone. The featurette was created around the time of Cliffhanger's release, which is why Stallone appears in Demolition Man garb for his narration shots.

Another section includes some deleted scenes. This area runs for a little more than nine minutes total, though most of that doesn't come from actual cut footage; introductory and additional videotaped discussions from Harlin fill most of the nine minutes. Two deleted scenes appear, both of which are mildly interesting. Harlin completely explains why he excised them. One annoyance: although the segments were clearly intended to run as a continuous piece, there's no option to watch them that way here. Each of the three parts - including the "Introduction" - must be selected manually.

Special Effects: How It Was Done offers video examinations of two different scenes, "Helicopter Explosion" and "Sarah's Fall". The first shows film clips and some good rough footage of the shoot plus some narration and interviews, while the second presents the finished product accompanied by Harlin's narration. These segments do a nice job of letting us know how the parts were made. In total, these pieces last for about seven minutes and 20 seconds.

Storyboard Comparisons provides a split-screen presentation for three different scenes: "Helicopter Explosion", "Air-to-air Transfer", and "Sarah's Fall". It's pretty standard stuff, and will interest those who like that sort of material. The running time for all three combined is nearly 12 minutes.

Two photo galleries appear. There's the "On Location Gallery", with 42 shots of the actors on the sets, plus the "Special Effects Gallery", with 22 pictures of the technical work in various stages of completion. These are mildly interesting, but I continue to find it annoying that CTS insists on presenting stillframe pictures in small boxes. Usually this is done for “creative" reasons - little touches such as making the photos look like they're in an album - but on Cliffhanger, the presentation remains dull and has no spark. Plus, the images are at least 30 percent smaller than they could have been.

The DVD includes the original theatrical trailer which also tosses in a three minute and 25 second introduction from Harlin. He discusses what inspired him to make that particular clip and explains his general thought processes in regard to promotion. The trailer itself is decent - though my memories of the actual movie prevent me from finding it too compelling – but I really liked Harlin's bit. After all, when was the last time you heard a director discuss a trailer?

Finally, the DVD ends with Talent Files for four of the actors (Stallone, Lithgow, Rooker and Turner) plus Harlin. As usual, these are the standard CTS non-entries that appear on most of their DVDs; they provide almost no interesting information about the participants. The DVD's booklet also includes two pages of decent production notes.

This would be a hell of a DVD if only the movie itself didn't bore me. The picture and sound are both strong, and the collection of supplements is thorough and engaging. Unfortunately, Cliffhanger itself is a dog; it's a dull, uncompelling attempt at an action film. If you disagree and know you like the film, then you'll want to buy this DVD; it's a solid package. However, if you're not sure, be more cautious and rent it first or just skip it altogether.

To rate this film, visit the Superbit review of CLIFFHANGER

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Review Archive:  # | A-C | D-F | G-I | J-L | M-O | P-R | S-U | V-Z | Viewer Ratings | Main