垂直极限英文影评Vertical Limit

垂直极限英文影评Vertical Limit
上映时间 2000年
A Film Review by James

I have always appreciated the concept of a man versus nature adventure thriller. Unfortunately, the reality, at least as brought to the screen by Hollywood, has rarely lived up to the promise. Instead of relying on the inherent suspense in the struggle of a small group of human beings to overcome an implacable force, movie screenwriters throw in all sorts of pointless subplots and contrivances that reduce the central conceit to little more than a sideshow. Vertical Limit is the latest case in point. It's not a bad film, and it doesn't fall prey to as many clich閟 as have afflicted its predecessors, but its numerous missteps reduce this from the level of a gripping thriller to a popcorn diversion.

The setting of the film, which is about a high altitude mountain climbing rescue, is the fabled peak K2, a.k.a. Mount Godwin-Austen. K2 is the highest peak in the Karakoram Range near the Pakistan-China border. It is the second tallest mountain in the world, but, although its 28,250-foot summit is more than 700 feet lower than that of Mount Everest, many experienced climbers consider scaling K2 to be a more difficult endeavor. Since the mountain was first topped by a group of Italians in 1954, 113 climbers have reached the peak, but 37 have died trying. Over the years, K2 has had its share of high-profile disasters; although the events in Vertical Limit are fictional, the film draws bits and pieces of its inspiration from many of the previous trips up the mountainside.

Peter and Annie Garrett (Chris O'Donnell and Robin Tunney) are an experienced brother-and-sister climbing team who have gone their separate ways after an accident claimed the life of their father. Annie has thrown herself into her climbing, claiming that only at the tops of mountains does she feel close to her father. Peter, on the other hand, has given up the sport, opting instead to pursue his love of wildlife by becoming a photographer for National Geographic. The two meet at the K2 base camp when Annie arrives with a group of climbers headed by billionaire Elliot Vaughn (Bill Paxton). As a publicity stunt for his new airline, Vaughn is determined to climb to the top of K2 so he can wave to one of his planes as it flies overhead. Leading the expedition is experienced climber Tom McLaren (Nicholas Lea), but he's really just Vaughn's puppet, bought and paid for by a $1 million check. So, when bad weather threatens and Tom argues in favor of turning back, his words go unheeded. The predictable result is a disaster (complete with an avalanche) that forces Peter to recruit an emergency rescue team and speed-climb towards K2's peak before the survivors succumb to a fatal condition called high altitude pulmonary edema. Worse still, because the survivors are trapped in an underground ice cave, Peter's group must carry canisters of unstable nitroglycerin to blast a hole through the mountain's frozen crust.

One thing missing from Vertical Limit is a sense of awe. Admittedly, one wouldn't expect to be transported to the top of the world like in the IMAX film Everest, but, with the exception of a few nice fly-over shots, Vertical Limit fails to capture the majesty of K2. It's also odd that the movie was shot with a 1.85:1 aspect ratio rather than in widescreen (2.35:1). This is, after all, the kind of production that cries out for the biggest screen possible.

Bill Paxton's presence immediately calls to mind another man versus nature movie: Twister. Like that earlier endeavor, this one is not satisfied with establishing the elements as the lone villain. The human bad guy in Vertical Limit is not as obvious or cartoonish as the one in Twister, but he nevertheless represents an unwanted distraction. In contrast with Twister, however, the special effects are inferior. Too many scenes in Vertical Limit have a cheesy look, with characters clearly being superimposed against matte painting backdrops. In this era of stunningly real digital visuals, such evident gaffes are inexcusable. Then there's the underground cave set, where the ice appears to be made out of Styrofoam and plastic, the snow is fake, and no one's breath is showing. Not since Star Trek III have movie-goers been subjected to a less impressive cold weather environment.

By using the transport of nitroglycerin as a means to ratchet up the tension, Vertical Limit takes its inspiration from Henri-Georges Clouzot's 1953 thriller, Wages of Fear. Although vastly inferior to the French classic, Vertical Limit employs the plot device well enough to generate a few moments of nail-biting tension. However, while in Wages of Fear, the sense of danger was constantly on the rise, the level of suspense in Vertical Limit ebbs and flows. There are peaks and valleys, and the movie doesn't really build to anything except (of course) the obligatory rescue.

As is true of most films of this nature, where action set pieces take prominence, there's not much acting going on. Chris O'Donnell is likable as Peter, but the character is simplistic. He carries a burden of guilt associated with his father's death and this simple psychological prod forces him to take great risks to save his sister. Her life represents his redemption. Likewise, Robin Tunney (last seen opposite Arnold Schwarzenegger in End of Days, where she played Satan's bride) gets us to care about Annie - but not to any great extent. Bill Paxton turns on the charm that has made him a welcome addition to many action/adventure films over the years. The only one guilty of giving a legitimate performance is Scott Glenn as the reclusive expert climber Montgomery Wick, who joins Peter's expedition to further his own agenda.

The film is directed by Martin Campbell, whose successes include the first Pierce Brosnan 007 movie, Goldeneye (Bond girl Izabella Scorupco has a part here), and the playful The Mask of Zorro. While Campbell does his best to keep Vertical Limit at a consistently high level of excitement, he is occasionally betrayed by plot contrivances and special effects blunders. Nevertheless, when it comes to mountain climbing adventures, Vertical Limit is more effective than either the relatively obscure 1992 effort, K2, or the overblown Sylvester Stallone vehicle, Cliffhanger. With this movie, it's possible to experience a few white knuckle moments without being in danger of catching frostbite.
 

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