Review of Cliffhanger

Cliffhanger (1993)
6/10
Don't you see what he's doing! He's hijacking the shipment!
25 November 2011
***SPOILERS*** Sylvester Stallone as mountain rescue climber Gabe Walker has a chance to show off his muscles in this high climbing adventure while wearing in most of his scenes a sweat drenched t-shirt in sub-zero temperature. That as he tries to get his nerve back that he lost some eight months ago.

It was back then that Gabe in an attempt to save her life lost his best friend Hal Tucker's, Michael Rooker, girlfriend Sarah's, Michelle Joyner, grip as she was dangling some 4,000 feet above ground level when her security belt gave out! With Sarah's tragic death and his friend Hal holding him responsible for it Gabe just dropped out of sight not willing to face or see anyone for over eight months.

Now in town to get back with his girlfriend mountain ranger Jessie Deilghan, Jennie Turner, Gabe suddenly finds himself face to face with arch-enemy Hal Tucker as he's reluctantly recruited to save a number of people lost in the high Rockies after their plan crashed. What no one realizes is that the persons trapped in the snow are a gang of skyjackers who sky-jacked a government plane with over 100 million dollars in denominations of $1,000 dollar bills! It's the skyjackers headed by former US Government Intelligence Agent Eric Qualen, John Lithgow, who want Gabe and Hal to find the cash,in three large suitcases, that they lost during the failed skyjacking attempt!

****SPOILERS**** It takes a while for both Gabe & Hal as well as Jessie to figure out what Qualen & Co. are really up too but that's after all three ended up getting captured by Qualen and his gang. It's Gabe who escaped, wearing only a t-shirt and pair of torn up pants, and made it to safety who had to save his fellow mountain rescuers Hal and Jessie's lives depended on the Qualen Mob getting the lost money which Gabe was threatened or better yet blackmailed to find. But in what we soon see how Qualen & Co. interacted with each other, by murdering themselves over the slightest mess-up, it's a given that as long as the cash is not recovered that will assure that both Hal & Jessie will remain alive!

***MORE SPOILERS*** Great action scenes with both Gabe & Hal really getting worked over by Qualen and his thugs but still having enough left to finally put them out of commission. Incredible final sequence with Gabe & Qualen having out on a disable helicopter hanging by a string, or cable, on the side of a one mile high mountain. Gabe who in all reality should have died from the beatings he's taken as well as the bitter cold, wearing only a wet and unfrozen t-shirt, was able to turn the tables on Qualen at the very last moment. In the end Qualen ended up with his fellow hijacked for all intents and purposes dead and buried in the snow. And as for the 100 million dollars in $1,000.00 dollars bills that Qualen & Co. was after: It ended up burned shredded and blown away to the four winds where,in the high snow covered and impassible Rockie Mountains, no one would ever find it!
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