Gripped: Climbing the Killer Pillar

This movie is like the skin that forms over pudding. You know what I'm talking about. Either you love pudding skin or you hate it. I waited and waited for this movie to be OK, but it did not happen. Because this movie is silly and dumb and the musical score made feel a sensation quite like marbles slamming against my skull.

Then the movie ended.

First, i am a rock climber. Everything related to climbing in this movie is beyond ridiculous and hilarious. There is so much so say about it that i will just pass because it is impossible to say how insanely irrealistic and awful.

But that is not why i pit a bad rating. No! It is because the entire movie is so bad EVEN if you completely disregard the « climbing » that again one is speechless: the clichés, the bad acting and plot, the relentless continuity errors, the shots that don't match, the real climbers with cheap wigs, and on an on and on. But it was a solid laugh!

I have seen Amanda Maddox in a couple of Lifetime movies so I figured I would give this one a try. The moment when slimeball Bret tried to kiss Rose (Maddox) in his trailer I began to despise the movie. These types of PG TV movies are often put together hastily without a buildup. The way she fell for him by just seeing him and in the conversations mostly they talked about climbing, but not their own backgrounds, where they're from what they do for a living etc. Is just annoying which often happens in these stupid thrillers.

And as for Bret being an experienced outdoor rock climber and he falls and gets injured and Rose who has no outdoor experience all of a sudden becomes the hero in the movie is just stupid and far-fetched. I am not a rock climber but aren't rock climbers supposed to wear helmets, and not just bandanas?

Seriously the further the movie progressed the more I was rooting for both of them to fall off the cliff. Do not waste your time with this crap!

I'm not a climber, so the accuracy of the technical jargon wasn't a concern to me. I thought the cinematography was excellent and the story suspenseful enough, and didn't think the acting was bad at all. I'd like to see how this was made. There was an obvious continuity error at the end that shouldn't have been missed (a wound on the female lead completely disappears), and some of the climbing segments showed rocks they were supposedly climbing that they obviously weren't, but that wasn't enough for me to consider this a bad film. I didn't particularly like the way it ended, but I've seen worse. I thought it was entertaining overall.

Decent enough action climbing movie. Great cinematography and scenery. Technically well done, at least in my opinion. I'm no climber. On the downside the female lead's motivation to try something extreme is a little like watching a horror movie knowing the characters will stick their head into the maw of a monster even though it makes no sense. Movie people being movie people. But, we finished it and pretty much enjoyed it and liked the characters well enough. Not great but decent. And, if you like climbing scenery, etc., it's even better.