MOVIE REVIEW : ‘Aspen Extreme’: Inches of Powder on a Foot of Slush

If you snipped the skiing footage from “Aspen Extreme” (citywide) you might have enough for a pretty exciting 20-minute documentary. The shots of downhill racers skidding and slaloming down the steep slopes are diverting, and there’s a beauty of a sequence involving an avalanche that should by all rights have won the cameramen Purple Hearts.

As for the non-skiing stuff, it’s strictly sudsville. T. J. (Paul Gross) and Dexter (Peter Berg) are best buddies who ditch their boring, soul-grinding auto assembly-line jobs in Detroit and head for Aspen to work as ski instructors for the rich and famous. T. J., a great skier and great-looking, quickly becomes king of the hill; a wealthy socialite vamp with the soap-opera-ish name of Bryce Kellogg (Finola Hughes) picks him as her plaything. Dexter, goofier and troubled, has a more difficult time negotiating the slopes of life.

We’re supposed to regard these two as a variation on George and Lenny from “Of Mice and Men.” We’re also supposed to recognize that T. J., despite his dalliance with Bryce, is really in love with the flaxen-haired Robin (Teri Polo), who sees him for the sensitive soul he really is. T. J., you see, wants to be a famous author but he never went to college. Bryce fills the young man’s arms with volumes from the Aspen library: Proust, Camus--you know, the biggies. But Robin actually inspires him to write a short story about her. Dexter inspires T. J.’s muse as well. A story about him ends up as the cover story in Powder magazine. (It’s a magazine about skiing, not snorting.)

The plot synopsis for this film, which was written and directed by TV writer-producer and former Aspen ski instructor Patrick Hasburgh, may sound like a jamming together of bad soaps as reimagined by the guys who created “Airplane!” If only it were so. Hasburgh sets a shaggy, amiable tone for the first half hour or so and then sinks into the melodrama with a heavy thud. The mind begins to wander, particularly when we are shown the dewy lovers intercut with shots of flowers poking up through the ice.

Given all the recent hoopla about a winter boycott in Aspen, this film (rated PG-13 for some language, drug content and nudity) might have had some curiosity value. Aspen and its denizens are a great subject for a film, and a ski-bum hustler is a great protagonist. But T. J.’s motives are always impeccable. He’s boringly humane even when he’s being seduced and abandoned. “Aspen Extreme” is a snow job in more ways than one.

‘Aspen Extreme’

Paul Gross:T. J. Burke

Peter Berg:Dexter Rutecki

Finola Hughes:Bryce Kellogg

Teri Polo:Robin Hand

A Hollywood Pictures presentation in association with Touchwood Pacific Partners. Director Patrick Hasburgh. Producer Leonard Goldberg. Executive producer Fred T. Gallo. Screenplay Patrick Hasburgh. Cinematographer Steven Fierberg and Robert Primes. Editor Steven Kemper. Costumes Karen Patch. Music Michael Convertino. Production design Roger Cain. Art director Dan Self. Set decorator Nina Bradford. Running time: 1 hour, 54 minutes.

MPAA-rated PG-13.