Color, PG-13 (mature themes, violence, tense situations), 93 min., VHS rental, DVD $29.99
DVD: no extras
Street: May 6, Prebook: April 14
First Run: W, Nov. 2002, $4.8 mil.
Cast: Rufus Sewell (Victory), Klaus Lowitsch (Mayday!), Rupert Graves (Room to Rent), Bridgette Wilson-Sampras (The Wedding Planner)
Director: Christian Duguay
PARAMOUNT
Story Line: Director Ian (Sewell) and a team of hard-partying extreme athletes--snowboarders who can skydive--head to Austria to shoot a commercial involving an Alpine avalanche. They inadvertently run into the lair of ruthless Balkan war criminal Pavle (Lowitsch), who needs to execute them all to keep his whereabouts secret.
Bottom Line: With its sexy young cast, fast sports and action, thrilling set pieces and dynamic techno score, Extreme Ops is the kind of movie that inspires movie executives to speedily work with the latest pop on full blast. However, in this case, that song is the blues. Apparently the James Bond smash Die Another Day, released a week before Ops, ate a big chunk of the film's potential theatrical audience. With its video release comes an opportunity to harvest the youth audience that missed it in theaters. Director Duguay gets things moving early and only slows down for the slightest expository reasons. Brain food? Hardly, but the action and stunts are what count, and they're terrific. --Buzz McClain