A team of hot-shot admen filming a commercial in the Austrian Alps run afoul of terrorists and must ski and snowboard for their lives in this extremely stupid, Gen-Y reincarnation of 1984's HOT DOG... THE MOVIE. Jeffrey (Rupert Graves), his wild-man partner, Ian (Rufus Sewell), and their cameraman, one-time outlaw snowboarder Will (Devon Sawa), specialize in commercials featuring adrenaline-charged daredevilry. Their current campaign, for a Japanese digital camera manufacturer, features extreme-sport punks Silo (Joe Absalom) and Kittie (Jana Pallaske) — who'll do anything for a thrill, from hitching their snowboards to the back of a train to slaloming off a chalet roof onto the hotel bar — and mediagenic, American downhill ski-bunny Chloe (Bridgette Wilson-Sampras), who has a World Games gold medal but lacks the chops to handle unfamiliar, ungroomed slopes at breakneck speeds; unfortunately, she's the one the client wants skiing in front of an avalanche, a stunt Jeffrey promised they'd do without computer-generated effects. Will has a huge crush on Kittie, who thinks he's a doughy sellout; Kittie and Silo consider Chloe a stuck-up priss; Ian's girlfriend is about to give him the heave-ho because he's always off somewhere working; and everyone hates Jeffrey for being a money-grubbing sissy. Petty personality clashes soon prove the least of the group's troubles: They take up residence in a half-finished resort atop a photogenic mountain, unaware that Serbian war-criminal Pavle (Klaus Lowitsch), who just blew up a commercial jet liner in hopes of convincing the CIA that he died in the mid-air fireball along with hundreds of innocent travelers, is using the place as a hideout. Posing as local construction workers, Pavle and his cohorts are plotting to blow up the International Court of Justice headquarters in The Hague; unfortunately, Will and Silo accidentally capture Pavle on video while surreptitiously shooting his sexy girlfriend, Yana (Liliana Komorowska). Once the unshaven, slavering baddies realize there's footage proving that Pavle is alive and well, it's run for-your-life time for the film team. This tacky attempt to cash in on the popularity of extreme sports and Jackass-style escapades feels like two films uneasily cobbled together. The dramatic scenes are frequently unintentionally funny, and the action sequences — clearly the main event — are surprisingly uninvolving, especially given that director Christian Duguay is an extreme skiing buff who habitually shoots dangerous stunts himself. --Maitland McDonagh
