Tucker Tooley

Based on an astonishing true survival story, this film is subtitled "Miracle on the Mountain", so it can't help but be an inspirational movie that tugs on the heartstrings. But it's a shame that's all filmmaker Scott Waugh (Need for Speed) aims for here. And despite the stunning settings, his limited approach leaves this feeling like little more than a TV movie of the week. Still, it's a story worth telling.

The film is based on the memoir by Eric LeMarque (played by Josh Hartnett), who when the story starts is trying to get his life back on track while he's kicking a drug habit. Waiting for his day in court, he decides to blow off some steam on the slopes, so heads up to do some off-piste snowboarding. Then a sudden whiteout leaves him lost in an unfamiliar snow-buried wilderness, chased by wolves. Over the next eight days, he struggles to find a way out. Meanwhile, his mother (Mira Sorvino) gets in touch with a ski patrol officer (Sarah Dumont) to organise a search.

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Consistently amusing but never uproariously funny, this comedy plays it relatively safely by gently subverting our expectations of Aniston and Roberts, while making rising-star Poulter the butt of most jokes. There's just enough rude humour to keep fans of adult-oriented comedies happy, even if the movie continually reveals a squidgy-soft underbelly of sentimentality. But it's fun while it lasts.

The chaos begins when happy small-time Denver pot dealer David (Sudeikis) is robbed, leaving him indebted to his supplier Brad (Helms). Then he's offered a way out: travel to Mexico and collect a "smidge" of weed to smuggle back across the border in an RV. To increase his chances of getting through without an inspection, he creates a fake family from his neighbours: desperate stripper Rose (Aniston), lonely geek Kenny (Poulter) and homeless tough-girl Casey (Roberts). And the fact that they struggle to act like a convincing family is the least of their problems as they're chased by two vicious goons (Sisley and Willig) and befriended by a too-friendly couple (Offerman and Hahn) along the road.

Yes, this is one of those road comedies in which something unexpected happens every step of the way. Sudeikis rides out the film relatively unruffled, while Aniston's big scene is a scorchingly over-the-top striptease performed to distract a drug kingpin. Roberts' only subplot is a silly liaison with a moronic skater (Young). These sequences are carefully calculated to be mildly funny but never embarrassing to the big American stars. On the other hand, acclaimed British actor Poulter (see Son of Rambow and Wild Bill) dives in to his humiliating scenarios with gusto, from an awkward romance with another girl (Quinn) to kissing practice with his "mother" and "sister" to a ghastly spider bite. In the process, he walks off with the whole film.

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