title: High Ice (film)
text: # High Ice (film)
  
  High Ice, also known as Challenge of the High Ice, is a 1980 American adventure television film directed by Eugene S. Jones and starring David Janssen, Tony Musante, Madge Sinclair, and Gretchen Corbett. Its plot follows a park ranger and army lieutenant attempting to save three rock climbers stranded on a mountain ledge. The film was released in the United States as an NBC Movie of the Week in early 1980, but was given a theatrical release internationally. The extended theatrical cut of the film shown in foreign countries includes nude sequences that were excised from the television version.
  
  ## Premise
  
  A park ranger (David Janssen) clashes with an army lieutenant colonel (Tony Musante) regarding the rescue efforts of three rock climbers stranded on a mountain ledge in Washington.
  
  ## Cast
  
  * David Janssen as Glencoe MacDonald
  * Tony Musante as Lt. Col. Harris Thatcher
  * Madge Sinclair as Dr. Pittman
  * Gretchen Corbett as Liz
  * James G. Richardson as Scott
  * Allison Argo as Kathy
  * Dorian Harewood as Lt. Zack Hawkins
  * Warren Stevens as Sgt. Lomax
  * Katherine Cannon as Sandy
  * James Canning as Lt. Foster
  * James Kaufman as Lt. Foley
  
  ## Production
  
  Filming took place in Darrington, Washington in the summer of 1979. The production budget was approximately $2 million.
  
  ## Release
  
  Upon its airing on NBC in January 1980, High Ice was met by approximately 25 million viewers in the United States. The film was subsequently given a theatrical release internationally, with nudity which had been cut from the television version reinstated. The film aired on television again in the late 1980s on MTV.
  
  ### Critical response
  
  James Brown of the Los Angeles Times deemed the film a "visually breathtaking, but dramatically stuttering diversion... Director Eugene Jones further hampers his own cause with some choppy transitions, confusing flashbacks and muddled dramatic focus."
  
  