`Snowbound' Gives Realistic Portrayal Of Family's Drama

"Snowbound: The Jim and Jennifer Stolpa Story," "CBS Sunday Movie, 9 p.m., Channel 7. ------------------------------------------------------------------- It's a tribute to the talents of performers Neil Patrick Harris and Kelli Williams, writer Jonathan Rintels and director Christian Duguay that "Snowbound" packs punch and tension.

After all, we know the outcome of the true-life incident upon which this docudrama is based: Jim and Jennifer Stolpa, and their 5-months-old son, Clay, were trapped for more than week in a snow-covered wilderness on the California-Nevada border. Jim finally managed to hike out of the area to get help to rescue his wife and baby before they perished. It was a story of courage and love that captured the attention of America a year ago.

But what could have been a merely routine or perfunctory TV time-filler becomes, instead, a compelling narrative thanks to the talents mentioned. Rintels wrote a dialogue that sounds as if it might be spoken by real human beings, both in the film's lighter moments and, more often, at those times when the young couple face up to the fact their chances of rescue look pretty slim. The heroics never seem fake or forced.

Rintels' dialogue is well-served by Harris and Williams, who are completely believable as the young, decent couple who find themselves trapped in the mountains. The sincerity and conviction of their performances are major factors in the success of "Snowbound."

Finally, Duguay has done everything possible to convince us the Stolpas are lost in a vast and snowy wilderness - the film was shot in British Columbia and Alaska - and it's easy to forget these scenes are being shot by a film crew just out of our viewing range. It's the kind of film in which you can almost feel the cold, one in which, for a change, we see the actors' breath when they speak.

Also contributing to making "Snowbound" the effective movie it is are Susan Clark and Michael Gross playing Jim's mother and stepfather. Like the two younger leads, their performances never seem routine or mechanical. Sure, "Snowbound" is meant to be an inspirational docudrama - but its sentiments never seem phony, making this a welcome change from the usual docudramas about family squabbles and murder. ------------------------------------------------------------------- More murder

"Secret Sins of the Father," "NBC Sunday Movie," 9 p.m., Channel 5. ------------------------------------------------------------------- "Murder Between Friends," "NBC Monday Movie," 9 p.m., Channel 5. -------------------------------------------------------------------

NBC gives viewers a double dose of murder this week, beginning with "Secret Sins of the Father," a truly dreadful potboiler.

While Beau Bridges and his father, Lloyd, work wonderfully well together on CBS' "Harts of the West" series, both are wasted here in a preposterous mishmash that finds Beau playing a Nebraska sheriff accusing his father in the death of his wife, Beau's mother, with a side conflict stemming from the fact that Beau's father wanted to divorce his wife in order to take up with the little hussy with whom Beau had previously had fling, to the unsurprising consternation of Beau's wife.

More you don't need or want to know - this one is a real turkey.

Conversely, "Murder Between Friends" turns out to be an intriguing, if rather unsavory, mystery movie, thanks to Philip Rosenberg's script, Waris Hussein's taut direction and jittery, unnerving performances by Stephen Lang and Martin Kemp as two good old boys who appear to be both close enemies as well as friends.

"Murder Between Friends" is another fact-based film but the film makes clear that the facts are rather muddy - even after two court trials. About the only thing one knows for sure is that Janet Meyers, the wife of the character played by Lang, has been murdered. Was it done by Janet's husband, by his friend Bill, played by Kemp - or possibly by both of them acting together?

That's the question pondered by an assistant district attorney in New Orleans, well-played by Timothy Busfield. The fact he's the only familiar face in the cast makes it easier to concentrate on the drama that's unfolding.

NBC has rightly put a warning about violence at the beginning of "Murder Between Friends" but for adults, this is one of the more satisfying mystery movies of the season. ------------------------------------------------------------------- Classic `Columbo'

"Columbo: Butterfly in Shades of Grey," "ABC Monday Night Movie," 9 p.m. Monday, Channel 4. -------------------------------------------------------------------

Peter Falk and "Columbo" are back with another engaging episode focusing on the man with the rumpled raincoat. And like the recent "Columbo" episode which was such a success because of the protagonist played by Faye Dunaway, once again Falk/Columbo has a worthy opponent in the person of William Shatner.

He has great fun playing Fielding Chase, a Rush Limbaugh-styled radio talk-show host who bullies his assistant, played by Jack Laufer, and is much too protective of his daughter, played by Molly Hagan.

It's classic "Columbo" stuff and even if you figure out early on where the murderer made his mistake, a great part of the fun is in waiting to hear Columbo speak those familiar words: "Oh, there's just one more thing . . '

Doing "Columbo" in this fashion - two-hour movies, rather than one-hour episodes - allows time for better scripts (this one was written by veteran Peter Fischer) that tell more interesting stories with richer character development, and they are more likely to attract quality guest-stars like Dunaway and Shatner. ------------------------------------------------------------------- Castles to behold

"America's Castles," 5, 9 p.m. Sunday, A&E. -------------------------------------------------------------------

If you're one of the many moviegoers dazzled by the opulence of the settings in "The Age of Innocence," this new two-hour documentary on A&E will be a treat.

"America's Castles" looks at several of the fabulous dwellings and estates that America's wealthy industrialists like the Vanderbilts, Jay Gould and William Randolph Hearst built in the late 19th and early 20th century, environments created by famous architects for clients for which money was no object.

All are open to the public as museums, thus this film serves as a kind of guided tour that is likely to make many viewers vow to see them in person.

They range from Cornelius Vanderbilts' "The Breakers" in Rhode Island to George Vanderbilt's spectacular "Biltmore" in North Carolina to the house and museum John Ringling North built in Florida to William Randolph Hearst's famous "San Simeon" in California.

Most were either done or at least begun in the pre-income tax days and the film makes it quite clear we'll probably never see their likes again today. (Certainly Bill Gates' home on Lake Washington is taking far longer to build than the bulk of these castles, partly because crews of a thousand or more workers were often employed.)

One can, of course, view these palaces as great selfish self-indulgences - but their owners and their creations are a part of American history and, as such, are fascinating.