Too many dramas for two hours

There is hardly another mountain disaster about which so much has been published as about that on Everest in the spring of 1996. Jon Krakauer‘s book “Into thin air” became a bestseller worldwide. But other involved climbers started writing too, such as the Russian Anatoli Boukreev who disagreed with Krakauer’s version on many points. There were accusations here and there. The story is complex: A melange of weather conditions, tactical mistakes of the mountain guides and the lack of climbing skills among some clients of the commercial operators led to the disaster. During the storm in the summit area, many dramas played simultaneously, each of them would have delivered alone enough material for a two-hour movie: such as the incredible survival story of Beck Weathers, the rescue attempts of Anatoli Boukreev, who set off again and again from the South Col to search for the missing climbers, or Rob Hall‘s radio call with his pregnant wife Jan Arnold in New Zealand before he froze to death (Hear below what Jan told me about the call when I met her in Kathmandu in 2003).

Only hinted

That’s the weakness of the movie: The reasons for the accident in 1996 were so complex, there were so many persons involved, and it happened so much during the storm that it is simply impossible to cover all the details and aspects in a two-hour movie. But that’s exactly what the director Baltasar Kormákur seems to have tried. Everything is somehow touched or hinted, but nothing is really deepened. For example the film suggests a conflict between the Sirdars of the various groups by showing two Sherpas with sullen faces who obviously do not want to cooperate. Why? Don’t they like each other? Where are the other Sherpas? Or this scene: Suddenly we learn that there are no fixed ropes at two key points in the summit area – cut – a Sherpa is shown pulling a female client with a short rope upwards. Who are they? Should this Sherpa really fix the ropes at the “Balcony” and the “Hillary Step”?

Distorted

Jake Gyllenhaal as Scott Fischer

There are real Hollywood stars among the actors: Josh Brolin, Jake Gyllenhaal, Keira Knightley, Robin Wright and Emily Watson, to list just a few. But they get little opportunity to develop their roles properly – simply because the film wants to cover too much rather than focusing on single aspects. That leads to the one or other misleading picture. So Gyllenhaal plays the US guide Scott Fischer, who died in the accident, admittedly with a great deal of verve. But the “real” Fischer was probably more than an often drunken, crazy, narcissistic freak as he comes off in the movie. But Gyllenhaal has just not enough scenes to draw a more differentiated picture of Fischer.

Always wind and avalanches

Speaking of little differentiated: If you believe the movie, there is virtually no time on Everest without wind, storm, avalanches or collapsing seracs – as if Everest was not spectacular enough without this dramatization. If the conditions were really like that, there would not have been almost 7,000 successful ascents since 1953.

Enough moaning. Maybe I am just dealing too much with high-altitude mountaineering and what is happening at the highest mountain on earth. Just go to the movies (cinema release on 18 September) and let “Everest” entertain you! Then you will probably enjoy it. Just think of the outside shower!

Jan Arnold about her last call to Rob Hall (recorded in 2003)

Scene in the movie “Everest”

Good mountaineering movies are few and far between. They often snatch effects, are unrealistic or just cheesy. Let’s see if the film “Everest” will be a laudable exception. Now the first official trailer of the movie has been released (see below). Laudably, the Universal Studios and the film crew appeal for donations to the earthquake victims in Nepal in the closing credits of the trailer.  There is no such appeal in the German version – a pity! The movie “Everest” will start in the cinemas in September. It tells the story of the Everest accident in 1996, when eight members of commercial expeditions died in a storm in the summit area. Jon Krakauer’s book “Into Thin Air” about the events on 10 and 11 May 1996, was an international bestseller and triggered a discussion about commercial climbing on Everest. There are many Hollywood stars in the new Everest film.

From Gyllenhall to Knightley

Keira Knightley

Jake Gyllenhaal (known i.a. from the movie “Brokeback Mountain”) plays US mountain guide Scott Fischer, who died in the storm as well as New Zealand guide Rob Hall, who is portrayed in the film by Jason Clarke (“The Great Gatsby”). Josh Brolin (“True Grit”) plays the US client Beck Weathers, who miraculously survived the storm night outdoors but suffered from severe frostbite. There are also top actresses for the female roles. Robin Wright (“Forrest Gump”) plays Weathers’ wife Peach. Keira Knightley  (“Pirates of the Caribbean”) takes on the role of Rob Hall’s pregnant wife Jan who was speaking via satellite phone with her dying man on Everest.

Riegler brothers as doubles

The mountain scenes were filmed earlier this year in Val Senales in South Tyrol. The shooting lasted five weeks. The “Everest Base Camp” of the film was on the glacier Hochjochferner, 3000 meters high. “For other shootings the stars are picked up by limousines. Here they went by glacier lifts or snowcats”, said producer Nicky Kentish Barnes. “The stars fought bravely.” But they had not to become extreme mountaineers. Eleven climbers had been engaged to double the actors in snow and ice, including the two South Tyrolean extreme climbing brothers Florian and Martin Riegler. They were not allowed to say which actors they doubled.  The climbing brothers already had movie experience. In 2012 they played in the film “Messner”: Martin, born in 1980, took on the role of Reinhold Messner, the two years younger Florian played Guenter Messner, who lost his life on Nanga Parbat in 1970.