Everest

This is an excellent movie. Good acting, great script and terrifying plot. Honestly, it is difficult for me to find any sympathy for any of the characters tho. At no stage does the movie give any appearance of professionalism or low risk. Anybody who ventures up on this crazed escapade does so with full knowledge that he or she is putting his own life and that of others at extreme risk. Zero sympathy when that eventuates. Choice! And ego!!

Having just this week returned from climbing all 19,341 feet of Kilimanjaro, I find myself intimately capable of reviewing "Everest", the new thriller from Icelandic director Baltamar Kormákur.

Based on a true story from 1996, Jason Clarke and Jake Gyllenhaal play Rob Hall and Scott Fischer respectively, rival organisers of commercial climbing ventures whose businesses involve training well-paying clients at Everest Base Camp and then taking them to the summit to experience the 'ultimate high'. When the climbing season of 1996 becomes hugely crowded, including a rather obnoxious team from South Africa, the two rivals decide it is in the interests of their clients to combine forces and attack the mountain together.

We are introduced to some of the clients including Texan Beck Weathers (Josh Brolin), second-attempt postman Doug Hanson (John Hawkes) and Japanese mountaineer Yasuko Namba (Naoko Mori) chasing her seventh and final major mountain summit. Supporting the teams is hen-mother from base camp Helen Wilton (Emily Watson), medical helper Caroline Mackenzie (Elizabeth Debicki from "The Man from U.N.C.L.E.") and hard-man Anatoni Boukreev (Ingvar Eggert Sigurðsson) who eschews the use of such luxuries as oxygen. To add dramatic tension to the situation, Rob Hall's wife (Keira Knightley) is heavily pregnant with their first daughter.

In an extremely hostile environment, as a storm passes through, the film neatly characterises how a single impetuous decision can have devastating consequences.

The action scenes in the film are well-executed with a number of vertiguous shots and heart-in-the-mouth moments, neatly escalated by Dario Marianelli's effective score. At its heart this is (without remembering the details of the original news story) a "will they, won't they" survival story of the ilk of "The Towering Inferno" and other classic disaster movies.

However, despite the long running-time and relatively leisurely built-up, I found there to be a curious lack of connection between the viewer and most of the key players. Perhaps this stems from the fact that you know they were all fully aware of the potential dangers? Or perhaps that the mountain seems a bigger character that any of the humans involved? Whatever the reason, it's only the future parental responsibilities of Hall that really resonate and make you root for him as opposed to any of the other characters.

Some of the hardest special effects to pull off are those that depict the natural world (as opposed to Krypton, Asgard etc), and in this regard the team led by Jonathan Bullock (from the Harry Potter series) does a great job. Whilst the "top of Everest" was in reality a set in the Pinewood 007 stage, you'll well believe a man can freeze there.

As such, this is a decent and entertaining telling of a true-life tragedy that will definitely work better on the big screen than the small.

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This is the true story of two different expeditions in 1996 who attempt to scale Everest but encounter massive storms on the descent down the mountain. Everest is a stunning looking film that you come away from , feeling totally exhausted. Because it is so realistic you do feel you are with the climbers at times. Sure , it's a stock disaster movie but because of the nature of the true story behind it , you feel more connected. The special affects are amazing and the performances from Jason Clarke and Keira Knightley are great too. I watched this in 3D but ended up taking the glasses off because it was so annoyingly dark so i recommend watching it in 2D instead. It's a staggering statistic that 1 in 4 people who attempt to get get to the summit of Everest , dies. Why do people do it? that question is asked in this film but apart from the stock answer of " Because it's there" it is never really answered . Perhaps there isn't one?

I always find my viewing experience of the retelling of historical events ruined when I come across scenes which I know have been added for dramatic effect or when someone is played as a bad guy just to let us know who to root for.

The King's Speech was particularly guilty of the former, the portrayal of other teams in Glory Road had the latter, and The Imitation Game was shamelessly guilty of both. I'm not saying this made them bad films, but it certainly made me feel like the experience had strayed away from a retelling of the facts as known.

Everest is everything that is good in such a film. There is no needless good v evil addition and no leading the viewer to conclusions. It tells the story and I have since spent three or four days thinking about the hows, whys and wherefores... whilst knowing I will never find an answer.

The other touch that really elevates this film is that there are no added action sequences that have been added to make Everest more of an action move. The film makers have been intelligent enough to realise that climbing Everest does not need any exaggeration, the characters involved were three dimensional people, and the story was interesting enough not to need embellishment.

I expected an action film but left pleasantly surprised by a biopic with a light touch.

The one mark deduction is for the totally unnecessary 3D. The film absolutely didn't need me wearing dumb glasses to be three dimensional.

Got the chance to see Everest early in IMAX 3D. I'll start off by saying this, if you get the chance, definitely see this movie in IMAX. It adds to the experience and you feel like your on the mountain. That aside, let's dive into one of my most anticipated films of the year.

Everest is chalk full of star power. Jason Clarke, Josh Brolin, Keira Knightley, Jake Gyllenhaal, the list goes on. Everyone is believable in this hostile environment, going from optimistic and adventurous to mortified and forced to fight for their lives. Each character is given a back story, some more drawn out and centered than others, and you get attached to most but not all of them. When the emotional blows hit, they hit hard for some, but not as much for others.

The visuals are, as you might have guessed, stunning. The shots they get of climbers and the way the camera gives you an an idea of how dangerous this is are breath taking. The cinematography is definitely award worthy. IMAX only added to it, putting you in this environment and taking you along for the ride.

This film really did it for me because I have always been fascinated by Everest and the journey it is to make it up to the top and back. If there is a Netflix documentary about Everest, I've watched it. I even watched the one about the story told in this movie. What this film does so well is it immerses you into the environment as well as gives you characters to care about. It's all tied in well together.

At times, the pace is a bit slower than expected and the tones shifts from serious to light hearted are a bit messy. But that stuff doesn't bother you in the moment, your just wrapped up in the intensity of the story.

Overall, Everest gave me exactly what I wanted. It was intense, emotionally powerful, and the visuals were beautiful. It's not perfectly structured, but it sure is engaging. As someone who has studied the mountain, this offers a brutal look into how much time and energy is out into a trip to Everest, and how quickly things can go wrong. Definitely worth a trip to the theatre.