The emotional power of Dmytryk's films may derive from his range of vision always patronizing his characters, restoring honesty and ability to a style and realism...
For Tracy climbing a mountain is a matter of integrity... The conquest of a peak brings moments of exultation and bliss... What he gets from the adventure is just sheer joy... He is simple, kind and sincere...
All brothers dream, but Tracy dreams for the little... He sees life in an honest way... His brother (Wagner), at the contrary, dreams big and with open eyes to make it reality...
When a plane crashes on the top of the mountain, Wagner insists on going up to plunder the remains of the wrecked plane... Spencer accedes to the request to stop his spoiled younger brother to climb the mountain alone...
The avaricious brother is a novice in climbing techniques... He is seeking outdoor adventure only to bring gold and silver, and to strip the dead passengers robbing their money, jewelry and goods...
Tracy - with previous mountaineering experience - had something else in him which responds to the challenge and goes out to meet the struggle of life itself upward and forever upward to shield the safety of his brother with passion and enthusiasm...They are two generations apart, two opposite characters with two utterly different goals...
After a long and hard journey up the mountain, they succeed to reach the airplane wreck and to find that one passenger is still alive - a Hindu girl (Anna Kashfi).
A concerned Tracy gives all his good nature assistance as a caring human being to the injured delicate girl... But an unscrupulous brother intends to murder the helpless woman in order to steal her precious gem...
With the most gorgeous natural areas around; large fields with many ridges and faces; difficult rock climbing; and weak snow bridges, Dmytryk adds to the drama (in VistaVision and Technicolor) the magic and beauty of the high mountain country...
