Everest
4 out of 5 Humbling Stars
"You, my friends, are following in the footsteps of history, something beyond the power of words to describe. Human beings simply aren't built to function at the cruising altitude of a 747. Our bodies will be literally dying. Everest is another beast all together."
Wow, is this movie something else. The graphics for Mount Everest are simply amazing. They show how overwhelming, scary, and unforgiving Everest is, yet at the same time how beautiful and awe-inspiring it is. And the cast, phenomenal job. I feel like I went on this journey with them, though of course very far in the background; I can feel their joy when the reach the top, and their anxiety and fear when the storm comes. At the end of the movie, it's impossible to look away. Jason Clarke and Jake Gyllenhaal are fantastic in their roles, along with the rest of the cast.
Some of the way they show people dying is truly disturbing, there one second and gone the next. The makers of this film accurately show how Everest can mess with one's mind. No sane person would undo their harness, or feel like they are overheating and start to take off some layers while near the top of the mountain. How some people just lay down and die, their bodies simply too exhausted to keep moving, and how they are left behind, either being overlooked or people simply too focused on themselves to help another, is frightening. The fact that some of these bodies are left on the mountain as markers is even scarier.
"I'm climbing Mount Everest because I can, because to be able to climb that high and see that kind of beauty that nobody ever sees, it'd be a crime not to."
There are some problems I have with this film, starting off with the probability of some of the problems actually happening. Ropes are not fixed in place, oxygen is not left where it is supposed to be, which I can understand, but there is a specific scene when people say they are going to check/do these things. What happened that they didn't? Also, how could they have not known about the storm? My main problem, though, is with the bad choices that some of the characters make. A leader/guide should allows follow the rules and make sure his group gets back as safely as possible. If a group member is behind the group and is still climbing to the summit after the allotted safe time has passed, it is the leader's job to bring him back to camp, no matter how much he may want to make his dream a reality by climbing Everest. And shouldn't there be more attention paid to the climbers as they are traveling between camps? If someone is coughing more than they should be, or if someone is having other health problems, they should not be allowed to continue. Do these things actually happen in real life? Was this a real problem during the 1996 climb, or just added into the movie?
Besides for these concerns, Everest delivers on its goal, which is to tell the story of the actual 1996 disaster, following as closely to the truth as they can. It shows how the mountain is friends with no one, no matter how many times one may have climbed it, no matter how well one thinks he knows it, Everest doesn't care. If you climb Mount Everest, you're risking your life, and there is never a guarantee that you'll get to keep it. Once you start climbing, you belong to the mountain. Humans can never truly best Mother Nature, and this film leads to the question: Can anyone ever really conquer Mount Everest, or are they just surviving it? One thing I know for sure, this is one challenge I'll never face. I completely fine with observing Everest from a distance.
"There is competition between every person and this mountain. The last word always belongs to the mountain."
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