The Epic of Everest (1924) – 3/5

Higher and higher

„The Epic of Everest“ is a documentary from the United Kingdom from the year 1924, so this one is really close to its 100th anniversary now and it probably has happened already if you read this review of mine a little later. Of course, given the year, it is a silent film, but you could hear some music while watching just like I did when this aired at some midnight screening with a live musician playing the tunes. It was nice. I don’t regret going one bit. I guess that next year, in 2024, this film will be shown on several occasions again because of the anniversary, maybe also again at the movie theater where I saw it. It runs for almost 1.5 hours, which is admittedly pretty long for this era. The writer and director was J. B. L. Noel, also from the UK of course, and he was just in his early/mid 30s when he shot this film, so not old at all. He lived on for another 65 years afterwards, which means he came extremely close to becoming a centenarian. Good for him and age-wise this means of course the exact opposites compared to the two climbers he is elaborating on in here. They did not make it back alive. It is fairly obvious before the film already because most people know that Sir Edmund Hillary was the first who officially climbed Mount Everest, but we cannot say for sure that these two here did not succeed. Maybe we will never know or who knows, perhaps one day their human remains will be found even. But this is not the content of this documentary. The content was what happened at the exact time when Mallory and Irvine and some sherpas tried to make their way up. We see the duo on a few occasions in front of the camera, but what maybe stays in mind the most were their headshots towards the end when we there was already a great deal of information on how they did not succed.

There was this major spoiler around the middle of the film when it is already said that they would be dead only two days later. Well, „spoiler“ feels more fitting, even if the film towards the end is actually about their shortcomings then when there is some drama if we would see the sign for success or death when some of the one accompanying them returned. By the way, Mallory and Irvine were not old at all I checked. One was just in his early 20s and the more experienced one was approximately the director’s age back then. I personally was not sure initially if this was mostly reenactment, especially towards the end when the director films people from far away, or if it was all real and not staged. We will never be 100% sure anyway, but to me it did feel authentic and this is one key reason why I give this film a relatively high rating. It is also informative here and there and I liked it when one some occasions we are told how the locals from the era call Mount Everest. We also see them here and there of course. It is really not only about the two climbers, but many others are depicted. This was handled nicely by Noel. The film never really dragged or at least not too much: Be it a little anecdote about the wife of a sherpa who just carried as much weight as her husband or be it the anecdote about the baby donkey who was apparently just one day old, but had to go on a walk that was perhaps longer than what any other donkey walked at this age. And the second day was almost the same distance then. It was so exhausted. Of course, I am biased here with how much I adore donkeys, so I have to talk about this inclusion a bit. When we see a man carry the donkey then in its final scene, it was almost the only moment when people in the movie theater were laughing quite a bit.

This is no comedic short film like what Méliès or de Chomón did. It is all about the adventure instead and the film surely succeeds in this department. Maybe one reason for this is that it was apparently not the first Everest-themed documentary Noel worked on. He also did the cinematography for one in 1922, so two years before this one here, but from what it looks like to me that one is lost, so this film here will be the one that he will always be remembered for. It stayed his only directorial effort from what it looks like. Maybe it also had to do with the change to sound films afterwards. He has some more credits for his cinematography, but I think these were just closely connected to this 1924 film we have here, with decades passed in-between, so I am not sure if he brought something new to the table for those. He was still alive though in both 1953 and 1983. But it is not too important anyway, he reached enough fame with the 1924 film and the evidence is that it is still shown nowadays almost a century later and that prestigious institutes and bodies came up with restored versions here. One consequence is that you can hardly call this a black-and-white film anymore because of how tinted the screen is on a few occasions. No matter if it is shades of red (maybe linked to Mallory’s and Irvine’s blood as you see this at the end), shades of blue (that almost made it look like the ocean) or others, they all worked well.

The film relies a lot on intertitles and provides them sufficiently I would say. It was easy to understand what was going on and with many silent films, this is really a big issue that they would have needed more text on the screen. Anyway, luckily this is not the case here. It is almost too much even here and there when they state the exact amount of feet they have reached at that point. I had to do the math quickly there, a meter indicator would have been easier for me, but I don’t wanna complain, the 30 cm connection is not too complicated. I guess this is pretty much it then. Given the outcome, even if we do not see the protagonists‘ frozen bodies of course, you can say that this is among the early tragedy movies from film history. Sometimes, admittedly, it felt almost a bit too melodramatic with how the intertitles elaborated on Mount Everest, made references to the two protagonists that they are basically the two most capable ones out there and true heroes etc. But then again, it is not wrong in a way. Just look at the sheer size of Mount Everest as the peak of the world. Today, we do not see it like this anymore really, probably because so many people have already gotten up there. It is debatable if that is a good thing or not. Maybe some points are not really meant to be reached for mankind and Everest could surely fall into that category. I mean just look at the fact that you need warm clothes, oxygen support and other people with you as you would never get up there without these items and company. Perhaps it is a good thing that the deepest ground of the ocean cannot be explored like this and just stay with nature itself.

On a completely different note, I also like it that this film comes from England because this is a country that is not super known for its silent films. But if you look closely, they are there too without a doubt, even if not in the same quantity like some other countries. Overall, I think this film deserves to be seen. It surely went more under the radar then it should have and the nature recordings are really as good as it gets for the 1920s. Would also have been impressive for standards from several decades later. This is why I give the overall outcome a thumbs-up here, even if it is not a superb movie or a must-see I guess, and recommend checking it out. Do not miss out, especially if you have the chance to see it on a big screen. I took said chance and so should you. The nostalgia element here is special too of course knowing these mountains existed long before everybody you see in this film and will exist for a long, long time after all of us are gone. It’s tough to find weaknesses with this one. Therefore, I am of course handing out a positive recommendation here. Maybe people who like photography or shooting films themselves even will find even more interesting aspects in here if they get to evaluate Noel’s work. Or like snow. Guilty as charged for me for sure. Or like to see female locals have more crazy haircuts than Pippi Longstocking. What was up with that? So funny I almost had to post a grin smiley.