She took one look at the item I was talking about, silently giggled to herself, and proceeded to pat me on the head. "Those aren’t yoyos dear, those are grinders. They’re for weed" Now I know what you’re thinking, but unfortunately I have had quite a few of these embarrassing moments in my life, so this was nothing new for me.
But the reason I’m bringing this sad moment in hook up history to your attention, is that it’s pretty obvious to everyone who comes into contact with me that I’m not a weed smoker. Now just because I don’t smoke doesn’t mean I’m lame; I actually one of the more adventurous people you’ll ever meet. But I’d have to be on the strongest strain of the stickiest icky ever conceived by man to even come close to climbing a mountain. And it would probably have to be laced with something even more powerful than that to get me to climb Mt. Everest.
As people climb that torturous mountain, their bodies literally begin to die. They suffer from conditions where they run out of oxygen, their bodies fill up with fluid which ultimately kills them, or their bodies play tricks on them and make them believe that they are burning up. And those are just the ones they explained to us in the film, I haven’t even mentioned frost bite or the dying from alcohol poisoning in an attempt to keep your body warm. Ok, so I made the last one up but the point remains the same. Why would anyone ever pay $65,000 to do this to themselves? Wouldn’t it just be easier to join a book club?
Well this is the basically what takes place in the movie Everest. In this film you are introduced to Ron, a lifelong adventurer who now makes his living taking people on guided tours, so to speak, up to the top of Mt. Everest. Everyone who signs up for this suicidal trek has to be an experienced climber, but even most of them aren’t truly prepared for what’s to come. On this particular trip there is added pressure for Ron to get everyone to the top as there is a writer who has decided to come along for the ride and chronicle everything that happens for his publication. So Ron finds himself taking risks that he normally wouldn’t take in order to help his business out and to also help the people he’s grown to know achieve their dreams.
The first half of the film is predictably dedicated to character development and setting up the ominous tone of the story. You hear all sorts of inspirational monologues explaining why they do what they do and there is a ton of climber lingo that will probably go over your head. But once they start the final climb to get to the top of the mountain, the movie really takes off.
The filmmakers do an excellent job recreating the tough elements they had to live through as they were making their climb. So much so, that you even start cough a little yourself out of empathy for these poor souls. I swear they were pumping some extra AC into the theater that night because I felt like I was freezing too.
And for the most part they treat some of the death scenes with the same harshness and indifference as the cold and the mountain did the climbers. It’s a fairly brutal goodbye to some of these characters, especially given the fact that you spent so much time getting to know them. But maybe that’s point. And that’s part of the reason some of the scenes towards the end are so gut wrenching.
I liked this movie but in the end, it runs a little too long and you are introduced to way too many characters. I would suggest paying the extra money to see it in IMAX to try and get the full experience of the climb but poor people like me will do just fine in normal 2D. I give this movie a rating of FRESH!
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