wjmcpeak Review of The Climb

The Climb (1986)

Some good drama--but disappointing as a dramatic climbing movie

[5/10 · 21 May 2006]

I have just seen this movie lately, thinking I had seen the total climbing movie catalog, but I was admittedly ignorant of this one's existence. The story line has already been summarized twice (to date the only other reviews) so--unlike the sometimes inordinate pages of 'reviewers' finding the need to repeat what was summarized by the first few reviews of a movie (a waste of memory if there ever was)--my comments deal with the re-creation of the climbing sequences of the first ascent of Nanga Parbat in 1953. I will repeat that the acting is very competent and Bruce Greenwood (lately seen in a fine job for Disney's Eight Below) does a credible job of portraying the loner-but magnificent climber Hermann Buhl. My review is not meant to be a know-it-all technical, nit picking criticism, but as a climber it is always more satisfying to see the technical aspects of climbing shown due justice. It might very well be that the budget could not stand a too ambitious depiction of the climbing--but then again shots were filmed in far off Pakistan as well as the Canadian Rockies with some actual climbers. Nanga Parbat was originally thought to be a relatively easy Himalyan peak--deceptively so--over and above its 25,000+ feet and the usual altitude dangers of climbing--the avalanche and storm dangers tragically plagued the German expeditions of the 1930s. Weather was not a problem in 1953, but the dangers of the mountain were there, as always. The easier slope climbing was depicted good enough in the movie, but it grows a bit incredible to see the same 'easy day for a lady' marching in the upper reaches of the climb. One would not be climbing with such essentials as ice axe slung over your back--along with crampons (the spikes that are strapped to climbing boots). Greenwood is shown doing just that and using something as unstable as ski poles for snow and ice--it would be foolhardy to say the least--to arrest a slip or fall one needs an ice axe. Hard snow and especially ice require crampons--Greenwood's remain dangling--he never uses them!-- from his chest after leaving his pack for the summit bid. The camera continues to show snow slope when it should be showing the rock pitches that were the hardest climbing for the last 1,000 feet or so. Because although Greenwood conveys something of the extreme difficulties of climbing at such high elevation without oxygen--a great feat in itself by Buhl--showing the climbing difficulty and sheer strength to accomplish it would have conveyed Buhl's amazing climb to the summit with a much more deserved dramatic intensity. If Eastwood can look pretty good climbing the Eiger (Eiger Sanction, 1975), surely Greenwood should have looked better re-creating the greatest lone climbing feat of perhaps the greatest technical mountain climber of the mid 20th century.