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Here’s an intense but crowded disaster epic from director Baltasar Kormákur, detailing an ill-fated expedition to the peak of Mount Everest in 1996. Jason Clarke stars as Rob Hall, the head of a massive tourist pack heading up the slopes. Among his entourage is Josh Brolin as Texan adventurer Beck Weathers, Jake Gyllenhaal as mountaineer Scott Fisher and Emily Watson as base camp leader Helen Wilton.





While it’s no surprise that Jason Clarke is excellent, the real stand-out performances come from Watson and Brolin, particularly incredible for the former considering she’s tied to a phone for a sizeable chunk of screen-time (as is Keria Knightley as Rob’s wife Jan). Brolin has never been much of a selling point for me, but here he’s a wonder to watch as Beck’s go-gettin’ attitude is slowly and cruelly worn away by the ascent.





As one might expect with a true-to-life story, a reverential tone is maintained throughout, particularly by Dario Marianelli’s unfurling score and a script that doesn’t waste time trying to glamourize the climbers as heroes or stigmatize anyone for what may or may not have gone wrong. The mountain itself is also given due respect: a recurring shot with the cast shunted to the side of the frame as Everest looms all around – just itching for them to put a foot wrong – illustrates the famous peak as a character in itself.









Blacing the many characters and respective tangents was always going to be difficult, and sadly Everest makes a bad job of it: Gyllenhaal’s Scott Fisher is sporadically returned to every once in a while almost as an afterthought, which feels ill-befitting not only of his talent as an actor, but also disrespectful of his real-life counterpart. Constantly switching perspectives adds a lot of un-necessary running time too, but at the same time other parts of the story feel underdeveloped. Elements of the real-life tale that are still under speculation to this day are handled mostly through hasty cutaways to other events or by having characters simply drop from the frame…sometimes literally!