Touching the Void

Touching the Void, starring MacKey and Aaron ★★★★★
I love to watch climbing films, but often they are miserably done in a manner that considers the viewer completely naive to climbing technique and possibilities. I was fairly nervous that this film would repeat the horrid sensationalism of other recently reviewed films, like the Vertical Limit. This movie was everything but that. It is based on the true but unbelievable story of two British climbers Joe Simpson and Simon Yates who set out to scale an unnamed peak in Patagonia. In the process, they succeed to make the summit, but the descent is greeted by disaster when white-out conditions, and a fall by one of the partners, leave the two completely out of communication and presuming that the fallen climber is dead. The struggle to get off the mountain and the eventual survival of both climbers is well beyond belief. The movie does a beautiful job with superb acting to portray as accurately as possible what is thought to be the events that led to both climbers getting out alive. About the only other story, this incredible is Doug Scott escaping from an unnamed peak in the Himalayas with both femurs fractured, while living out a 2-week storm. This is a movie very much worth watching, even if you aren’t into climbing.