Credited cast: | |||
Woo Jung | ... | Moo-Taek Park (as Jung Woo) | |
Hwang Jung-min | ... | Hong-Gil Um (as Jeong-min Hwang) | |
In-kwon Kim | ... | Jeong-bok, Park | |
Mi-ran Ra | ... | Myeong-ae, Cho | |
Jo Sung-ha | ... | Dong-gyoo, Lee | |
![]() |
Lee Chae Yun | ... | Yeon Woo (8 years old) |
Following a grueling climb up Kanchenjunga, Hong-gil and Mu-taek become fast friends and partners in climb. The peak of their professional careers comes when they become the 14th team to scale the Himalayas. But the climb came at a price: both sustained injuries and Hong-gil was compelled to retire. Years later, Hong-gil is a renowned lecturer and Mu-taek takes up an assignment to go up Everest. When Hong-gil learns that Mu-taek has gone missing, he blames himself for encouraging the younger man's plans. Looking at a photo of Mu-taek's frozen corpse still trapped on the mountain, he decides to put together a rescue team to retrieve the body. Despite warnings, concerns over his injured leg and treacherous storms, Hong-gil leads the expedition. Written by CJ Entertainment
By far, this movie leaves every other Himalayan climbing movie in the dust. The images of the climbing teams were so realistic and depicted so beautifully that it left me in awe. Having been around tall mountains, I can safely say that the mountain scenes was very well done.
The movie also captured the 'tank' personality of the main character Captain Um. He is a driven man, and the story reveals how much that impacts his life and work. It also smoothly depicts the age/stature value that is practices so clearly by Koreans. The lead actor did a tremendous job of getting Captain Um's character, his mannerisms and attitude.
Of course the movie is emotional, I had to see it in two sittings. That emotional aspect of the film is what gives it its human quality - after all the whole expedition to rescue a dead teammate is very much a human reaction. I am very glad that the movie took in stride the god times, as well as the very sad times in a very realistic way. I loved the scenery of South Korea as well, the movie blended these city scenes with the mountain scenes in a balanced way.
Fantastic movie! And yes, bring the tissues.