Product Details

• Actors: Rebecca De Mornay, David Breashears, Jake Norton
• Directors: Liesl Clark
• Format: Closed-captioned, Color, NTSC
• Language: English
• Rating: NR (Not Rated)
• Number of tapes: 1
• Studio: Wgbh Boston
• VHS Release Date: November 14, 2000
• Run Time: 60 minutes
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (6 customer reviews)
• ASIN: B00004REMM
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #4,045 in Video (See Bestsellers in Video)

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  #1 in	Video > Television > WGBH Boston > Nova > Animals & Nature
  #2 in	Video > Sports > Mountaineering & Climbing
  #11 in	Video > Special Interests > Outdoor Recreation

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com

In 1924 British "gentleman climbers" George Mallory and Andrew Irvine attempted to reach the top of the world's tallest peak, Mount Everest (28 years before the successful expedition of Sir Edmund Hillary). Mallory and Irvine were last spotted 1,000 feet from the summit, at which point they vanished, never to be seen again. Seventy-five years later, a nephew of a member of the 1924 expedition sponsored a search for the bodies of Mallory and Irvine, hoping to prove that they had been the first to conquer Everest. The PBS documentary series Nova was there to record this exciting quest. We follow the searchers as they brave the world's harshest climbing and weather conditions. Their efforts are amply rewarded when they find Mallory's frozen remains, the name tag on his clothing still intact, a moment of discovery that's thrilling to witness. Archival footage of the 1924 expedition provides a fascinating counterpoint as the viewer is struck by how incredibly underdressed and ill prepared the 1920s climbers were compared to today's trekkers, with their high-tech clothing and equipment. Also engrossing is the analysis of the clues surrounding the body, in the attempt to settle the question Did Mallory and Irvine actually attain the summit, or not? --Laura Mirsky

Product Description

"I looked up at a patch of white. It wasn’t rock and it wasn’t snow," explains Conrad Anker, world-renowned climber and mountaineer. It was the half-buried body of British mountain-climbing legend George Mallory. Clothed in a tweed jacket and leather boots, Mallory had set off to scale the final slope of Mt. Everest on the morning of June 8, 1924. Soon after, he was seen for the last time just 1,000 feet from the summit.

75 years later in May 1999, Mallory’s frozen remains were discovered by Anker, a member of the world-class climbing team charged with solving a mysterious question: Was Mallory the first to reach the top of Everest?

Discover what new clues Mallory’s body, bones, clothes, personal items and letters offer. Climb the daunting slopes that challenged Mallory’s mind, body and archaic equipment. See remarkable exclusive archival film footage from Mallory’s deadly expedition. And take part in mountaineering history as NOVA brings you an up-close look at this headline-making quest.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars LOST AND FOUND...ON EVEREST!, December 2, 2000

By	Lawyeraau (Balmoral Castle) - See all my reviews (TOP 10 REVIEWER)    (COMMUNITY FORUM 04)

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This Nova presentation is a first rate documentary which explores the mystery of the disappearance of Mallory and Irvine, chronicling their 1924 Everest summit attempt and the present day efforts made to find them on Everest. Archival footage of the 1924 Everest British Expedition, along with a montage of vintage photographs of these early gentleman explorers, as well as extracts from personal letters sent by Mallory to his wife, are interposed with modern day footage of Everest in order to frame the story. Commentaries by David Breashears, world class filmmaker and climber, and by various members of the 1999 Mallory and Irvine Research Expedition who discovered the remains of Mallory on Everest, add depth to this documentary which is narrated by Rebecca Mornay.

The efforts of the early Everest expeditioners were truly amazing, considering that they climbed in tweeds and hobnail boots, without fixed ropes, ironmongery, or other sophisticated equipment available to climbers today. A demonstration with a circa 1920s ice axe shows how they would chop steps and hand holds into the ice. It was a terribly painstaking process.

The discovery of Mallory's body on Everest seventy five years after his disappearance into the mists of Everest is truly amazing and wondrously memorialized on this film. The efforts that went into this search were highly organized, with the search area divined through simple cartography based upon anecdotal, second hand information about the sighting on Everest by a Chinese climber, long since deceased, of an "old English dead".

Mallory's marble like body, well preserved and intact, tells of the trauma that he had sustained before his eventual death. A review of the artifacts found with his body, an altimeter marked MEE2 (Mount Everest Expedition 2), personal clothing, a pocket knife, goggles, and personal notes, all add a certain poignancy to the discovery. The burial of Mallory's body on Everest finally puts to rest a chapter in Everest history. Now only Irvine is still left to be accounted for. Perhaps the discovery of his remains will answer the question that is yet to be answered. Did Mallory and /or Irvine summit Everest before their tragic deaths?

11 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars The Razors Egde, March 18, 2000

By	M. James "jilesmeacham" (Vancouver, B.C.) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

In 1924, dressed in little more than tweed climbing gear and possessed of a naive esprit de corp an expedition of English gentlemen adventurers made successive but abortive attempts upon the summit of Mount Everest. The fate of the last pair to attempt this feat, George Leigh Mallory and Andrew Irvine, has remained a mystery for seventy-five years as both ascended into a mist from which they were never seen again. This video captures the first moments of an historic day in 1999 when climbers found the remains of Mallory, perfectly preserved in its trans-alpine resting place. Despite the frequency of its conquest life on Everest is tenuous at best. Curiously, when life is at its most fragile, men of selfless heroism walk the razors edge when the safer path beckons. This video is a fitting requiem to two of Everest's early explorers and chronicles an age when achievements were less a public acclamation of the self than a personal celebration of it.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Watch it, March 8, 2002

By	Daffydd (Ontario, Canada) - See all my reviews

Nova needs to add more extras and to put out more of thier videos in the DVD format. Enjoyable, educational, and balanced. The searchers, with a discreet camera following them, walk about an area where climbers who fall off Everest seem to collect. I understand the need to be respectful, but I think it would be more (for a lack of a better word) 'scary' to see what the stakes of climbing Everest often are. Do I give away the ending? They find Mallory expecting to find Irvine, but do they find the answer? It was possible they made it, though not likely. But how often has 'not likely' not prevented people from accomplishing thier goal? Its incredible to think men in sweaters and skimpy boots climbed at the top of Everest, while they use space age materials now. They need to find Irvine! And the camera!