Jennifer Peedom’s thrilling Everest drama celebrates the Sherpa climber who helped make history, with breathtaking vistas and a deeply human story.
By James Verniere/Boston Movie News
Uplifting in more ways than one, Jennifer Peedom’s “Tenzing” tells the (truish, I’m sure) story of Tenzing Norgay, the Tibetan-Nepalese sherpa who accompanied Edmund Hillary (Tom Hiddleston) to the summit of Mount Everest in 1953, where the two celebrated their unequaled achievement.
The history of “mountain films”—one of the greatest, “Free Solo,” was released only eight years ago—in the cinema is long and legendary, and “Tenzing,” which was shot on location in Nepal, is a worthy and welcome addition to the genre. Like its greatest predecessors, “Tenzing” is a wondrous experience of verticality, making you feel like you’ve been craning your neck for (about) two hours.
But it’s also deeply human. Depicted by three actors, Tenzing, first played by child actor Samdrup Dorje Lama, is a charming boy who herds yaks in a high-altitude field. He is enchanted by the “goddess of the mountain,” an ever-present deity in the eyes of the Nepalese, who live at her feet, whose native name is Chomolungma. “She” is Everest to us. As a young man, “servant boy” Tenzing (Tenzin Dalha), from a different tribe than the locals, runs away with Dawa (the remarkable Thinley Lhamo, who also supplies the ethereal voice on the soundtrack), the beautiful daughter of his master. Then Tenzing bluffs his way into a job as a sherpa, to Jill Henderson’s (Caitriona Balfe, a genuine asset in a smallish role) equal admiration and dismay, a local British representative in Darjeeling, India, where a Swiss team has tried to “conquer” Everest. The Swiss fail. In a flashback, Tenzing, the servant boy who dreams of being a sherpa, wanders into a climbing camp and meets English mountaineer George Mallory (Johnny Flynn). (Mallory famously disappeared during a 1924 expedition; his body was found just below the summit in 1999). In 1953, a British team led by Colonel John Hunt (a terrific Willem Dafoe) wants Tenzing on the team. He insists on being a “team member” and “not a sherpa,” and Hunt reluctantly relents. This causes friction between Tenzing and the sherpas led by the rebellious Pasang (a very good Tenzin Jigmey).
In more flashbacks, we learn that Tenzing and Dawa have two daughters and are happily married until (spoiler alert) Dawa is struck down by an ailment, leaving Tenzing and his daughters inconsolable. Before he leaves on the expedition, Tenzing’s worried older daughter gives him his wife’s bead bracelet to protect him on his dangerous, groundbreaking journey.
Like Philip Kaufman’s “The Right Stuff,” the classic 1983 drama about NASA’s Mercury program, “Tenzing” is about brave explorers going where no one has gone before. For the British team, the dangers include crevasses that can block their way or swallow them up, vertiginous walls of rock and ice, and extreme conditions such as freezing cold and oxygen deprivation. Tenzing and Hillary bond during the journey. Tenzing proves his value by showing the team how to traverse a seemingly impassable crevasse. But will Hunt choose Hillary, a New Zealander, and Tenzing, a “foreigner,” for the “final approach” to the summit? It’s unlikely at best.
Written by award-winning Australian author Luke Davies (“Lion”), “Tenzing” is a thrilling, engrossing watch, though it can feel a bit forced and on the nose at times. The visual splendor, the dangers of climbing, and the physical and emotional challenges, however, ramp up the experience just as they do in “The White Hell of Pitz Palu” (1929). That’s the essence of mountain films. The film’s ace in the hole is Tibetan actor Genden Phuntsok, who plays the mature Tenzing, looks a bit like Omar Sharif, brings strong acting and action chops, and stands head and shoulders with veterans Dafoe and Hiddleston. “Tenzing” is the epitome of a big screen experience, so it is ironic that the film, an Apple TV release, will only have a one-week theatrical run, beginning Oct. 9, before streaming on Apple TV on Oct. 16. See it in theaters as soon as you can, and all hail Chomolungma.
‘Tenzing’
Rating: PG for thematic elements, language, smoking and some peril.
Cast: Genden Phuntsok, Tom Hiddleston, Willem Dafoe Caitriona Balfe
Director: Jennifer Peedom
Writer: Luke Davies
Running time: 2 hours, 8 minutes
Where to Watch: AppleTV
Grade: A-
