If you fancy a night in watching a DVD, then take a look at the selection available at Island Libraries. At just £1 per night, they’re a great bargain. Ed
Rather than dealing with the perils and pitfalls that can be at times bewildering – from making a cup of Earl Grey tea well or even scaling the escalators at Piccadilly Circus, a film from Ventnor Library that puts these challenges of the five-sense reality into serious perspective is indeed, ‘Touching The Void’.
Combining excellent level reconstructions and documentary interviews with the three mountaineers from England who headed for Peru to climb the unclimbed West face of Siula Grande, this is obviously a piece of work to be reckoned with.
Director Kevin MacDonald manages to not only blur the question of who is acting up to a realistic and believable level, but also visually uses his obvious talents to put across something bordering on alternate states of consciousness that one of the mountaineers reaches.
Really, ‘Touching The Void’ is a film that does hold some answers to what did go wrong for the descent from the summit but unexpectedly turns into a film with humour on its side. Possibly this simple idea causes ‘Touching The Void’ to elevate through the hardship of how a link with the descent became even more than just a literal term for heading back to home.
With very little to fault at all, due to its enthusiasm for the subject and also the appeal of the mountaineers explaining enough of an educational angle of learning to anyone who is interested, that undoubtedly climbing is a state of mind in itself and if anything, the reality of how dangerous it is, is all too apparent to anyone who has tried.
When films do inspire, they also change the negative thoughts to positive and vice-versa. ‘Touching The Void’ clearly demonstrates this subjectively, perhaps that is all it takes.
