The Ensemble Polaris & Toronto Silent Film Festival presents

Epic of Everest 1924 87min *World Premiere of New Score *Toronto Premiere of Restoration

Director & Cinematographer: Captain John Noel

This is the official filmed record of the doomed Mallory and Irvine 1924 attempt to reach the summit of the highest peak in the world. Filmed in the harshest of conditions imaginable, John Noel brilliantly succeeded in capturing the soul of what was then a mysterious and little understood landscape and culture. The powerful images of the approach to and of Everest itself and of the people that inhabit the surrounding region reveal the profound visual style of the filmmaker. Lying unseen and untouched for decades, it has now been restored by the BFI (British Film Institute) from the 2 surviving prints; all tinting and toning reinstated.

This film brings back to life all the beauty, isolation and vulnerability of one of the most enduring chapters in the history of exploration. Profoundly moving in scope, with the preparations, dangerous incidents and final climb all recorded in incredible clarity; the breathtaking cinematography also records some of the earliest film of life in Tibet. Sequences of Phari Dzong (Pagri), Shekar Dzong (Zegar) and Rongbuk monastery are interposed with life in the villages and the trek of the climbers. No footage was staged or filmed at other times: this was all done live as it happened. “Revealed by the restoration, few images in cinema are as epic – or moving – as the final shots of a blood red sunset over the Himalayas.”-BFI

World premiere of new score by Ensemble Polaris, performed live

Tickets: $20 -$15Senior/Student available online or at the door

Festival Pass for all screenings April 7-12 also available