Sunday, June 20, 2010

Turning Back

180° South (2010) - Malloy
Photobucket
Photobucket
Photobucket
Photobucket
These rugged boys got it good. A surfer/climber Jeff Johnson and friends try to duplicate the journey to Patagonia by Ben and Gerry of outdoors world(Yvon Chouinard, founder of Patagonia Sportswear and Doug Tompkins, founder of North Face turned environmentalist) in 1968. Johnson hitches a yacht ride, making a detour to Rapa Nui(Easter Island) when the mast of the ship breaks, picks up a hot surfer chick Makohe(she sings beautifully too) there, then arrive in Patagonia to climb the revered Corcovado. It is then, a total surprise for the crew(including Chouinard who's fast approaching his 70) that the peak is not snow-capped anymore, due to climate change and thus unclimbable.

The environmental message here mixed with 60's idealism is pretty strong. Tompkins apparently bought 2 million acres of lands in Chile to conserve it and is fighting alongside the locals against the development down in Patagonia.

Cutting back and forth between stunning nature photography and 16mm footage of 68' journey with soundtrack featuring James Mercer, Isaak Brock, Mason Jennings constantly in the background, 180° South plays out like a pretty North Face commercial at times. The cutesy animation is also too hipsterish for its own good. But the beauty of visuals is too overpowering for me to be cynical about this crunchy granola of a film.

No comments:

Post a Comment