Man v. Mountain In "Challenge"

Radio Record, Volume XII, Issue 23, 18 November 1938, Page 15

Man v. Mountain In "Challenge"

["The Challenge." London FilmsUnited Artists. Directed by Milton Rosmer. Starring Luis Trenker, Robert Douglas. Just released.] AVING never climbed anything much higher than a tree to look at the Prinee of Wales in my schooldays, I hardly feel qualified to express any expert opinion on the mountaineering sequences of ‘‘The Challenge.’’ Yet it is easy to understand that this climbing sport has a peculiar fascination; and: one does not, eevee se ‘need fo have a head for heights

to find much of this picture, which is based on the first aseent of the Matterhorn in 1865, extraordinarily thrilling. Really, it is two films in onethe genuine climbing drama of man against mountain, made in the Alps

by Luis Trenker (himself once a guide); and the artificial melodrama which has been grafted on to the central stem. Drop To Death With the annoying habit of critics who look .up the facts. I am able to inform you that, although the film makes no bones about taking .verties with detail, much of the story is authenticthe rivalry between the Italian and English parties starting from different sides of the Matterhorn, the race to the summit, the triumph of Edward Whymper and his party, and the tragedy which . followed swiftly when the descent began.

It is a breath-stopping moment when the foot of one of the climbers slips and he spins into space and, falling, plucks off three of the others like ripe fruit. For one sickening second, they hang suspended and then the rope snapsand the camera follows the four bodies as they drop 4000 feet in Jess time than it takes to write this. Dummies, of course. Yes, but 73 years ago they weren’t dummies, Before And After HAT goes before the climb and what follows after the tragedy seems uncommonly tame by comparison; even though the producers have gone to great lengths to embroider the plot with a heroine (Joan Gardner), and also make much ado about the antagonism between Whymper and the Italian guide Carrel, and the accusation that Whymper cut the rope (which, in the film, almost results in a Swiss lynching party). Actualiy (said he, knowingly) it was not Whrmper, but one of the Swiss guides, Peter ‘Taugwalder, who was accused of cutting th rope to save his own neck. : Rugged Strength [T may seem strange that, as an ardent non-mountaineer of many years’ standing, I should have found the mountaineerix’; scenes of "The Chalienge" by far the best. But’ there it is, and I doubt if my reaction will be in any way unique. for no artificial cevices of plotetructure can lessen the thrilling realism of the photography, which takes the onlooker in imagination on to those beetling crags, desperately seeking for footholds, pitting nerve and puny human strength against the majesty of Nature. And nothing can obscure the stark grandeur of the Matterhorn itself, towering cloud-swept, black and bare ezainst the sky. It is symbolic somehow of all that is best in the picture; and something of the mountain’s rugged strength is etubodied in-the performance of Luis Trenker, as Carrel.