This is a story about a journey made by a man who once had a dream and guts. Donald Crowhurst was an English businessman and amateur sailor who competed in the Sunday Times Golden Globe Race, a single-handed, round-the-world yacht race.
I was very intrigued by the story after listening to a radio interview from the producer John Smithson, who is also the producer of "Touching the Void", one of the first documentaries that made a commercial success in 2003. I had gone to the cinema with great hope and not much previous knowledge on the historic event, and I'm relieved that it didn't let me down. For 92 minutes I was led through a haunting story and came out with much to think about.
Without any reenactment, this film made great use of the limited audio and video archive footage they found and turned it into a compelling story which allowed the audience to understand Crowhurst from a personal level. The story unveiled itself as people who had direct links to the events including his wife and his son, and the eventual winner, also the only one who made it back out of the 9 competitors, Robin Knox-Johnston gave their own accounts of what happened almost 40 years ago.
Crowhurst's logs(journals) that he kept during the 243 days at sea are so haunting that it made it much easier for me to come to understand what being in total isolation can do to a man. While Crowhurst's body was never found, the other competitor Nigel Tetley whose yacht sank just weeks before claiming the prize for fastest passage committed suicide three years later after unsuccessful attempts at properly completing a circumnavigation.
Everything could take its toll, especially the sea.
The director Louise Osmond was also at the Q&A session after the showing together with producer John Smithson. I had no idea that it's a female director and that just came as a very nice surprise. The film is getting a limited release in the UK (a couple of days in certain cinemas). Catch it in cinema while you can, unless you have a state of the art sound system that can recreate the sound of the bashing Southern Ocean.. then I'm sure they'll soon have it on DVDs too.
I was very intrigued by the story after listening to a radio interview from the producer John Smithson, who is also the producer of "Touching the Void", one of the first documentaries that made a commercial success in 2003. I had gone to the cinema with great hope and not much previous knowledge on the historic event, and I'm relieved that it didn't let me down. For 92 minutes I was led through a haunting story and came out with much to think about.
Without any reenactment, this film made great use of the limited audio and video archive footage they found and turned it into a compelling story which allowed the audience to understand Crowhurst from a personal level. The story unveiled itself as people who had direct links to the events including his wife and his son, and the eventual winner, also the only one who made it back out of the 9 competitors, Robin Knox-Johnston gave their own accounts of what happened almost 40 years ago.
Crowhurst's logs(journals) that he kept during the 243 days at sea are so haunting that it made it much easier for me to come to understand what being in total isolation can do to a man. While Crowhurst's body was never found, the other competitor Nigel Tetley whose yacht sank just weeks before claiming the prize for fastest passage committed suicide three years later after unsuccessful attempts at properly completing a circumnavigation.
Everything could take its toll, especially the sea.
The director Louise Osmond was also at the Q&A session after the showing together with producer John Smithson. I had no idea that it's a female director and that just came as a very nice surprise. The film is getting a limited release in the UK (a couple of days in certain cinemas). Catch it in cinema while you can, unless you have a state of the art sound system that can recreate the sound of the bashing Southern Ocean.. then I'm sure they'll soon have it on DVDs too.