Okay, so I get that they had to cut a lot for time. It's a made-for-TV movie and I wasn't really expecting total accuracy. I don't really have any major problems with the condensing of events and speeding up the timeline of acclimatization and the ascent. I have re-read the book a couple of times in the recent past and I also read Beck Weathers's "Left for Dead," so I noticed a lot of inaccuracies, but there were only a few that really bothered me.
The first is that they portrayed Yasuko Namba as incompetent and maybe a little stupid. I haven't seen evidence elsewhere of either. While she was not a professional climber, she had successfully completed 6 of the 7 summits. The mistake she made (of clipping on before the rope was anchored) was not made like an idiot when she was just starting the climb...it was made near the summit where oxygen and judgment are harder to come by. That error was also caught before she pulled Beidleman down. She also died much more quietly, as far as Krakauer's account goes.
The second problem I had was Krakauer's incredibly over-inflated role in the movie. During most of the disaster, he was sleeping in his tent. That's not meant to be a criticism of him, but it was really weird to see him being the one everyone was calling and him being the one in charge of everything. I suppose they were trying to condense and not bother to introduce one more character (poor Stuart Hutchison gets no credit here), but it's the least useful and most nonsensical condensation in this movie.
I also don't like the playing up of the rivalry between Hall and Fischer and I don't think that Fischer was as over-the-top reckless as he was portrayed here.
I think I'm going to show Storm Over Everest to my class instead.
The first is that they portrayed Yasuko Namba as incompetent and maybe a little stupid. I haven't seen evidence elsewhere of either. While she was not a professional climber, she had successfully completed 6 of the 7 summits. The mistake she made (of clipping on before the rope was anchored) was not made like an idiot when she was just starting the climb...it was made near the summit where oxygen and judgment are harder to come by. That error was also caught before she pulled Beidleman down. She also died much more quietly, as far as Krakauer's account goes.
The second problem I had was Krakauer's incredibly over-inflated role in the movie. During most of the disaster, he was sleeping in his tent. That's not meant to be a criticism of him, but it was really weird to see him being the one everyone was calling and him being the one in charge of everything. I suppose they were trying to condense and not bother to introduce one more character (poor Stuart Hutchison gets no credit here), but it's the least useful and most nonsensical condensation in this movie.
I also don't like the playing up of the rivalry between Hall and Fischer and I don't think that Fischer was as over-the-top reckless as he was portrayed here.
I think I'm going to show Storm Over Everest to my class instead.