Many glorious shots of the breathtaking Himalayas make a poignant backdrop for this painful portrait of a traumatized family. An agonizing watch because it's made by the eldest son of Alex Lowe, Max, who doesn't seem able, as a documentarian, to dig deep below the -- sorry -- avalanche of grief and anger that he and his family are still buried under. Many times I thought to myself, "These people are so locked in." No one seems to be able to dig very deep into themselves. When Max presses his mother about why she "fell in love" with her dead husband's climbing partner three months -- three months! -- after Alex went missing in an avalanche, she just says, "I was in love." That's the extent of your insight? Everyone has mask-like expressions, unable to look into themselves, except for Conrad Anker who is heartbreakingly aware of his survivor guilt. Even Max, who was driven to make this film to dig himself out in some way, can't say why he didn't take Conrad's last name when his two younger brothers did. He just says, "Yeah, I don't know why I did that." I found myself yelling in my head: "Because you resented your mother for moving on too quickly! Because you were still traumatized! Because no one in your family is able to process anything and you're unwilling to go along with the weirdly blank, smiling erasure of your mother!" I often find climbers hard to understand. This gave me a secondary understanding of what it is to be raised in a family who don't or can't seek to understand themselves. As a result, the final images of supposed peace and healing felt forced and scripted. I ache for all of them.
