Myosotis
Striking images portray the drama of the inexorable advance of modernity.
Somewhere in the vast Southern Ocean, halfway between Australia and Africa, a snow-clad volcano rises like a great white whale reaching nine thousand feet skywards. Heard Island is one the remotest islands on the face of the planet. The waves that continually pound its shores by Antarctic waters make it a perilous undertaking to land a craft there. Largely unknown, it is home to Australia’s highest mountain: Mawson Peak, otherwise known as Big Ben, is 2,745 metres in height.
With the aid of outstanding archive material, film director Michael Dillon reconstructs the two expeditions which aimed to scale the peak in the 1960s. It is an unlikely adventure, reminiscent of the epic South Pole expeditions at the beginning of the last century. One of the youngest expedition members retells this unknown chapter in mountaineering history in both word and song. Wrap up warm, don a sou’wester and prepare yourself for an absurd journey, whose expedition members go into battle with only contempt for death. In the mould of Shackleton.
Michael Dillon has been making adventure documentaries for more than 50 years, 25 years of which he served as filmmaker for Sir Edmund Hillary. He filmed three Australian Everest expeditions including the first ascent from sea level to summit. That film, “Everest Sea to Summit” won 8 major awards worldwide and is considered to be one of the greatest adventure films of all time.
In 2022 he won the IAMF Grand Prize for Lifetime Achievement from the International Alliance for Mountain Film.
