2023   Netflix

Rated:  R

Length:  2hr  24 min

Adventure ~ Biography ~ Drama ~ Thriller ~ True Story

Directed by:  J. A. Bayona

Starring:  Enzo Vogrincic, Matías Recalt, Agustín Pardella.

“What happens when the world abandons you? When you have no clothes and you’re freezing? When you have no food and you’re dying? The answer’s in the mountain.”

Society Of The Snow is based on the True Story of an Uruguayan Rugby Football Team. On October 13, 1972 the chartered Air Force plane Flight 571, carrying the team to a match, crashed into a glacier in the middle of the Andes mountains. Of the 45 passengers, 29 survived the crash only to fight for survival on one of the most inaccessible and hostile environments on Earth.

The movie follows their journey to survive as they battle extreme temperatures, wind and snow with only the shell of the plane for shelter. With no means of communication they have no way of knowing if anybody even knows where they are, or if they are thought to have perished. They resort to extreme measures to survive, and learn to lean on each other with love and faith to help them through their ordeal.

There was a 1993 Movie titled Alive that told the same true story. I vaguely remember it, at least the details of what they went through. I do remember that it looked like it was shot in a studio so you didn’t get the full sense of realism it should have had. Society Of The Snow was shot on location in The Sierra Nevada mountains in Spain and the actual crash site in The Andes Mountains of Uruguay. It is very realistic, you feel as if you are there with them struggling every minute to survive.

Netflix has a lot of Foreign films they overdub. I am not a big fan of these and try to avoid them. When the dialogue does not match the actor’s mouth, and it looks like an old Japanese karate movie…..it drives me nuts. I can’t hang with that. This one is well done and the story of survival itself is so intense, that is all you are focused on. It is an incredible true tale of survival and the heartwarming conclusion after all they went through is overwhelming.

And you know I love the True Story movies.

This is a good one.

Two Thumbs up.

P.S. There is a 36 minute documentary on Netflix entitled: Who were we on the mountain. It is an in-depth look at the creative process and the development of the film. Might be worth watching first before Society of The Snow.