From high above, two tiny figures cut a line across a white slope so vast it barely looks real. Everest: The Other Side wants you to feel the pull of that line, the madness and the beauty of it, and on a big screen it very nearly makes you understand.
This is the new documentary from Elizabeth Chai Vasarhelyi and Jimmy Chin, the Oscar-winning team behind Free Solo. It is spectacular, intimate and at times hard to watch, and it opens in UK and US cinemas, including IMAX, on 30 October.
Everest has never looked more beautiful, or more indifferent to the people who love it.
Movie at a Glance
- UK release: In cinemas and IMAX from Friday 30 October 2026
- US release: In cinemas and IMAX from Friday 30 October 2026
- Distributor: Walt Disney Studios (National Geographic Documentary Films)
- Directors: Elizabeth Chai Vasarhelyi and Jimmy Chin
- Featuring: Jim Morrison and Hilaree Nelson
- Runtime: 116 minutes
- Certificate: 12A (UK)
- Genre: Mountaineering documentary
Viewer Match
- Best for: Fans of Free Solo and Meru, anyone who loves big-screen landscapes, and viewers drawn to true stories of love and loss.
- Maybe skip if: You find extreme-risk sport hard to celebrate, or you want a film that seriously questions why people do it.
- Mood and pace: Awe-struck and tense, with long stretches of grief and a thrilling final ascent.
- Cinema or streaming? Cinema, ideally IMAX. The mountain is the reason to go.
- Spoiler level: Spoiler-free: we only discuss what the film sets up in its opening stretch.
A Love Story at 8,000 Metres
Jim Morrison and Hilaree Nelson were elite ski mountaineers who fell in love while pushing the limits of their sport. Their shared dream was the direct North Face of Everest: to climb it, and then to ski down it, something no one had ever done. The film is built from expedition footage, home videos and interviews, and the filmmakers were close friends of the couple, which gives it a warmth most adventure documentaries lack.
Nelson is a magnetic presence. In interviews she talks with real honesty about the pull between climbing and motherhood, and those words take on great weight as the story unfolds. When the first attempt ends in tragedy, the film turns into something more fragile: a portrait of grief, and of a man deciding whether to go back.
Spectacle You Can Feel
On a technical level, this is superb work. Drone shots give a clear sense of the terrain, showing exactly how steep and exposed the route is. Helmet-camera footage puts you right up against the ice, crampons biting into rock. The scale is overwhelming, and the final stretch of the climb and descent is genuinely thrilling to watch on a giant screen. It is easy to see why this is getting an IMAX release.
The score pushes hard for uplift, sometimes a little too hard, but the images rarely need the help. The mountain does the work on its own.
The Questions It Avoids
The film’s weakness is that it believes in the mission more than it interrogates it. Friends, including Chin himself, voice doubts about the risk, and Nelson’s sons speak movingly about what they have lost. Yet the documentary keeps drifting back to the shape of an underdog sports story, celebrating determination over doubt. The Nepalese guides who make the expedition possible are largely kept at the edge of the frame, and the very real cost of the climb is acknowledged rather than explored.
That will divide audiences. Some will find the final summit cathartic and inspiring; others will leave wondering what it was all for. The filmmakers’ closeness to their subjects is the film’s great strength, and also the reason it never quite steps back far enough.
Why It Is Worth the Trip
For all that, it is rare to see a documentary made with this much craft and feeling, and rarer still to see one this cinematic. It is one of the most striking releases of the week, and you can still catch our Everest: The Other Side trailer post. For something to watch at home tonight, try What to Watch Tonight.
Spoiler-Free Verdict
Everest: The Other Side is breathtaking to look at and moving as a story of love and grief. It celebrates its subjects more than it questions them, but on a big screen the mountain is unforgettable.
- Performances: 7.5/10
- Direction: 7.5/10
- Screenplay: 6/10
- Score: 7/10
- Cinematography: 9.5/10
- Entertainment Value: 8/10
- Overall score: 7.5/10
Star rating: 3.5/5
Verdict badge: One for Fans
One-line verdict: A stunning, heartfelt climb that leaves the hardest questions at base camp.
Watch the Official Trailer
See the North Face for yourself with the official trailer.
Would you ever return to a mountain that had taken so much? Share your spoiler-free reaction to Everest: The Other Side.