The mountaineers climb for reasons that have little to do with nationalism - reasons the film clumsily attempts to articulate in words. It's far more successful conveying those inspirations with stunning images of them scaling daunting heights.

| Original Score: 7.1/10 | Jul 4, 2010

It's Kolja Brandt's gloriously edge-of-the-seat/seat-of-the-pants cinematography (much of the film was shot on location) that really packs a natural wallop.

| Original Score: 3/5 | Apr 30, 2010

A straightforward, wickedly suspenseful Man vs. Nature saga of the type that rarely gets made any more.

| Original Score: 3.5/4 | Apr 16, 2010

Philipp Stolzl worked in the same dangerous conditions as the original climbers, and we can feel the chill and peril in our bones. It's a shame, then, that the screenwriter, unlike the camera crew and the characters, was afflicted with such timidity.

Full Review | Original Score: 2.5/4 | Mar 25, 2010

North Face" is something of an old-fashioned epic shot with modern wisdom and technique, a man vs. nature flick that also weighs the importance of the individual vs. the social while exposing the mean cost of vicarious thrills.

| Original Score: B | Mar 12, 2010

The word "gripping" doesn't do it justice.

| Original Score: 3/4 | Feb 26, 2010

This white-knuckle adventure is a literal and metaphoric cliff-hanger that gets a spectacular foothold on an unforgiving mountain.

Full Review | Original Score: 3.5/4 | Feb 25, 2010

The result is terrifically suspenseful even if one already knows the outcome.

| Feb 25, 2010

While the movie is never dull, its romantic fodder doesn't do justice to any period at all.

Full Review | Feb 25, 2010

Some of the shots must have been made on sets. None of that matters. I was on the side of that mountain all the way.

| Original Score: 3/4 | Feb 25, 2010

Five writers were responsible for the script, and the characters consequently have one or two generic characteristics and no inner life of their own; they've been committeed to death.

| Original Score: 2.5/4 | Feb 11, 2010

Kolja Brandt's cinematography is stunning, but can't rescue the end from some wince-inducing "Ain't no mountain high enough" heroics.

Full Review | Original Score: 2.5/4 | Feb 5, 2010

Stölzl makes the smallest details loom large.

Full Review | Original Score: 3.5/4 | Feb 4, 2010

It is impossible not to put yourself in the boots of the mountaineers clinging to a sheer, icy rock face during a blizzard that threatens to send them into oblivion.

Full Review | Original Score: 3/5 | Jan 29, 2010

Kolja Brandt's hand-held cinematography and Philipp Stolzl's direction keep the suspense level high. Unfortunately, somebody decided to insert a superfluous love story involving a completely fabricated female photojournalist.

| Original Score: 2/4 | Jan 29, 2010

The historical backdrop is fascinating and an important part of this story, but there's a pervasive sense that director Philipp Stölzl and his screenwriters soft-pedal it as much as possible in order to exalt their heroes.

| Original Score: C+ | Jan 28, 2010

Cleverly playing on the genre's propagandistic ties to the Third Reich, the film reflects the tragic arc of National Socialism in each ominous crevasse and in every grandiloquent gesture.

| Original Score: 3/5 | Jan 27, 2010

Climbers who know the famous tale needn't be warned of spoilers: Shot on location, the film is slow, realistic, and excruciating in its latter stages.

| Jan 26, 2010

Slogs through an hour of frequently rote exposition until it hits its riveting groove when the rappelling and piton-hammering take over.

| Original Score: 3/4 | Jan 25, 2010

A well-crafted, visceral piece of historical filmmaking.

| Original Score: 4/5 | Dec 12, 2008