North American Premiere
Pierre (writer-director Thomas Salvador) is a robotics engineer. After presenting at a sales conference in Chamonix, he calls in sick from work, buys climbing gear, and heads out into the Alps. It is a fateful, irrational turning point. Paris, work, family—these things no longer matter. The only thing that speaks to him is the mountain.
In recent years, we have seen several breathtaking climbing documentaries (Free Solo; Meru; The Summit). Like these, Salvador’s film has spectacular vistas, moments of vertiginous and claustrophobic intensity, and an obsessive protagonist, literally an outsider. But The Mountain is a reminder of how far dramatic fiction can go. A deep mystery opens up at the heart of this story, a fissure in the fabric of the real, and Salvador/Pierre plunges in after it with a zeal that will either inspire or infuriate, according to your taste for adventure. This is a simple film, but a remarkable one, that much is sure.
Cannes DF 2022 (best French film SACD)
Supported by
Thomas Salvador, Louise Bourgoin, Martine Chevallier, Laurent Poitrenaux, Andranic Manet, Sylvain Frendo
France
2022
In French with English subtitles
Book Tickets
Missing VIFF? Check out what's playing at the VIFF Centre
Orwell: 2+2=5
Oscar-nominated director Raoul Peck reimagines 1984 in this urgent essay on power, language, and control. With narration by Damian Lewis, it’s a chilling portrait of how Orwell’s warnings became our reality.
Cover-Up
Oscar-winner Laura Poitras and Emmy-winner Mark Obenhaus turn their lens on legendary journalist Seymour Hersh in a riveting film that unpacks how one reporter exposed the truths behind My Lai and Abu Ghraib — and what it takes to hold power to account.
Image: © The New York Times
The Baltimorons
An early Xmas present and the rom-com of the year: a dental emergency on Christmas Eve brings together flailing comedian Chris and cynical divorcee Didi for a series of low-key urban misadventures.
Credits
Producer
Julie Salvador
Screenwriter
Thomas Salvador, Naila Guiguet
Cinematography
Alexis Kavyrchine
Editor
Mathilde Muyard
Original Music
Chloé Thevenin
Director
Thomas Salvador
Thomas Salvador is a filmmaker, screenwriter, and actor in his own films. He has directed six short films that have been selected and awarded by numerous festivals, including Petits Pas (2003), which was screened at Cannes’ Directors’ Fortnight, and De Sortie (2005), which won the 2006 Jean Vigo Prize. While hosted at the Villa Medici in Rome, he wrote his first feature film Vincent (2015), which was selected by more than 40 festivals in France and abroad. The Mountain is his second feature film.
Filmography: Vincent (2015)