by John Tillyard, Contributing Writer
When a Uruguayan flight with a rugby team on board crashes in the Andes mountains, the surviving passengers must figure out how to survive. Facing bitterly cold winds and the threat of being buried under avalanches of snow, the slowly decreasing survivors must figure out what to do to enable rescue, and fight to stay alive.
While there have been other dramas about this specific true story from 1972, the best-known previous telling being Alive from 1993, Society of the Snow is the first to be based on the book of the same name by Pablo Vierci. In the director’s chair is J.A. Bayona, who has previously worked on the incredibly harrowing but gripping disaster and survival story, The Impossible.
Immediately clear in the opening of Society of the Snow is that it is a story of the people involved in this disaster, rather than just the disaster itself. There is a reasonable amount of time spent introducing this group of friends, why they are together, and the importance of the trip they are on. As events on the plane turn from playful banter among friends into a situation where people fear for their lives, the tone and visuals do a decent job of recreating the terror those on board must have felt and slowly building the suspense of the situation. Even if the audience knows what happens, they are still wondering, as the scene builds, how the crash will happen, and it still feels unexpected when it does. The effects and visuals of the Andes are also stunning and genuinely look like a plane crash.
The crash scene alone makes you question how any of these people could have survived, and indeed, many did not, but survival only becomes seemingly impossible for those who did, as the bitter cold of the mountains sets in. This sequence is where the element of the pure human spirit shines through, as those who know about survival and have medical experience do everything they can to help. There’s an apparent attempt to humanize all the people involved in the disaster, with a narration giving their internal thoughts, and the film provides every death with an onscreen acknowledgement when it happens in the story. Many films like this would wait till the end to acknowledge all the casualties, but here they are done during the story. There’s a natural feeling of sadness and a sense of dread with each death, and as the story progresses, it continues to display the hopelessness of the situation. Many other aspects that emphasize the gloomy situation are touched on as the group speculates on the likelihood of someone finding them, or even if a plane might have seen them. There’s a genuine feeling of woe for the group, with the hopes of rescue slowly slipping away.
This desperate situation leads to the most infamous thing about this disaster: the group resorting to cannibalism to stay alive. The story doesn’t focus too much on the actual eating of the bodies; it is more on whether it is right to do it, especially considering they are the bodies of their friends. Many suggest it may be illegal and immoral without the deceased’s consent, while others cannot bring themselves to do it. Those favoring the idea look at it from a logical perspective, that there is no other way to survive. It’s a fascinating debate for which there is no correct answer, and it got me wondering what I would do if I were in their predicament. Could I bring myself to ingest something that had been another person and a friend? I thought about it for a long time after watching this, and I still don’t know what I would do.
While usually I’m not too fond of narration in a visual medium, it works incredibly well here. In a desperate situation like the one in this story, people won’t want to verbalize the suffering they are going through, so hearing the harrowing internal thoughts helps to convey what they are feeling in a way you understand entirely. You feel right there in their head, going through all this with them, and the voice performances capture this brilliantly. The dubbing could have been better than the original performances in Spanish, but that is not to say it is not still decent. I’d always recommend subbed over dubbed, but if you don’t feel like reading, the dubbing here is good enough that I don’t think you are missing too much in performance.
The whole experience presents itself beautifully as well. To make for several compelling sequences as members of the group search for anything that could help them, the film blends of the stunning visuals of the Andes, the musical score, and narration from the characters. In contrast, others mourn the loss of loved ones or break down emotionally. The score provided by Michael Giacchino is perfect in moments of heavy emotion. It does an impressive job of communicating real feelings of sadness and panic to a level I’ve not felt since the ending of Oppenheimer.
If there was one major negative, it’s that with such a large group of people involved in the disaster, you never feel any significant connections to specific characters. The feeling of connection is to them as a group, which comes from the events shown in the opening before they board the plane, and the work many do to figure out survival and how to be rescued. But there is a lack of any main character or core group to tell the story through the eyes of. Perhaps this is deliberate, as this was a team that played rugby together, and there is a clear theme of teamwork in what they do throughout the story. Furthermore, these were real people, and it is, if anything, more meaningful to remember those who died since the casualties account for more than half the people who were on board.
There are also other occasional negatives: Specific information is relayed to the group in ways that seems a little forced. Also, a few scenes where the group messes around and bonds, which helps to lighten the mood slightly. Scenes like this are a welcome change of pace in a distressing story like this, but they also feel like filler and slow down the pacing, which can sometimes drag.
There are no explicit standout performances, with the focus on the group, but the entire cast does an excellent job. Enzo Vogrincic has the most impactful presence, with one speech in particular where he nails the sensitive tone of the scene.
Society of the Snow is a harrowing but incredibly compelling story, with a gorgeous musical score perfectly fitting the group’s situation and the mountains’ visuals. There is a lack of a clear connection to any individual people, but still a clear emotional attachment to the group. The mood is established brilliantly through narration at specific points and others through the visuals alone. The substantial budget is onscreen in every shot of the mountains and during the crash sequence. It makes you question what you would be willing to do to survive, and has a clear theme of teamwork, the human spirit, self-sacrifice to help others, and the motivation that sacrifice gives people.
Rating: High Side of Liked It
Society of the Snow is currently streaming on Netflix
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