The Great White Silence
I'm sorry - I owe e-mails all over the place, but I've been out tonight. I went to see Herbert Ponting's restored film of Scott's 1911 expedition, The Great White Silence.
It was stunning. On several different levels. The ice... the ice is breathtaking. And to see the Terra Nova in action, the dogs quartered on the deck and the men working - there's a shot Ponting took of the ship's iron clad hull cutting through pack ice which is amazing. But then add to that Ponting's descriptions: This appalling silence, he says. This dread wasteland.
He loves the endearing Adele penguins. His shots of the Wendell seals and the Killer Whales are amazing. But then of course, there is Scott, and Ponting's careful, heroic image can only be counterbalanced by Huntsford's searing biography - Scott's diary talks of the "desperate struggle" and "for the honour of our country". And as your heart goes out to Evans and Bowers and Oates (Oh, Oates, who tried so hard to care for the outclassed, misplaced ponies - it's Huntsford who says, I think, but who opened the tent door?) at the same time you cannot but think of the lack of dogs and the lack of food and the cobbled together gear. And Scott doubting from the moment they reached the Pole that they could make it back. So the film is heroic and heartbreaking and at the same time carries the shadows of jingoism and misplaced honour and the whole media creation - from boy's own hero to bumbling idiot and back again - that surrounds this single tragic event. I found it fascinating.
I also didn't mean to write so much. Good night, guys.
It was stunning. On several different levels. The ice... the ice is breathtaking. And to see the Terra Nova in action, the dogs quartered on the deck and the men working - there's a shot Ponting took of the ship's iron clad hull cutting through pack ice which is amazing. But then add to that Ponting's descriptions: This appalling silence, he says. This dread wasteland.
He loves the endearing Adele penguins. His shots of the Wendell seals and the Killer Whales are amazing. But then of course, there is Scott, and Ponting's careful, heroic image can only be counterbalanced by Huntsford's searing biography - Scott's diary talks of the "desperate struggle" and "for the honour of our country". And as your heart goes out to Evans and Bowers and Oates (Oh, Oates, who tried so hard to care for the outclassed, misplaced ponies - it's Huntsford who says, I think, but who opened the tent door?) at the same time you cannot but think of the lack of dogs and the lack of food and the cobbled together gear. And Scott doubting from the moment they reached the Pole that they could make it back. So the film is heroic and heartbreaking and at the same time carries the shadows of jingoism and misplaced honour and the whole media creation - from boy's own hero to bumbling idiot and back again - that surrounds this single tragic event. I found it fascinating.
I also didn't mean to write so much. Good night, guys.