‘Everest: The Other Side’ Review: The ‘Free Solo’ Directors Return With Another Extreme Sports Doc, This Time Tainted by Tragedy

Elizabeth Chai Vasarhelyi and Jimmy Chin's latest spectacularly — maybe too spectacularly — chronicles the Everest dream of ski mountaineer Jim Morrison and his late partner Hilaree Nelson, asking too few questions along the way.

By Guy Lodge

Guy Lodge

Film Critic

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“Because it’s there” is the famous, possibly apocryphal, reply attributed to British mountaineer George Mallory when asked why he wanted to climb Mount Everest. Unlike present-day climber Jim Morrison, Mallory didn’t also want to ski down it. But doesn’t the same non-answer apply? Why are certain people compelled toward any of these reckless, perilous, barely possible feats? If it’s just because they can, should they? These are the questions that will be on the minds of many viewers watching “Everest: The Other Side,” a gleaming, would-be rousing documentary portrait of Morrison, his late partner Hilaree Nelson, and a shared Everest ski-mountaineering dream that wound up taking her life.

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