51° FILM FESTIVAL CITTÀ DI TRENTO
From April 27th until May 4th has taken place the 51° edition of the International Filmfestival “Città di Trento”, Mountain, Exploration and Adventure.
The Trento’s event has become by now a reference point of the Italian culture in the mountain world, and this year it has reached a turning point. New president (Italo Zandonella Callegher), new director (Roberto Bombarda), new managing board and new marketing partners. Among them La Sportiva Spa, which is proud to join its name with a prestigious event, which gathers a great inheritance of historical knowledge and compares it with today’s society. Culture and tradition, modern technology and image. More and more important values, that allow us to go with the time, but without forgetting the past, and therefore the memory of the roots and the environment where we were born.

The leading theme.
This year is the fiftieth Anniversary of the first ascent of Mount Everest. The Filmfestival, that begins its second half-century of existence, couldn’t miss the appointment with the history of the main symbol of mountaineering. For half a century Mount Everest has been in the middle of dreams and nightmares of thousands of mountaineers. For half a century during the Filmfestival dozens of films have been shown about it: different sides of the mountain, protagonists, various perspectives.
Today it’s amazing to observe the vitality of the sector, verify the energy and the value of the ideas. In mountaineering, as in the mountain film. It is remarkable the will to tell new tales with fantasy and correctness.
Recently it seems that the time of the awareness has arrived, that mountaineering is above all a game, also if the most beautiful one in the world. And that the mountains are troubled by problems that the mountaineers will not be able to solve perhaps, but surely to understand.
That’s why Everest becomes, besides an historical symbol, also a sign of change, or better expressed, a sign of “renewal”. It has been renewed in the goals, different but equally important, and has started again with greater power. The Festival is doing the same thing. It starts again, after the turning point, towards new goals, towards the will to communicate new emotions bound to the mountain, exploration and adventure world.

The exhibition about Everest.
In concomitance with the Filmfestival, in Palazzo Trentino, the exhibition of the books about the “conquest” of the Third Pole, about the Epos of Everest, has been organized by Roberto Mantovani and Leonardo Bizzarro. The exhibition of the Filmfestival has been realized with the collaboration of the National Library of Club Alpino Italiano and the Mountain Library of SAT.

The history of Mount Everest.
On May 29, 1953 Edmund Hillary from New Zealand and the Nepali Sherpa Tenzing Norgay reach the summit of the highest mountain of the planet, since 1856 known as Everest. Before then the English-Indian topographers had indicated it with a simple initial: Peak XV. Everest, then, but also Sagarmatha, as it is called on the Nepali side, or Chomolungma, goddess mother of earth, for the Tibetans. The actual place-name is coined, in the middle of the 19th Century, in honor of George Everest, responsible of the Great Trigonometrical Survey of India, the trigonometrical and geodetic body that, since 1818 was in charge of surveying the territory of the Indian subcontinent, then still partially unknown. During this great achievement, the height of the highest mountain of the world was detected in 1852, thanks to the work of the topographers and special optical equipment, called theodolites. After the first surveys they soon discover that the highest summits are on off-limits territory, on the other side of the borders of Nepal and Tibet, hermetically closed to Westerners.
Here the reason of huge theodolites, carried by teams of dozens of men, that allow measurements from big distances, even over 200 kilometers. The discover of Everest, nevertheless, remains theoretical, because, for several years, no Westerner manages to observe the mountain from near by. In 1913 the English Captain John Noel makes a clandestine flying visit to Tibet, entering it from Sikkim. At last, behind a mountain range not shown on the maps, he manages to see the last 300 meters of the terminal cone of Everest. Shortly afterwards the exploratory phase begins.
From 1922 until 1938 six British expeditions follow one another. In 1922 the elevation of 8320 meters is reached (with artificial oxygen). In 1924 the attained elevation becomes 8580 meters. During the same expedition two persons disappear, about whom a lot has been spoken, George Mallory and Andrew Irvine. The two climbers disappear in the clouds at high elevation, in the “Second Step” area. In 1999 an expedition finds the body of Mallory, not too far from the place where he had disappeared from the sight of Odell, his expedition partner. Researches and verifications seem to exclude the hypothesis of the successful ascent to the summit of the British team, if nothing else, because of the difficulty of the route in that section, with grade 6 moves, insuperable difficulty at that elevation in the Twenties.
The tries follow one another. After the Second World War the race accelerates a lot. The “third pole”, as Everest is also called, is more and more coveted, because it represents an important goal, the symbol of the modern exploration of the earth. In 1952 a strong Swiss expedition fails at 8600 meters, to blame is a problem with the oxygen bottles.
For the summit, it will be necessary to wait for the following year. On May 29, 1953, at 11.30 a.m., Hillary and Norgay conquer the top of the planet, a small snowfield at almost 9000 meters elevation. It meant to set foot beyond the border of another world, and look at the globe from a new and unknown perspective. It meant to overcome a time barrier and, at the same time, to establish new ones.
At 11.45 a.m. they begin the descent. Fifteen minutes had been enough to hug, to shoot a few pictures and look around. Fifteen minutes that have changed history.

The award-winning films.
71 were the competing films viewed by the international Jury, chaired by the famous director and mountaineer Kurt Diemberger and composed by Henri Agresti (France), Spiro Dalla Porta Xidias (Italy), Leo Dickinson (Great Britain) and Marina Razbeshkina (Russia).
Your Himalayas, of Spanish Alberto Inurrategi wins the Genziana d’Oro Gran Premio “Città di Trento”, as best film in general. Pensieri nel vento, of Ermanno Salvaterra, wins the prize of Club Alpino Italiano, Genziana d’oro as best mountaineering film, while Schwabenkinder, of Austrian Jo Baier, wins the prize Città di Bolzano, as best mountain film.

Exhibition La Sportiva.
AA bouldering exhibition of the best athletes of the team La Sportiva has taken place on Friday, the 2nd of May, at 2 a.m.
It was a real bouldering competition, with direct elimination, on four previously “worked“ problems. The goal was to realize a fast and dynamic show, without down time. To attain it the formula designed by French Jacky Godoffe has been implemented, here there is a direct comparison during the climb and after each round the worst competitors are eliminated, and so on, until only the winner is left. All this with a professional speaker, who entertains the spectators with a simple and immediate technical comment.
Two climbers eliminated, therefore, on the first problem, two on the second one, one on the third one and the final round for the last two climbers on the fourth boulder. At the end of the game reigning World Champion Mauro Calibani wins over a very fit Christian Brenna and the Italian Champion Riccardo Scarian. Also competing Stefano Alippi, Enrico Baistrocchi and the French Antony Lamiche and François Lombard. Very good attendance of spectators and media, entertained, for about an hour, by the evolutions of the climbing athletes.
Oscar Durbiano