Film Review: ‘Society of the Snow’ is a Respectful Yet Intense Look at Tragedy and Survival

On the surface, another version of this story seemed unnecessary. After all, Alive already did it in a decent, if unremarkable manner. Hollywood had its swing, and many a project has referenced the events. So, seeing filmmaker J.A. Bayona opt to tackle it seemed odd. Then, I saw Society of the Snow. In a way, he’s been building his whole career to tell this story. Armed with all of his tools, he makes it engrossing and riveting, a true tribute to survival.

Society of the Snow is intense yet respectful. Survival and tragedy are hand in hand, but never fighting. There’s a bleakness here, but also hope. It’s a definite tightrope that Bayona and company walk. Thankfully, he was more than up to the challenge, making for a film that’s as much a large-scale epic as it is an intimate character piece.

This is the true story of Uruguayan Air Force Flight 571. In 1972, the plane, which had been chartered to fly a rugby team back home to Chile, crashed. Ending up in the middle of the Andes, it’s a massacre. Out of the flight’s 45 passengers, only 29 survive the crash. After the accident, it seemingly only gets worse, as they’re trapped in a part of the world where there’s almost nothing to help in their survival. To live, extreme measures must be taken.

The survivors aren’t the only ones we’re following, as the narrator of the film is one of the deceased, in law student Numa Turcatti (Enzo Vogrincic). He had initially opted out of the flight, though we see him being ultimately convinced. Numa watches over the story, as the living players do their best to wait out the cold, until somewhat warmer weather allows two of them, Nando Parrado (Agustín Pardella) and Roberto Canessa (Matías Recalt), to attempt a ten day hike towards Chile. We know where things are going, but watching it unfold is largely captivating.

The cast certainly gets your empathy, even if there aren’t really any standouts. Enzo Vogrincic is best in show, with an obvious ethereal quality to him. Agustín Pardella and Matías Recalt are solid as well, as you easily get engrossed in their journey. This is the opposity of something like Alive, where movie stars were the focus. Here, it’s the story and the honoring of the actual people. Supporting players in the film include the likes of Valentino Alonso, Esteban Bigliardi, Fernando Contigiani García, Agustín Della Corte, Rafael Federman, Simón Hempe, Esteban Kukuriczka, Felipe Otaño, Blas Polidori, Andy Pruss, Felipe Ramusio, Francisco Romero, Diego Vegezzi, and Tomás Wolf.

Director J.A. Bayona is so deeply invested in honoring the victims as well as the survivors, it leads to some very interesting choices. The script he co-wrote with Nicolás Casariego, Jaime Marques, and Bernat Vilaplana not only has a ghost essentially narrating from above, whenever anyone loses their life, they’re honored on screen. It’s incredibly respectful, while also being creative. At the same time, Bayona the director makes the crash absolutely thrilling. Armed with a strong score from composer Michael Giacchino, those moments work very well alongside the quieter ones. The pacing is a little slack, but this moves faster than you’d expect a two and a half hour movie to.

Society of the Snow is a tough movie to sit through at times, but it’s a rewarding one in the end. It’s probably not what you’re expecting, though that’s meant as a compliment. It zigs when other projects would have zagged, opting for emotion and respect, even reverence, as opposed to just thrills. It makes for a more complete motion picture, overall.

SCORE: ★★★