THE ENDURANCE

“Men Wanted for Hazardous Journey. Small Wages, Bitter Cold. Long Months of Complete Darkness, Constant Danger, Safe Return Doubtful. Honour and Recognition in Case of Success.” Had you responded to this 1914 newspaper advertisement, you might have found a berth on the legendary Antarctic expedition of British explorer Ernest Shackleton. Now you can. Using archival material, interviews with descendants of the participants and extensive footage shot by the expedition's official photographer Frank Hurley, the view once again walks the deck of Shackleton's southbound ship Endurance, as relentless ice closes in, and what began as a trek to the South Pole turns into a prolonged struggle with a more immediate and urgent goal – sheer survival, as freezing wind, starvation, killer whales, even grumblings of mutiny threaten the long-suffering crew, drawn from different strata of England's social classes. If THE ENDURANCE was simply a tale of tragedy , triumph, heroism and who-got-voted-off-the-ice-floe, that would be enough; but the filmmakers also present a time-frozen snapshot of the Edwardian-era finale to the great Age of Exploration, when “gentlemen of adventure” like Shackleton could boldly go where no man had set foot before.