The Ghosts Above

This short documentary produced in collaboration with Sony Alpha Films and National Geographic explores the past and present of climbing on Mt. Everest, and looks more deeply into the changing dynamic between high-altitude workers and Western mountain climbers.

Renan, who narrates the film from his own perspective, summited Mt. Everest in 2019 on an expedition that sought to solve the oldest mystery in Himalayan climbing – could George Mallory and Sandy Irvine have actually reached the summit of Everest nearly 30 years before Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay? As Renan searches for the final resting place of Sandy Irvine, he reflects upon the history of Everest expeditions, the fraught relationship between indigenous guides and expeditioners, the rigors of high-alpine mountaineering and the commercialization of this sacred mountain.