The North

Those that have been hiking will be stunned to see the accuracy of their own experiences reflected in Bart Schrijver’s sophomore hiking film, The North. Those who haven’t may come away with a much more intimate understanding of why they should (or shouldn’t) put on a pack and experience all its joys and discomforts.

The movie captures perfectly the quiet of a summited hill and the way the sound of a rushing river suddenly disrupts that quiet, the blistered feet and wet boots, the mental and physical resilence required to set up and pack down a tent in the rain, eat dinner in a swarm of midgies, and listen to a creaking mattress as your partner twists and turns all night. 

The film follows Chris (Bart Harder) and Lluis (Carles Pulido) as they rekindle their friendship by traversing 600 kilometres of the Scottish Highlands, where they confront one another and ultimately, themselves.

From the interruptions of business calls, we know that Chris is a young professional with the rest of his life laid out for him: job, marriage, house, kids. His walking partner Lluis is the stereotypical loner artist – serious, distant, uncertain of his future – who seems to walk the entire length reluctantly.

While the sparse dialogue added emotional depth to the landscapes, it did the opposite in conveying the evolution of the two friends. For an entire month, they remained stiff and closed off from one another, and the endless walking didn’t seem to lubricate any confessions or confidences. When they both separately have their own road to Damascus moment of transformation standing alone on a desolate beach, one has to fill in the gaps to understand the emotional weight of their experience.

The lovely pacing of the film and raw depiction of hiking makes it a beautiful contemplation of the great outdoors. For me, the landscape is the hero of this film, which remains indifferent to the human dramas and inner turmoil of the two friends. Watching the wideframe shots of them trudging up a craggy, isolated slope while mist recedes and unfurls was pure visual poetry.