Society of the Snow: 5 Compelling Reasons to See JA Bayona’s Brutal Film
The story of Society of the Snow is legendary and there are very few people in Latin America and around the world who have not heard about it in some form, but JA Bayona tells it differently and more deeply in his new Netflix film. The film, with Enzo Vogrincic, Agustín Pardella, and Matías Recalt, takes us back to the 70s, at a time marked by struggle and social unrest, where a group of friends take a flight from Uruguay with the mission of going to play rugby to Chile. The flight would not be long, and emotions were high, but something happens along the way, the plane suffers an accident and crashes in the mountains, leaving dozens dead and a few survivors trapped in an area that is not exactly compatible with the life, where they must deal with pain, cold, hunger and fear to survive.
Bayona tells the story from the perspective of the survivors, showing their greatest challenges, what was going through their heads, and what they had to do to stay alive, and the result is moving, brutal, tragic, and at the same time inspiring. It is a film made with respect, love, and care, but also with great performances, great cinematography, and a story that you can’t get out of your head, and it makes you put things in perspective. Five years after the release of Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom, the Spanish director Juan Antonio Bayona returns behind the camera with a new film, distributed by Netflix, entitled Society of the Snow, which tells a tragic story experienced in the Andes in the 1970s.
Why Should You See Society of the Snow?
It Is Based on Real Events!
The first reason this film is worth watching is because, like one of Bayona’s best films (The Impossible), it is based on a real tragedy and an extraordinary story. The rugby team we see in the film is real and many of the players are still alive today. They crashed in the Andes in the ’70s and lived that odyssey that is shown in Society of the Snow, and the best part is that the actors had the opportunity to talk to them to understand what the experience was really like, and to be able to capture that and show it in a way that is true to the truth.
Tells Much More of the Story (Than the Previous Film)
The story of Society of the Snow had been seen before in a movie called Alive, which starred Ethan Hawke and was released in 1993, but this version includes more details and is told by people who grew up hearing the legend of the survivors. of the accident. Here we can see more about how they made decisions on the mountain, how the survivors stayed together to survive, how they motivated themselves, what they thought about and what the most difficult moments they faced, such as the avalanche that happened after the accident. or the moment when they ran out of food and had to resort to something that caused them moral conflicts and many doubts. Bayona makes clearer the time the survivors spent on the mountain, showing their physical and emotional deterioration, the things that drove them to continue fighting until the end.
What Would You Do To Survive?
Among everything this movie does in your head, it leads you to ask what you would be willing to do to survive, how much you would fight, what limits you would break or even what beliefs you would abandon. In addition to the physical aspect, we can see an internal struggle in the survivors, especially when they encounter more and more death, and with the realization that to live you have to eat, and in that place full of snow and rocks, what not there is food. Those who know the story know what the survivors had to do (which we will not say to avoid spoilers for those who do not know) and how this marks them, and this allows us to empathize more with them and their situation. Bayona manages to humanize the situation, while he makes you wonder how much you want to live and what that thing would be that you would be willing to do and sacrifice to return home.
It’s Impossible Not To Fall In Love With The Characters (and cry)
A good story is nothing without good actors and great characters, and this is something that Society of the Snow has at its core. Each actor completely immersed themselves in their character’s story, giving voice to the survivors and allowing us to connect more deeply with them, feeling their pain as if it were that of a friend or family member. The film is narrated by one of the survivors (Numa, played by Enzo Vogrincic), who becomes a kind of guide through hell and who also explains very well what the mental state of the characters is as time passes. narrating hard moments, of hopelessness and changing perspective to be able to stay alive and face the mountain.
Friendship, Survival, Human Errors and Nature
Yes, this is a story of survival, but also of many other things. It is a film that tells us about the strength of human beings, about the importance of finding our motivations to move forward, about how a simple mistake can have enormous consequences, and about the importance of having a support network, friends, and good people. around you, not only to survive but to keep your spirits up and to better deal with the good and bad in life. There are many lessons and messages in this story. It is a story that catches you and changes you, it is entertaining and intense, but it also makes you feel all the emotions at the same time, until you end up full of tears and wanting to know what happened next.
