Roberto Sorgato

Three famous climbers, the Frenchman Pierre Mazeaud, the German Winfried Ender and the Italian Roberto Sorgato, meet up at the bottom of the Tre Cime di Lavaredo and decide to join together in a single roped party, climbing the 'Direttissima' on the north face of the Cima Grande di Lavaredo. The beautiful film illustrates with precise sequences the climb of the route, that was opened in 1958 by the filmmaker himself, Lother Brandler. The film wants to highlight the idea of frienship, cooperation, fraternity and peace showing three men from historically-confronted nationalities roped and working together as a single team. The film won the Grand Prix at the Trento Film Festival in 1964.

Pierre Mazeau has managed to unite three of his passions which seem to have nothing in common, at a very high level: mountaineering, jurisprudence and policy. The Everest mountaineer, rescued from the Freney Pillar, the passionate jurist, the former sports minister, privy counsellor, and president of the French Constitutional Court is a charismatic personality. This sensitive film portrait follows a line, which Pierre Mazeaud himself has quoted: “Alpinism belongs to those who provide themselves with means to reach their goals, to those who are fully committed to a goal, to those, who know the value of solidarity of men, and to those who are aware that true human existence can only be fulfilled by proceeding with a team of roped-partners.”

"The Climbers" is a six-part documentary series tracing the history of mountaineering. Directed by Chris Bonington and Richard Else, it was produced by the BBC and broadcast in 1992. The series recounts the evolution of mountaineering and the traditions of climbers in Great Britain and on the European continent: the former developed a free climbing technique, while the latter used aids such as keys, pitons, and drills to ascend otherwise inaccessible routes. The program includes archive footage of the pioneers of the sport, from the emergence of free climbing as a distinct discipline in the late 1970s and 1980s to the advent of competitions.