The Mountain Between Us

Hany Abu-Assad’s film comes from Charles Martin’s novel but changes the names and jobs: Ashley Knox, a writer on the page, becomes photojournalist Alex Martin racing to her wedding, and the doctor Ben Payne becomes neurosurgeon Ben Bass with surgery waiting in Baltimore. The crash site stays where the book put it, the High Uintas in Utah, while shooting happened on the British Columbia and Alberta border. The project changed hands for years, with Gerardo Naranjo attached to direct and Michael Fassbender, Charlie Hunnam, Margot Robbie and Rosamund Pike all announced as leads, before Idris Elba and Kate Winslet settled it in 2016. Cinematographer Mandy Walker took the unit above 11,000 feet, roughly 3,350 metres. No large lighting rig could be hauled up, so she worked with bounce placed close to the actors, chose the ALEXA 65, and the crew did not break for lunch up there. At Abu-Assad’s request the crash was staged inside the cabin in real time, without cheating the angles. A good fit if you have patience for the long post-rescue stretch, which follows what becomes of a bond made on a mountain once it reaches a city. Not for viewers who want a settled answer: the film starts the last move and cuts before showing where it lands.