Out of Compettion

K2 UNA STORIA ITALIANA
K2 An Italian Story
Alessandro Varchetta, ITALY, 2004, 48’, col., video
Director Alessandro Varchetta
Screenplay Elvio Annese
Cinematography Simone Pera
Editing Simone Perra, Francesca Sanbucci
Music Daniele Cestana
Production Marco Visalberghi, Francesco Virga per DocLab, in coproduzione con il CAI, il Museo Nazionale Della Montagna – Cai-Torino, in associazione con l’Istituto LUCE, con la partecipazione di RAI "Superquark", The History Channel, RTSI

In 1954, an Italian expedition lead by Ardito Desio set out to climb K2: the participants were recruited among some of the best Italian mountaineers and after undertaking a period of innovative training for that time, they left directly for the massif of Karakorum. With the cooperation of a host of porters, under the almost military command of Desio, Achille Compagnoni and Lino Lacedelli reached the peak. Walter Bonatti, twenty-three at the time, the youngest in the expedition, spent a night without shelter at an altitude of 8100 metres, after having carried oxygen cylinders to Campagnoni and Lucedelli. The K2 conquest followed a trail of controversy, although returning home to Italy was triumphant: the Italian mountaineers succeeded in climbing K2, one of the most difficult mountains in the world.

DIRECTOR
Alessandro Varchetta was born in Milan in 1959. After studying musicology in Cremona, he devoted himself to documentaries. He has been a director since 1997, producing "La pietra della bellezza" (a meeting with photographers in Carrara’s marble caves), "Un giorno di Festa" ( a documentary on the snake festival in Abruzzo), "Il canto delle pietre" ( music and architecture of Romanesque churches) and "Il complesso archittonico a San Vitale-Ravenna". He is currently working on the project "L’opera prima dell’opera": a documentary on the birth of melodrama and the recitar cantando.

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