Standen: Filming Everest is tough

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Standen: Filming Everest is tough

Film director Phedon Papamichael gives a hug to Felix van Groeningen, a Flemish film director of Oscar-nominated foreign language film "The Broken Circle Breakdown," at 86th Academy Awards - Foreign Language Film Award Reception, on Thursday, Feb. 28, 2014 in Los Angeles, Calif. (Photo by Annie I. Bang /Invision/AP)
Film director Phedon Papamichael gives a hug to Felix van Groeningen, a Flemish film director of Oscar-nominated foreign language film “The Broken Circle Breakdown,” at 86th Academy Awards – Foreign Language Film Award Reception, on Thursday, Feb. 28, 2014 in Los Angeles, Calif. (Photo by Annie I. Bang /Invision/AP)

Clive Standen has admitted filming new action thriller Everest on location in freezing temperatures has been “tough but fun”.

The Vikings star is among an ensemble cast that includes Josh Brolin, Jake Gyllenhaal, Emily Watson, Jason Clarke and Michael Kelly in the film about the 1996 disaster which saw eight people killed when an expedition were trapped in a blizzard on the summit of the world’s tallest mountain.

Clive has already spent three weeks filming on location at the Everest base camp in Nepal, and in the Dolomite mountains in northern Italy.

He said: “It’s a film based on a tragedy that happened there in 1996, where a lot of mountaineers were stuck at the summit of Everest when a storm came in and many of them didn’t come back down alive. It’s an amazing tale of endurance and its been fantastic.

“We’ve been working on it for about three weeks now – we’ve been filming right at the top of the Dolomites at minus 20 celsius and it’s tough but it’s lots of fun. Lots of men stuck up a mountain and helicopters and we’ve been doing lots of mountaineering and climbing training. I think it’s going to be a good one.”

He added: “I just finished doing some scenes with Josh Brolin and he’s a joy to work with. He’s a fantastic actor and I feel really lucky to be a part of this project.”

The film is being directed by Icelandic filmmaker Baltasar Kormakur, whose work includes action comedy 2 Guns with Denzel Washington and Mark Wahlberg.

The script is based on several first-hand accounts of the disaster, including the novel Into Thin Air by John Krakauer who was one of the mountaineers stuck there at the time, and books by mountaineers including Anatoli Boukreev and Beck Weathers.

Clive revealed: “David ( Breashears, the film’s producer), was part of the IMAX team who helped some of the climbers down, and he’s on set with Guy Cotter who was another of the climbers there.”

:: The second series of Vikings will premiere on Amazon Prime Instant Video (formerly known as LOVEFiLM) from today (February 28) at www.amazon.co.uk/primevideo.

Press Association