Author Jon Krakauer slams Everest movie

JON KRAKAUER IS not pleased with Everest. "It's total b*ll," said the author of Into Thin Air which in fact was not the basis for Everest despite being based on the same events depicted in the film. "Anyone who goes to that movie and wants a fact-based account should read Into Thin Air," he told the Los Angeles Times.
Krakauer's book recounts his experience on the world's highest mountain, where eight climbers died during an unexpected storm. The author sold the rights to the 1997 bestseller to Sony Pictures, which led to a television movie about the events that same year. "People told me, 'Movies never get made.Take the money. What do you have to lose?" Krakauer said. "I curse myself for selling it at all. What I learned from the TV movie was that dramatic films take dramatic license, and when you sign a document, you can do whatever you want with me. It wasn't worth the money I got."
He also told the L.A. Times that several conversations of his in the movie were fabricated. Everest director Baltasar Kormakur responded, saying they had access to multiple books about the 1996 tragedy and "all the radio calls that went on in the Adventure Consultants camp." "The writers and I tried to look at things from a fair point of a view without choosing sides," Kormakur said. Reuters