British Council Logo UK Films Database
Project Detail

The Summit

Synopsis

'The Summit' is a feature length documentary about the deadliest day in modern mountain climbing history. In August of 2008, 22 climbers from several international expeditions converged on High Camp of K2, the last stop before the summit of the most dangerous mountain on Earth. 48 hours later, eleven had been killed or simply vanished into thin air. Like a horror movie come-to-life, it was as if the mountain began stealing lives, one climber at a time. At the feet of the heavens – ‘the death zone’ - the body literally dies with each passing second and the mind can play tricks. Morality above 8,000 metres is skewed 180 degrees from the rest of life. When a climber falls or wanders off the trail, the unwritten code of the sport is to leave them for dead. Survival depends on self- preservation at all costs.

Details

Year
2012
Type of project
Features
Running time
95 mins
Director
Nick Ryan
Producer
Nick Ryan
Executive Producer
John Battsek, Pat Falvey, Darrell Kavanagh, Alan Maher, John McDonnell
Editor
Ben Stark
Screenwriter
Mark Monroe
Director of Photography
Robbie Ryan

Genre

Climate / Environment Science

Categories

Documentary

Production Status

Complete

Production Company

Ireland, UK coproduction

Image Now Films (IE)

17a New Bride Street
Dublin 8
Ireland
Tel: +353 1 4113310
Fax: +353 1 4113319

Fantastic Films (IE)

28 Vernon Ave
Clontarf
Dublin 3
Ireland
Tel: +353 872551666
Fax: +353 1 853 1892

Passion Pictures

County House
33 - 34 Rathbone Place
London
W1T 1JN

Page updates

This page was last updated on 12th May 2025. Please let us know if we need to make any amendments or request edit access by clicking below.

Suggest amendments

See also

You may also be interested in other relevant projects in the database.

Free Lyric Free Lyric

Director: Cherish 'Chez' Oteka

Year: 2026

Reliving one of the first viral social media moments in rap culture, when a 17 year old female rapper’s life was turned upside down by admitting to having an orgy, FREE LYRIC explores the experience of online call out culture, gender and consent. With the rise of social media as the backdrop, this film explores the journey of a young woman named Niki who was cancelled before being cancelled was a thing, and how she survived a sex scandal. Official Selection Raindance Film Festival 2026 - World premiere

Black Docufiction Woman Director
Image from a dramatic reconstruction - Two white skinhead males are staring aggressively at a black man. Beyond the Divide

Director: Imoje Aikhoje

Year: 2025

A Black British activist and a former neo-Nazi sit face to face. In a tense encounter combining direct testimony with dramatic reconstruction, each man is forced to confront what brought him to this point: one radicalised by hate, one shaped by the movement that resists it. Chris Otokito and Nigel Bromage meet for the first time on camera. What unfolds is an unsparing examination of how far-right extremism takes root in Britain and whether dialogue across that divide is possible at all.

Black Docufiction Human Rights
Galicia! Galicia!

Director: Anna Maguire, Kyle Greenberg

Year: 2026

What if you went on a holiday and the apocalypse happened? GALICIA! is a found-footage, hybrid-documentary following a couple through home video footage as they visit their friends at a winery in rural Spain and inadvertently capture the end of days. We live in a time where the sense of our impending mutually assured destruction is more real than it’s ever been. GALICIA! Takes the form of a holiday video - a document of a couple before - and after the great cataclysm. The film starts as something that feels unedited - an accidental video diary of an ordinary couple that feels somewhat ghostly as much as it is also pedestrian. As the film evolves and degrades, we are led to question the fragility of humanity, as well as its power to endure.

Adventure Biography Climate / Environment Comedy Docufiction