Review Roundup: Jason Clarke & Jake Gyllenhaal Battle Mother Nature in EVEREST

Inspired by the incredible events surrounding an attempt to reach the summit of the world's highest mountain, EVEREST documents the awe-inspiring journey of two different expeditions challenged beyond their limits by one of the fiercest snowstorms ever encountered by mankind. Their mettle tested by the harshest elements found on the planet, the climbers will face nearly impossible obstacles as a lifelong obsession becomes a breathtaking struggle for survival.

EVEREST is directed by Baltasar Kormákur (2 Guns, Contraband) and produced by Working Title Films' Tim Bevan and Eric Fellner, Cross Creek Pictures' Brian Oliver and Tyler Thompson, as well as Nicky Kentish Barnes and Kormákur.

The epic adventure stars Jason Clarke, Josh Brolin, John Hawkes, Robin Wright, Michael Kelly, Sam Worthington, Keira Knightley, Emily Watson and Jake Gyllenhaal.

Let's see what the critics had to say!

A.O. Scott, New York Times: In telling its terrible true story, "Everest" gets stuck between celebrating the indomitability of the human spirit and reckoning with the awful consequences of hubris and bad luck. It aspires to something large and lofty, but in the end it's a big pile of rocks, ice and vain and valiant human effort.

Peter Travers, Rolling Stone: Short of heading to the Himalayas and climbing the world's highest mountain yourself, seeing Everest in 3D IMAX is the next best thing, a dizzying visual adventure that will knock the wind out of you. As personal drama, not so much. Working from a script by survival experts William Nicholson (Unbroken) and Simon Beaufoy (127 Hours), Icelandic director Baltasar Kormákur (2 Guns) must hew to the stark reality of the May 1996 expedition in which eight climbers died by mountain and blizzard. The Everest tragedies that killed 35 people this year and last only underscore the relentless risk.

Justin Chang, Variety: Following the 2014 and 2015 avalanche disasters that killed more than 35 people trying to scale the highest mountain on Earth, the timing is either wildly inappropriate or grimly right for "Everest," though it would be awfully hard to argue that it's too soon. A properly grueling dramatization of the ill-fated May 1996 expedition that saw eight climbers expire in a blizzard, this brusquely visualized, choppily played epic serves as the latest cinematic opportunity for Mother Nature to flaunt her utter indifference to human survival. Achieving fitful flurries of emotion amid an otherwise slow, agonizing descent into physical and dramatic paralysis, director Baltasar Kormakur's latest and biggest U.S. studio effort should ride its Imax 3Devent-picture status to decent theatrical returns worldwide, aided by a topical resurgence of interest in the movie's subject.

Michael O'Sullivan, The Washington Post: "Everest" gets several things right, but it fails to find a way to make the average viewer relate to the people on the mountain. Krakauer's character asks several climbers why they are doing what they're doing, but the answers he gets - because it's there; because it's rare; because it cures depression - seem as unsatisfactory to us as they do to him.

Peter Bradshaw, The Guardian: Everest doesn't deliver the edge-of-your-seat thrills or a centrally compelling story. By the end of this, audiences may feel they have laboriously made it to the summit - without getting much of a view.

Sara Stewart, New York Post: Still, you couldn't hope for a much more magnificent and immersive trip up to the Chinese-Nepalese summit short of trying it yourself. See it on the biggest screen you can find - and bring a jacket.

Jacob Hall, New York Daily News: Like the mountain for which it's named, "Everest" is rock solid. It's big, it's beautiful, it's terrifying, and it's merciless to both its characters and the audience.

Chris Nashawaty, Entertainment Weekly: At times it's confusing (especially if you haven't read Into Thin Air) who's where and who's still alive. They're just a sea of parkas. Maybe that's the point-that Mother Nature doesn't discriminate. But I doubt it. Plus, it shouldn't be. When the lights come up, you don't want to feel like you've watched a ­better Cliffhanger. You want to understand the tragedy you've just watched. Yes, you want to be entertained, but you also want the icy, whipping wind of reality to sting.

Todd McCarthy, Hollywood Reporter: For the 99.999 percent of us who will never climb Mount Everest, the new 3D Imax drama Everest provides plenty of vividly illustrated reasons to rationalize leaving it off one's bucket list. However, there are quite a few good reasons to see this robust dramatization of a 1996 assault on the world's tallest mountain that went disastrously wrong, beginning with the eye-popping, you-are-there visual techniques that make you feel glad indeed that you're not actually up there at 29,029 feet, but also including multiple characters sufficiently humanized to create real concern for their fates, and an attention to realistic detail that gives the film texture. Universal should be able to add this one to its impressive list of 2015 box-office successes.

Pete Hammond, Deadline: The technical aspects of this grueling film are superb throughout, including top-notch special effects and sound work. The movie should be a real player in the crafts categories of the Oscars, but I have a feeling it could go even further than that. Hopefully audiences will want to see this terrific film which represents the best of moviemaking at its most daunting.

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