I have read Shackleton's account of his 1914 expedition to Antarctica (and also the published diaries of Robert Falcon Scott's doomed mission in 1912) and so have both a great interest and admiration for these brave explorers, looking to chart the last unknown territories on this planet, unknown because they are so remote and dangerous. I was therefore most interested to finally watch this two-part dramatisation of the remarkable events of Shackleton's failed attempt to cross Antarctica the hard way, as his ship, the Endurance, becomes ice-bound and eventually ice-crushed, leaving him and his crew to attempt a tortuous journey back to civilisation and safety or share the fate of Scott and his team two years before.For me, though, the first of the two parts, which concentrated on introducing the viewer to the crew, shading in the background to Shackleton's private life as well as his determination to get funding (and sees him making the rounds of visiting in person wealthy potential donors) was far too slow and delayed the action. Did I need to know that there was another woman in his life as is implied here? Did she really make a telephone call to Shackleton's long-suffering wife to ask her if she knew he was still alive after being missing for so long? What did it matter if Shackleton had a dodgy brother, imprisoned for fraud? It just seemed to me that director Charles Sturridge wanted to indulge himself in some period melodrama at the expense of the meat of the story which was of course the incredible journey the explorer and his crew made, his promise to get them all back alive after they lost their ship and especially his incredibly brave decision to strike out with only four companions in a tiny boat to attempt to get to the whaling station at South Georgia to procure a rescue ship for his men. Thus, exciting as they are, these latter events seemed almost rushed, days and days of endeavour reduced to mere minutes. I really do think the first half could have lost an hour to the second half. I also don't remember reading of any dissent in the ranks of his crew as is portrayed here and again suspected another abuse of dramatic licence as Shackleton locks horns with a hard-nosed Scot, the shop's carpenter (a lippy chippie if you like).It has to be said though that the actors perform admirably, especially in the arduous scenes on the ship and especially on the ice. Kenneth Branagh is excellent in the title part but there are many good performances around him. There's a suitably sweeping orchestral soundtrack reminiscent of Vaughn-Williams' celebrated score for "Scott Of The Antarctic" many years before.In the end though my impatience for the director to get me to the heart of the story belied my enjoyment of a nevertheless still worthy and compelling account of a truly fantastic journey.

A number of years ago I read the story of the Shackelton expedition and like many who have read it before me, was amazed at the courage, skill and determination to survive that these men exhibited. The story has an old world "Roger of the Raj" sort of feeling to it: British empire, British pluck, fighting fearful odds and all of that. I found the story quite inspirational never the less (it being de rigeur to be cynical these days) and this film certainly does it justice. It is well worth a watch and somehow manages to squeeze in a huge story (and a large book) into quite watchable dimensions.Frank Hurley the photographer in the expedition was a person of considerable stature himself and is worthy of a film about his own life, but that's another story.

I have read about and watched documentary programs of this expedition and the hugely motivational and enigmatic Ernest Shackleton before seeing this version of it. From the very beginning there was a good, professional look and feel to this movie. A lot of time is spent on the 'background information' before the actual voyage. Don't be impatient though. The voyage begins and then you feel like you had better strap yourself to your seat as the pace and emotive content of the film comes at you like a runaway train. I cannot give enough compliments for this film. Please, if you get the chance, sit back, relax and watch a bit of history...when men were men and all that :) [smile]

I've not visited Antarctica, but I'm told by those who have that its austere beauty grows on you; far from being a frozen hell, it is a land where one can get closer to oneself and the meaning of things. This film uses Greenland for location shooting and is a dramatised version of Shackleton's 1914-16 expedition which started out as an attempt to cross the continent from the Weddel Sea to the Ross Sea, but, after the expedition vessel `Endurance' was first trapped and then crushed in the Weddel Sea ice pack, Shackleton and his party of 28 men, their dogs and one cat, were caught in a grim struggle for survival. The first 100 minutes is concerned with the origins of the expedition, and Shackleton's efforts to raise support and prepare for it. The son of an Irish country doctor, he served in the Merchant Navy, but by 1914 he was a very experienced polar explorer, having been on two major earlier expeditions; he was in fact the Englishman who had been closest to the South Pole and survived. Although the first half drags at times, Kenneth Branagh's full-on performance as Shackleton gives us a clear picture of the sort of man he is, ambitious, hard-driving, single-minded, yet one who genuinely cares for the men under his command. He is even aware of the effect his exploration obsession is having on his family life (not to mention his relationship with his mistress), but he plows on regardless. In the second half we are stuck on the polar pack ice, and the story turns into a conventional ripping yarn, but it is told with economy and a certain amount of humour. It is clear that, apart from luck, Shackleton and his men (the animals, alas, did not make it) owed their survival to Shackleton's good judgment and the fact that he was able to get all of them to rise to the occasion. He might have been slightly mad to get into such a fix to begin with, but he had no wish to suffer the fate of his colleague Captain Scott. Branagh dominates the film of course, but his crew, mostly made up of little-known actors, come through as characters in their own right. Several stand out; Ken Drury as McNiesh, the feisty ship's carpenter, Kevin McNally as Worsley the lugubrious skipper, Celyn Jones as the Welsh stowaway Blackborow, and Nicholas Rowe as Colonel, the expedition odd-man-out. It is melancholy to recall, that several of the crew survived the Antarctic only to die in the trenches in France. Matt Day as the Australian photographer Frank Hurley, who produced some unforgettable images of the trip, also puts in a strong performance. The characters at home seem bloodless by comparison, with the exception of Phoebe Nicholl's determined Lady Shackleton. One wonders how Lord Curzon, that very superior person, who presided over the very tight-fisted Royal Geographical Society (nicely played by Corin Redgrave) would have got by on the expedition.In 1922 Shackleton went back once more to the Antarctic but died of a heart attack at the whaling station on South Georgia before he was able to set off for the ice. He was only 48. Clearly, the attraction was more than fame and fortune – he was in love with the place. Since then the whalers have gone and Antarctic is now the preserve of scientists and a small but growing number of tourists. Latter-day Shackletons have no great geographical questions to solve but still persist on doing things like trying to ski across the continent. I think I'll settle for the tourist ship myself, but it's vaguely comforting to know there are still such people around.