The Great White Silence

This devastatingly haunting film charters the ill-fated final journey of Captain Robert Falcon Scott to the South Pole – beginning in 1910 and ending in tragedy in 1912. Photographer Herbert Ponting, best known as the cinematographer for Scott’s Terra Nova Expedition, has left a legacy to the world with his extraordinary footage at the start of the journey while later on, as only Scott and a team of four other men ventured ever further towards the South Pole, the footage seen was actually taken by Scott himself until the film rolls ran out and everyone became too weak.

Ponting’s footage begins with the departure of the Terra Nova, a former whaling ship, now destined to bring Captain Scott and his team to the Antarctic from New Zealand’s south island. Along the treacherous journey a number of animals and stores were swept overboard during fierce gales (some, including a dog, could be rescued), additionally the ship had to break through 400 miles of pack ice in order to reach the Great Ice Barrier. The footage taken by Ponting of the barrier is both fearsome and awe-inspiring, like a gigantic fortress carved out of ice that stretches seemingly endless along the horizon. Next we see footage showing the ship breaking through the ice. Once the crew and animals had arrived on Ross Island, Ponting lost no time in capturing the local wildlife on film – including killer whales, seals, Antarctic skuas (predatory sea birds) and the daily lives and habits of the Adélie penguins, some of which even ‘befriended’ him or so it would seem. This is an incredibly insightful glimpse into the habits of these flightless, aquatic birds – Sir David Attenborough couldn’t have come up with more arresting footage! Although it sounds exotic and adventurous the expedition was anything but! From an early point the journey was hampered by various misfortunes when the Terra Nova almost sank during a heavy storm and was trapped in pack ice for twenty days. This was to have fatal consequences as it meant a late-season arrival which gave the men less time for preparations before the Arctic winter set in full throttle. And one of the motor sledges was lost at Cape Evans during the unloading from the ship when it broke through the sea ice.

Things quickly turned from bad to worse with weather conditions steadily deteriorating and the Siberian ponies, which weren’t fully acclimatised, were too weak, thus slowing the expedition down. Party member Lawrence Oates (one of the five men to die) advised Captain Scott to kill the ponies for food and advance the depot to 80 degrees South but the Captain refused to do so, it was a decision he would come to regret. Several ponies perished during the journey from cold or were shot as they slowed things down considerably which begs the question why Scott, an experienced explorer who had already led an Antarctic expedition years earlier, decided on the ponies to begin with.
After wintering at Cape Evans the five men bid farewell to the remaining party as they set out on a race to be the first men at the South Pole and by doing so make their country proud. They were Edgar Evans, Henry Bowers, Edward Wilson, Lawrence Oates and Captain Scott. Initially starting with caterpillar tractors (which would prove impractical) and the ponies they quickly came to realise that in order to make any progress the final 800 miles had to be covered by man-hauling alone – no mean feat and it clearly exhausted the men who, as we can see from Scott’s own filmed footage, had to observe the same daily ritual: pitching the flimsy tent, cooking a broth made of ‘pemmican hoosh’ (dried beef with 60% fat) which they consumed with biscuits and the occasional cup of cocoa before hanging up their damp socks to dry and crawling into sleeping bags made of reindeer skin though not even that could keep the men warm as we’re talking 20 to 30 degrees zero inside the tent! God alone knows how these brave men managed their daily ablutions and going to the toilet.

With iron determination the five men finally reached the South Pole on the 17th of January 1912, only to discover that Norwegian explorer Roald Amundsen (who was smart enough to have his sleighs pulled by dogs from Greenland who were able to cope with sub-zero temperatures) had beaten them by thirty-four days and had proudly erected the Norwegian flag. Inwardly crushed and obviously deeply disappointed, Scott and his men refused to show their defeat outwardly (an example of the famous English stiff upper lip perhaps) and decided to return to Cape Evans and the much needed food supply… but the journey back marked the beginning of the end. First to perish was Evans, already fragile from an injury he sustained much earlier and severe frostbite, when he fell into a crevasse which caused a severe brain concussion, with his condition worsening rapidly. Next, Lawrence Oates began to suffer from frostbite and his toes were in such a bad state that he was barely able to walk, slowing down the trip back considerably. Two weeks later, in a heroic act of self-sacrifice, he left the tent with the words “I am just going outside and may be some time” while a blizzard raging, never to be seen again.

With only Bowers and Wilson still alive (albeit barely), Captain Scott pressed on with a heavy heart – perhaps the three men already knew they were doomed but nevertheless they stoically soldiered on. On the 19th of March the men made what would be their final camp about 12 miles from the One Ton Depot. However, due to increasingly worsening weather conditions and blizzards raging they were unable to leave their tent nor could they see anything else but ice and snow, with only food for one person left. A short time later Scott and his two companions froze to death inside the tent, their bodies were to be discovered some four months later by a rescue party led by surgeon Edward Atkinson. A cairn was erected over the spot where the tent was found. Since then, a century of storms and snow have covered the cairn and tent but Captain Scott’s memory lives on.

First released in 2011 this BFI re-issue is now available in a Dual Format Edition (Blu-ray and DVD) with a new musical score by Simon Fisher Turner and the following Special Features: 90 degrees South (1933, 72 min) –Ponting’s final sound version of his legendary expedition footage / The Great White Silence panel discussion / The Sound of Silence – 13min docu about scoring the docu / Archive newsreels / Location field recordings plus Illustrated booklet (first pressing only).