The Flight of the Eagle

1982 [SWEDISH]

Action / Adventure / Biography / Drama

1
Rotten Tomatoes Critics - Rotten 75% · 3 reviews
Rotten Tomatoes Audience - Upright 75% · 50 ratings
IMDb Rating 7.2/10 10 1417 1.4K

sweden hot air balloon biography north pole explorer polar exploration

Plot summary

The Swedish 19th century engineer Salomon August Andrée sets out to become the first man on the north pole. His idea is to launch a polar expedition using a hydrogen balloon, together with two friends. The balloon, "The Eagle", takes off from Svalbard in 1897, but the three men are never heard from again.

Director

Jan Troell Photo
Jan Troell

Top cast

Max von Sydow Photo
Max von Sydow as S.A. Andrée
Clément Harari Photo
Clément Harari as Lachambre
Knut Husebø Photo
Knut Husebø as Fridtjof Nansen
Marga Pettersson Photo
Marga Pettersson as Dancer
720p.BluRay 1080p.BluRay
1.26 GB
1204*720
Swedish 2.0
NR
Subtitles us  
24 fps
2 hr 20 min
Seeds ...
2.59 GB
1792*1072
Swedish 5.1
NR
Subtitles us  
24 fps
2 hr 20 min
Seeds 3

Movie Reviews

Reviewed by boywonder_4

one of the two most extraordinary movies of Man's relationship to "space (area)."

Seen in America as "The Flight of the Eagle," this is one of the two most extraordinary movies of Man's relationship to "space (area)." Where "Das Boot" best captured a world of confined spaces, this movie dramatically arrests the viewer in an terrifying environment of "too much space." Beginning as a beautiful period-piece, this story follows our three adventurers as they pitch and win the argument, to be the first humans to reach the North Pole. As an accomplished balloonist, Max Von Sydow as the real life Swedish Engineer, S. A. Andrée, meets and collects two hardy companions and embarks the `great adventure' via what else ? …a balloon! The film brilliantly captures the three travelers' descent from excitement into stark realization that `blueprints' do not always describe reality. The remainder of the film which runs about 3 hours, is an incredible story of how intellect, will always be limited against the harsh reality of God. Tremendous performances by Von Sydow and company, and significantly inter-cut with actual photos from the expedition, this movie won the Oscar for Best Foreign Film. One of the most psychologically-terrifying, emotional films (and a true story), this is a must see for fans of great film-making.Cheers.
Reviewed by shanayneigh 8 / 10

Up, up and away

I generally don't like Swedish movies because of their stilted and theatrical acting. There is some of this in this movie as well (why is it almost impossible for a Swedish actor to deliver a line reading that's natural, not "acted") but not as much as I feared. The direction is good and I really like the cinematography.Of course it's not a documentary but there are some curious and entertaining (in a morbid way) details which didn't make it into the movie. Like the last words heard from the men in the balloon sailing away, Andree exclaiming "What the hell was that??" Or how they knew beforehand that the sleds wouldn't work as intended due to their faulty construction, but chose to do nothing about it since they were never intended to be used. Or how they chose to load up a sled with useless things like cravats and encyclopedias instead of vital supplies as they set foot on their trek after crash landing the balloon. The book " The Expedition: Solving the Mystery of a Polar Tragedy" by Bea Uusma is great if you want to read more about this crazy venture.Still, a good movie. It was a wise choice not to show off too much of the polar bears. Kind of like the shark in Jaws.
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