Tenzing, the first dramatic feature from Australian documentary director Jennifer Peedom, had its world premiere at the Telluride Film Festival in Colorado on Saturday evening, in the 500-seat Galaxy theatre at 6.15pm local time. The film tells the story of Tenzing Norgay, the Sherpa climber who reached the summit of Everest with New Zealander Edmund Hillary on 29 May 1953. Genden Phuntsok plays Norgay and Tom Hiddleston plays Hillary.
Peedom, Hiddleston, Phuntsok, Willem Dafoe, Caitríona Balfe, Thinley Lhamo and producer Iain Canning were all listed as attending, and the film screened again with a question-and-answer session on Sunday and a third time on Monday. The festival's program note praises "Phuntsok's gentle, centered performance" and says Peedom "conveys the deep spiritual lessons that enable Tenzing's superhuman accomplishments, including the mantra 'keep your eye on the mountain.'"
The film is an Australian production in everything but its financier. See-Saw Films, the Sydney and London company behind The King's Speech, Lion and Slow Horses, produced it for Apple Original Films, which bought worldwide rights in a competitive sale at the Cannes market in May 2024. Luke Davies, who was Oscar-nominated for Lion, wrote the screenplay from a story by Peedom. Stefan Duscio shot it, Melinda Doring designed it, Simon Njoo cut it and post-production was done at Spectrum Films in Sydney. Norbu Tenzing, Tenzing Norgay's eldest son, is an executive producer. Filming ran from May to August last year in Nepal and New Zealand.
Peedom has been on this mountain for a decade. Her 2015 documentary Sherpa, which premiered at Telluride and won the Grierson award at the BFI London Film Festival, followed the 2014 avalanche season from the Sherpa side of the climbing industry. Mountain, her 2017 collaboration with the Australian Chamber Orchestra, took more than $2 million at the Australian box office. She has been developing a Norgay film since 2015. "At its heart, Tenzing is about a man who dared to imagine a life beyond the limits," she said when the film was announced as the Zurich Film Festival's opener last month.
The first reviews came out of Telluride on Saturday and Sunday. AwardsWatch gave it a B plus and wrote that "Tenzing's different perspective has given a familiar story a renewed sense of consequence", picking out the film's treatment of Sherpa belief about the mountain as its freshest material. See-Saw's Liz Watts, one of the producers, described the shoot as "an extraordinary creative endeavour across continents and cultures" when the film was selected for Toronto in July.
Rebekka Karijord's score was recorded with the London Contemporary Orchestra at AIR Studios. The film runs 126 minutes and is rated TV-PG in the United States.
Tenzing was not the only Australian film in front of a festival audience this weekend. Kuba Dorabialski's Agata the Writer, starring and executive-produced by Mia Wasikowska, had its first public screening in Venice on Sunday afternoon as one of ten films competing in the Giornate degli Autori sidebar, the first Australian selection there since Ben Young's Hounds of Love in 2016. It is backed by Screen Australia, Creative Australia and the Adelaide Film Festival Investment Fund, and Bonsai Films will release it in Australia after its Australian premiere at the Adelaide Film Festival.
Tenzing goes next to the Toronto International Film Festival for a gala on 15 September and opens the Zurich Film Festival on 24 September. Apple has it in select cinemas from 9 October and on Apple TV from 16 October. An Australian cinema release is planned but has not been confirmed.
