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Lawless star Tom Hardy is in talks to take on the lead role in director Doug Liman's film project Everest. The movie will tell the true story of mountain climber George Mallory, who in the 1920's tried three times to become the first man to scale the world’s highest mountain.
The movie is an adaptation of the book Paths Of Glory, Everest written by Jeffrey Archer, it was adapted by Sheldon Turner (Up In The Air). Liman is set to start shooting the movie after he's finished directing All You Need is Kill with Tom Cruise. Hardy is one hell of a talented actor, and he was awesome in Lawless! Everest sounds like a great project for him to take on, one where he'll once again be able to show off his acting skills.
If he doesn't get nominated for a Best Actor award for Lawless, maybe Everest will be the film that actually gets him a nomination. This is such a great story, and I have no doubt it will make for a solid film.
Here's a more detailed description of Mallory's attempts to climb Everest from Deadline: "At the time, Great Britain had been decimated by WWI, poverty and angst was rampant and the nation craved a hero. Mallory tried hard to fill that bill, even though he was caught short in his first two attempts to summit the mountain, in 1921 and 1922. A devoted husband and father, he was torn between adventure and the simple fact his family wanted him with them. He refused to use oxygen to aid him in high altitude in thin air the first two times. On the final climb, he and climbing partner Sandy Irvine used the oxygen and were last glimpsed in 1924 as they made their final assault near the top. They disappeared into the clouds and Mallory wasn’t seen again until they were discovered by climber Mark Ankner in 1999. That the discovery in 1999 was the basis for the rather incredible Anthony Geffen-directed docu The Wildest Dream. The big question is whether Mallory died after he completed the unprecedented summit. Some feel he became the first man to climb the mountain: Mallory took with him a photo of his wife, which he had vowed to place atop Everest. It was not found in his possessions. The first successful climb in which the men returned to tell the tale didn’t come until 1953, when New Zealander Edmund Hillary and Nepali sherpa climber Tenzing Norgay got to the top and came back down."
Here's the description of the book:
Some people have dreams that are so magnificent that if they were to achieve them, their place in history would be guaranteed. Francis Drake, Robert Scott, Charles Lindbergh, Amy Johnson, Edmund Hilary, Neil Armstrong, and Lewis and Clark are among such individuals.
But what if one man had such a dream, and once he’d fulfilled it, there was no proof that he had achieved his ambition?
Jeffrey Archer’s latest book, Paths of Glory, is the story of such a man---George Mallory. Mallory once told an American reporter that he wanted to climb Mt. Everest, “because it’s there.” On his third attempt in 1924, at age thirty-seven, he was last seen six hundred feet from the top. His body was found in 1999, and it still remains a mystery whether he ever reached the summit.
But only after you’ve turned the last page of this extraordinary novel, inspired by a true story, will you be able to decide if George Mallory’s name should be added to the list of legends, in which case another name would have to be removed. Paths of Glory is truly a triumph.
