Sir Cedric Webster Hardwicke was an English stage and film actor whose career spanned nearly 50 years. His theatre work included notable performances in productions of the plays of Shakespeare and Shaw, and his film work included leading roles in several adapted literary classics.
The Paradine Case is a 1947 courtroom drama with elements of film noir set in England, directed by Alfred Hitchcock and produced by David O. Selznick. Selznick and an uncredited Ben Hecht wrote the screenplay from an adaptation by Alma Reville and James Bridie of the 1933 novel by Robert Smythe Hichens. The film stars Gregory Peck, Ann Todd, Alida Valli, Charles Laughton, Charles Coburn, Ethel Barrymore, and Louis Jourdan. It tells of an English barrister who falls in love with a woman who is accused of murder, and how it affects his relationship with his wife.
The Eiger is a 3,967-metre (13,015 ft) mountain of the Bernese Alps, overlooking Grindelwald and Lauterbrunnen in the Bernese Oberland of Switzerland, just north of the main watershed and border with Valais. It is the easternmost peak of a ridge crest that extends across the Mönch to the Jungfrau at 4,158 m (13,642 ft), constituting one of the most emblematic sights of the Swiss Alps. While the northern side of the mountain rises more than 3,000 m (10,000 ft) above the two valleys of Grindelwald and Lauterbrunnen, the southern side faces the large glaciers of the Jungfrau-Aletsch area, the most glaciated region in the Alps. The most notable feature of the Eiger is its nearly 1,800-metre-high (5,900 ft) north face of rock and ice, named Eiger-Nordwand, Eigerwand or just Nordwand, which is the biggest north face in the Alps. This huge face towers over the resort of Kleine Scheidegg at its base, on the eponymous pass connecting the two valleys.
The White Spider is a non-fiction book by Heinrich Harrer that describes the first successful ascent of the infamous north face (Nordwand) of the Eiger, a mountain in the Berner Oberland of the Swiss Alps, with sections devoted to the history of mountaineering in the area.
Alison Jane Hargreaves was a British mountaineer. Her accomplishments included scaling Mount Everest alone, without supplementary oxygen or support from a Sherpa team, in 1995. She soloed all the great north faces of the Alps in a single season—a first for any climber. This feat included climbing the difficult north face of the Eiger in the Alps. Hargreaves also climbed 6,812-metre (22,349 ft) Ama Dablam in Nepal.
Fritz Wiessner was a German American pioneer of free climbing. Born in Dresden, Germany, he immigrated to New York City in 1929 and became a U.S. citizen in 1935. In 1939, he made one of the earliest attempts to conquer K2, one of the most difficult mountains in the world to climb.
Toni Kurz was a German mountain climber active in the 1930s. He died in 1936 during an attempt to climb the then-unclimbed north face of the Eiger with his partner Andreas Hinterstoisser.
The six great north faces of the Alps are a group of vertical faces in the Swiss, French, and Italian Alps known in mountaineering for their difficulty, danger, and great height. The "Trilogy" is the three hardest of these north faces, being the Eiger, the Grandes Jorasses, and the Matterhorn.
The White Tower is a 1945 novel by James Ramsey Ullman. It was the fourth best-selling novel in the US in 1945 and was reprinted as an Armed Services Edition.
The Green Glove is a 1952 French-American international co-production film noir directed by Rudolph Maté and starring Glenn Ford, Geraldine Brooks, Sir Cedric Hardwicke and George Macready.
The Glass Mountain is a 1949 black and white British romantic film drama directed by Henry Cass. It starred Michael Denison, Dulcie Gray and Valentina Cortese. The film was a popular success of its day, and was re-released in the UK in 1950 and 1953. It features acclaimed classical vocalists Elena Rizzieri as herself and Tito Gobbi as himself, with the orchestra and chorus of the Venice Opera House. The theme music by Nino Rota is memorable, and was also a contemporary hit. It was mainly filmed on location in the Dolomites and at Venice's La Fenice Opera House. Co-producer Joseph Janni also co-produced another film shot in Italy, the comedy Honeymoon Deferred, in 1951.
Erhard Loretan was a Swiss mountain climber.
Walk Softly, Stranger is a 1950 American romantic drama film starring Joseph Cotten and Alida Valli and directed by Robert Stevenson. Also regarded by some as either or both a film noir and crime film, it tells the story of a small-time crook on the run who becomes reformed by the love of a disabled woman.
Christian Almer was a Swiss mountain guide and the first ascentionist of many prominent mountains in the western Alps during the golden and silver ages of alpinism. Almer was born and died in Grindelwald, Canton of Bern.
Andreas Hinterstoisser was a German mountain climber active in the 1930s. He was killed in the 1936 Eiger north face climbing disaster during an attempted summit via that route with his partner Toni Kurz. A section of the north face was later named the "Hinterstoisser Traverse" in his honor. The 2008 film North Face was based on his experience climbing the Eiger.
Baby Face Nelson is a 1957 American film noir crime film based on the real-life 1930s gangster, directed by Don Siegel, co-written by Daniel Mainwaring—who also wrote the screenplay for Siegel's 1956 sci-fi thriller Invasion of the Body Snatchers—and starring Mickey Rooney, Carolyn Jones, Cedric Hardwicke, Leo Gordon as Dillinger, Anthony Caruso, Jack Elam, John Hoyt and Elisha Cook Jr.
Third Man on the Mountain is a 1959 American family adventure film by Walt Disney Productions, directed by Ken Annakin and starring Michael Rennie, James MacArthur and Janet Munro. Set during the golden age of alpinism, its plot concerns a young Swiss man who conquers the mountain that killed his father. It is based on Banner in the Sky, a James Ramsey Ullman 1955 novel about the first ascent of the Citadel, and was televised under this name.
Earthbound is a 1940 film directed by Irving Pichel. It stars Warner Baxter and Andrea Leeds. It is a remake of the 1920 silent film of the same name, Earthbound. Critical reception to the film was generally negative.
Tom Ballard was a British rock climber and alpinist, who was the first mountaineer to climb the six major alpine north faces solo in a single winter season. In February 2019, Ballard disappeared during bad weather on an expedition to Nanga Parbat, in Pakistan-administered Kashmir. His body was discovered on the mountain's Mummery Spur on 9 March 2019.
