| The Worst Journey in the World | |
|---|---|
| Genre | Docudrama |
| Written by | Mark Gatiss |
| Directed by | Damon Thomas |
| Starring |
|
| Narrated by | Barry Letts |
| Composer | Duncan Glasson |
| Country of origin | United Kingdom |
| Original language | English |
| Production | |
| Producer | Suzanne Lavery |
| Cinematography | Jonathan Partridge |
| Running time | 60 minutes |
| Production company | Tiger Aspect Productions |
| Original release | |
| Network | BBC Four |
| Release | 13 June 2007 |
The Worst Journey in the World is a 2007 BBC Television docudrama based on the memoir of the same name by polar explorer Apsley Cherry-Garrard. Narrator Barry Letts, best known for his tenure as the producer of Doctor Who , played Cherry-Garrard in the 1948 film Scott of the Antarctic .
A pre-title sequence shows Apsley Cherry-Garrard in London in 1938 struggling with his perceived culpability in Scott's death.
The Edwardian era was called the heroic age of polar exploration and the names of Nansen, Shackleton, Amundsen and Scott have passed into legend. The race for the poles caught the popular imagination, the conquest of the South Pole in particular. Captain Scott emerged as a tragic hero whose story has achieved almost mythical status. What’s less well known is Scott took more than 30 others to Antarctica, where they spent two years conducting extensive scientific experiments, as well as preparing for the attempt on the pole. One of the more esoteric chapters of this adventure is an amazing story of human endurance. It concerns the search for a penguin's egg. and the youngest Englishman in Scott’s party. This is his story...
— Barry Letts's opening narration
Cherry is incapacitated by a psychological collapse in 1946 and starts to flash back to his past. He arrives at the Natural History Museum in 1913 with eggs he collected in Antarctica. He recalls his discussion with Dr. Wilson two years prior when he had first suggested the expedition. Initially denied a place due to his poor eyesight a generous donation to the Terra Nova Expedition had changed Captain Scott's mind and Cherry was signed on.
Scott sets sail from New Zealand and sets up camp at Cape Evans where they settle in for the winter. Dr. Wilson leads Cherry and Birdie on the gruelling 67-mile trek to Cape Crozier where he had discovered an emperor penguin colony in 1902. Constructing a makeshift igloo four miles from the colony the trio collect the eggs. Dr. Wilson is badly burnt while rendering penguin fat for the stove and they lose their tent in a hurricane.
After recovering the tent the trio begin the journey back to the Cape Evans camp. Delivering the eggs to the museum Cherry is summarily dismissed by the curator and the eggs later prove to be too advanced to be of use. Dr. Wilson and Birdie joined Captain Scott on his trek to the South Pole a few months later and perished along with him on the return journey. Cherry sets out on a rescue mission but was forced to turn back by Scott's standing orders not to risk the dogs.
An epilogue, telling of Cherry's mental anguish at failing to rescue his friends who were only 70 miles from One Ton Depot when he turned back, shows the perfectly preserved camp at Cape Evans and the remnants of the igloo at Cape Crozier.
Captain Robert Falcon Scott was a British Royal Navy officer and explorer who led two expeditions to the Antarctic regions: the Discovery expedition of 1901–04 and the Terra Nova expedition of 1910–13.
Edward Adrian Wilson was an English polar explorer, ornithologist, natural historian, physician and artist.
Scott of the Antarctic is a 1948 British adventure film starring John Mills as Robert Falcon Scott in his ill-fated attempt to reach the South Pole. The film more or less faithfully recreates the events that befell the Terra Nova Expedition in 1912.
Apsley George Benet Cherry-Garrard was an English explorer of Antarctica. He was a member of the Terra Nova expedition and is acclaimed for his 1922 account of this expedition, The Worst Journey in the World.
Thomas Crean was an Irish seaman and Antarctic explorer who was awarded the Albert Medal for Lifesaving (AM).
Petty Officer Edgar Evans was a Welsh Royal Navy petty officer and member of the "Polar Party" in Robert Falcon Scott's ill-fated Terra Nova Expedition to the South Pole in 1911–1912. This group of five men, personally selected for the final expedition push, attained the Pole on 17 January 1912. The party perished as they attempted to return to the base camp.
Henry Robertson Bowers was one of Robert Falcon Scott's polar party on the ill-fated Terra Nova expedition of 1910–1913, all of whom died during their return from the South Pole.
William Lashly was a Royal Navy seaman who served as lead stoker on both the Discovery expedition and the Terra Nova expedition to Antarctica, for which he was awarded the Polar Medal. Lashly was also recognised with the Albert Medal for playing a key role in saving the life of a comrade on the second of the two expeditions.
Scott's Hut is a building located on the north shore of Cape Evans on Ross Island in Antarctica. It was erected in 1911 by the British Antarctic Expedition of 1910–1913 led by Robert Falcon Scott.
The DiscoveryExpedition of 1901–1904, known officially as the British National Antarctic Expedition, was the first official British exploration of the Antarctic regions since the voyage of James Clark Ross sixty years earlier (1839–1843). Organized on a large scale under a joint committee of the Royal Society and the Royal Geographical Society (RGS), the new expedition carried out scientific research and geographical exploration in what was then largely an untouched continent. It launched the Antarctic careers of many who would become leading figures in the Heroic Age of Antarctic Exploration, including Robert Falcon Scott who led the expedition, Ernest Shackleton, Edward Wilson, Frank Wild, Tom Crean and William Lashly.
The Terra NovaExpedition, officially the British Antarctic Expedition, was an expedition to Antarctica which took place between 1910 and 1913. Led by Captain Robert Falcon Scott, the expedition had various scientific and geographical objectives. Scott wished to continue the scientific work that he had begun when leading the Discovery Expedition from 1901 to 1904, and wanted to be the first to reach the geographic South Pole.
George Murray Levick was a British Antarctic explorer, naval surgeon and founder of the Public Schools Exploring Society.
The Worst Journey in the World is a 1922 memoir by Apsley Cherry-Garrard of Robert Falcon Scott's Terra Nova expedition to the South Pole in 1910–1913. It has earned wide praise for its frank treatment of the difficulties of the expedition, the causes of its disastrous outcome, and the meaning of human suffering under extreme conditions.
The Last Place on Earth is a 1985 Central Television seven-part serial, written by Trevor Griffiths based on the book Scott and Amundsen by Roland Huntford. The book is an exploration of the expeditions of Captain Robert F. Scott and his Norwegian rival in polar exploration, Roald Amundsen in their attempts to reach the South Pole.
Minna Bluff is a narrow, bold peninsula, 25 nautical miles long and 3 nautical miles wide, projecting southeast from Mount Discovery into the Ross Ice Shelf, Antarctica. It was discovered by the British National Antarctic Expedition (1901-04) which named it for Minna, the wife of Sir Clements Markham, the "father" of the expedition. It culminates in a south-pointing hook feature, and is the subject of research into Antarctic cryosphere history, funded by the National Science Foundation, Office of Polar Programs.
Cape Crozier is the most easterly point of Ross Island in Antarctica. It was discovered in 1841 during James Clark Ross's polar expedition of 1839 to 1843 with HMS Erebus and HMS Terror, and was named after Commander Francis Crozier, captain of HMS Terror, one of the two ships of Ross' expedition.
Patrick Keohane was an Irish member of Robert Falcon Scott's Antarctic expedition of 1910–1913, the Terra Nova expedition.
Edward Leicester Atkinson, was a Royal Navy surgeon and Antarctic explorer who was a member of the scientific staff of Captain Scott's Terra Nova Expedition, 1910–13. He was in command of the expedition's base at Cape Evans for much of 1912, and led the party which found the tent containing the bodies of Scott, "Birdie" Bowers and Edward Wilson. Atkinson was subsequently associated with two controversies: that relating to Scott's orders concerning the use of dogs, and that relating to the possible incidence of scurvy in the polar party. He is commemorated by the Atkinson Cliffs on the northern coast of Victoria Land, Antarctica, at 71°18′S168°55′E.
Between December 1911 and January 1912, both Roald Amundsen and Robert Falcon Scott reached the South Pole within five weeks of each other. But while Scott and his four companions died on the return journey, Amundsen's party managed to reach the geographic south pole first and subsequently return to their base camp at Framheim without loss of human life, suggesting that they were better prepared for the expedition. The contrasting fates of the two teams seeking the same prize at the same time invites comparison.
The British Antarctic explorer Robert Falcon Scott became the subject of controversy when, more than 60 years after his death on the return march from the South Pole in 1912, his achievements and character came under sustained attack.
