This Mountain Life

The awe that mountainous landscapes evoke is universal. Yet in a province that is 75% mountains, most of us seldom venture into true wilderness. Living amongst us is a special breed of people.

They are undefined by age, gender, profession or background, but for them, the draw of the mountains is so strong that their lives must revolve around it. Martina Halik and her 60-year-old mother Tania attempt a bitterly cold 2300-kilometer ski trek from Canada to Alaska through the treacherous Coast Mountains; a journey that has been completed only once before, and never by a female duo.

Their adventure is interspersed with beautifully crafted portraits of high-altitude human endurance: the gripping story an avalanche burial; a group of nuns who inhabit a mountain retreat to be closer to God; an impassioned alpinist; a focused snow artist; a couple who has been living off grid in the mountains for nearly 50 years. Shot in cinematic detail, This Mountain Life is a riveting examination of human passion set high in the peaks of British Columbia, Canada.