Widower Edie Moore (Sheila Hancock) is climbing the walls. Which is more than can be said for her late husband George (Donald Pelmear) who for the last three decades of their loveless marriage relied upon a stairlift to ascend the stairs of their gloomy suburban home after a stroke left him unable to walk.

Three years after his death and with her frosty daughter Nancy (Wendy Morgan) pushing her into a care home, Edie heads for the hills, namely the striking peak of Suilven in the North West Highlands of Scotland, after a trawl through the family archives stirs memories of her beloved father’s jaunt to the same mountain.

Having settled for “duty” over love and having “wasted so much time doing nothing” with her threescore years and ten plus VAT, scaling the peak, the symbolic translation of which is The Lonely Mountain, provides her with one last opportunity to rekindle the “wild child” of her youth.

Though with time and tide against her, not to mention creaking bones and quaking inexperience, she reluctantly accepts the help of local tour guide Jonny (Kevin Guthrie) who through gritted teeth and the small matter of £800 persuades her not to give up. “You only live one,” he quips. “Don’t I know,” her world-weary reply.

Sheila Hancock is terrific, her face a shell of a woman plagued by regret, upon which the audience project their thoughts. Guthrie, by contrast, does too much projecting, sapping their relationship of chemistry. As does the string-heavy score by Debbie Wiseman which is as overpowering as a swarm of midges and director Simon Hunter’s repetitive camerawork.

To zoom out once from Hancock’s wonderfully expressive face to reveal an epic landscape of cold sea and rugged hills is to suggest a sense of scale and loneliness. To zoom out twice is to dilute the message. To zoom out three times is to gild the lily. But to zoom out four times is, quite frankly, overkill and underwhelming.

Where the film really does hit home, though, is when Edie is isolated from all the other characters – including Amy Mason as Jonny’s fiery girlfriend Fiona and Paul Brannigan as their wisecracking pal McLauglin – and the camera follows her silent ascent up the hill and into her soul as she reflects upon a life half-lived. Unfortunately, the film is half-baked.

Director: Simon Hunter
Writers: Simon Hunter (based on an idea by), Edward Lynden-Bell (story by)
Stars: Sheila Hancock, Kevin Guthrie, Paul Brannigan
Peter Callaghan
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