« When I waked, I cried to dream again ».
Have you heard of the famous 8000? These 14 legendary mountains culminating at over 8000m. At this altitude, where the lack of oxygen considerably reduces your physical and mental capacities. That's why these peaks are renowned for being extremely difficult to access, and why they represent a real challenge for mountaineers in search of a new challenge.
Let's meet Adriana Brownlee, the 22-year-old British mountaineer who has set herself the goal of climbing these 14 peaks over 8000m high.
Based between London and Kathmandu, where she founded an expedition agency. Her life is dedicated to the world of expeditions and mountaineering. From the age of 8, Adriana knew she wanted to be ‘special’. It was in a letter that she expressed her desire to climb Everest and become famous in the process.
The years that followed were dedicated to preparing this project, with the help and support of her family, and particularly her father, with whom she discovered her passion.
For Adriana, the aim of climbing the highest peak in the world was to inspire people by taking on this challenge and talking about it to those around her. Proving that with hard work, patience and dedication, even the wildest dreams can come true - that was the challenge for the young climber.
So it was at the age of just 20 that Adriana Brownlee climbed Everest with her climbing partner, Gelje Sherpa.
Once she had realised her dream, she wanted to take it even further, by embarking on the long quest to climb the Fourteen. By the end of 2022, she had already climbed ten of the fourteen peaks, including the most dangerous: Annapurna and K2.
In this film, Adriana takes you with her as she comes face to face with Gasherbrum I and II, her 11th and 12th summits above 8,000m, as well as the last two summits of her quest in Pakistan.
To develop her mountaineering skills, she decided to take on the challenge of climbing them without oxygen and with a minimum of assistance. The aim was to move towards a more alpine style, and thus add a new dimension to her expeditions.
This adventure will take Adriana through new encounters, powerful emotions, but also painful moments, while opening her eyes to the 8000 industry. Having dreamt so much, and having achieved her initial goal and much more, she is now questioning this race for performance, which is surely not what the 8-year-old dreamt of.
Follow Adriana Brownlee on her expedition over her last four 8,000s, as you discover a little girl's dream come true, but also a woman for whom it is vital to get back to the basics of her sport, to dream again.
Gelje SHERPA
Gelje Sherpa is a Nepalese high-mountain climber based in Kathmandu. He was a key element of “Project Possible”, the challenge of climbing the Fourteens in less than seven monthsby Nims Dai and his team.
Gelje became famous in the high-altitude climbing world through this project but also through his breath-taking rescues at high altitude : he saves climbers fallen into crevasses, but also carries the body of a weakened man from Everest summit back to lower camps.
He has just finished the Fourteens with Cho Oyu in Tibet in Autumn 2023. However, he has climbed some 8000s many times and his huge experience and skills make him hired by big expedition companies to set the fixed ropes on the 8000m mountains for help and guide the other climbers. Gelje was also part of the team Of Nimsdai during the K2 Winter in 2021.
The DIRECTOR
Mathis Decroux is a film director and photographer based in Annecy in the French Alps. Using his running, hiking, skiing and climbing skills, he is able to work with outdoor brands and athletes to tell their stories in an original and creative way.
He likes to challenge himself physically and creatively and is always open to new challenges. After directing two short sport documentaries : UP&DOWN (18mn) and JULES (19mn), Dream AGAIN. is his next challenging production where he pushes the boundaries of his creativity.
During this project, he was able to follow Adriana in her training in London,on a glacier in Courmayeur (Italy) and in the expedition in the most remote glacier of Pakistan. He went up to Camp 1 at 6000 meters to capture climbing and landscape footage for the movie.
As far as the post-production side is concerned, he edited the movie and then played a role of conductor so the different talents sing in unison. From a single music note to specific drawings with unique style, everything was originally made for the movie.
MAIN PARTNER THERM-IC
The TEAM
Such a project is not possible to create alone. We were able to count on different talents and experts. Through research and experimental processes, they made our ideas come to life and enhanced the movie’s storytelling.
MAIN PARTNER THERM-IC
The French brand of sport accessories Therm-ic was a strong supporter of this project. They were at the origin of the project, provided the budget and were a precious help with production and logistics. Axel Kowalczyk was the one who came to Mathis with the idea.
The launch of this movie is part of a bigger campaign for 8000m climbing accessories.
SOUNDS
Original SOUNDTRACK
Pakistani culture is famous for their musics involving atypical sounds such as strings and chorus. As music plays for half of the viewer’s experience, we wanted to create a unique genre. We aimed for a mix of modern electro/trans base with a traditional Pakistani touch. The duo ZIKALI is famous in the industry for their artistic skills and iconic references, they mastered this new genre to give a powerful Original Soundtrack.
Sound DESIGN&MIX Melodio
High mountain climbing is a tough sport which pushes the athletes’ boundaries, making them feel intense emotions of pain or joy. With the idea of creating a complete immersion for the viewer on the big screen, the studio Melodio brought their magic touch. They created original sounds for textures, titles and ambiances, and mixed every sound in 5.1 for a 360° audio experience.
DESIGN
Motion DESIGN&3D
VINCENT ROMAIN
A title has way more impact when animated. Once they were created, a Motion Designer animated them with morphing techniques, with a robotic but modern style. Also, such expedition include different travels and rotations between camps and it can be complicated to understand through voiceover and footage. Vincent then designed 3D animation of the mountains and the travels using Adriana’s GPS tracks (GPX). He was able to visually explain the sequence of events.
Illustration - DRAWINGS
LUCAS GIACOMAZZO
High-altitude images being limited because of the difficulty of the terrain, it was a challenge for the director and editor to illustrate what happened up there. This is where a talented illustrator comes into play and helps us understand the story with original comic book style drawings.
Graphic DESIGN
FRED RENAUD
We wanted to create a unique visual identity that matches the messages we were telling: a modern and premium touch and a soft manuscript font for our female main character. A Graphic Designer imagined for us creative visuals to help us tell the story: font, colors, poster, titles…
