Even Ernest Shackleton promised “honor and recognition” to any adventurer who would sign up to cross Antarctica with him. ©Colin McNulty
Ever since the explorers of old used oral storytelling, flyers and published journals to spread word of streets lined with gold, fountains of youth or rich silks and spices, people have been using mass media to motivate others to go on adventures. A hundred years ago, even Ernest Shackleton promised “honor and recognition” in an ad in the London press to any adventurer who would sign up to go with him on an attempt to cross Antarctica via the South Pole:
“Men Wanted for Hazardous Journey. Small wages, bitter cold, long months of complete darkness, constant danger, safe return doubtful. Honour and recognition in case of success.”
In those days, however, most of the people who took the bait expected a testing of their mettle and knew that they would be taking on an adventure that would push them to the limit. Today, however, with the ubiquitous of films, “average people” are being inspired to go on dangerous journeys—thinking they’ll be safe. Often, this isn’t the case.
Sometimes, locations share starring roles with the actors in a film.
Unprepared pilgrims
Places sometimes figure as prominently as any lead character in a film. Think of the 1965 film The Sound of Music, and you picture Julie Andrews spinning around in front of the Austrian Alps. I wonder how many travelers since the sixties have attempted a climb for that exact spot—and done their own 360.
Twenty years later, 1985’s Out of Africa spawned countless African safaris by moviegoers. And following 2001’s Lord of the Rings trilogy, New Zealand was inundated with hordes of visitors looking for an adventure traveler’s playground: raging, white-water rapids; glacial lakes; dramatic cliff faces; and dense forests.
I have to confess that my own recent adventure to the Galapagos was partly inspired by a movie I’d seen a few years ago. In fact, my naturalist guide even pointed out a spot where a scene from the 2003 nautical adventure movie Master and Commander was shot.
Following 2001’s “Lord of the Rings” trilogy, New Zealand was inundated with hordes of visitors looking for adventure. ©Candice Gaukel Andrews
It’s clear that locations depicted on-screen often see a boost in tourism. Perhaps the top prize for the movie that inspired the most real-life adventures has to go to Into the Wild. Since that film premiered in 2007, year after year, a steady stream of unprepared people have risked their lives and trekked through Denali National Park in Alaska in hopes of reaching the bus where Christopher McCandless starved to death. And each summer since then, rescuers have recovered at least half a dozen lost hikers on McCandless pilgrimages.
Lost lagoon
As recently as September of last year, a 64-year-old man hiked into Utah’s Lower Blue John Canyon. He slipped and fell 10 feet, breaking his left leg and dislocating his right shoulder. Three days later, a National Park Service patrol found his car. The next morning, a helicopter crew spotted him crawling across the desert, about four miles from the site of his accident. Why had he gone to the Lower Blue John Canyon? He reported he had been inspired by the 2010 release of 127 Hours, the movie starring actor James Franco that was based on the experience of Aron Ralston, the man who got trapped in that canyon by a falling rock and was forced to amputate his arm. Until two years ago when the movie was released, the fissure was only known to serious canyoneers and people who’d read Ralston’s 2003 memoir, Between a Rock and Hard Place.
What’s even more intriguing about all of this—much as with the explorers of old who embellished their calls for adventure with promises of untold riches to be gained and wonders to be seen—is that the not-so-much-truth-in-advertising is still going on. That lagoon that Franco jumps into within Lower Blue John Canyon where Ralston got caught? It doesn’t exist.
The 2007 film “Into the Wild” has inspired many Alaskan adventures. ©Brad Josephs
Do you think modern movies are inspiring “average” people to go on adventures that are far beyond their physical abilities? Or is this just what adventure tales have always been meant to do: test our limits?
Here’s to finding your (safe) true places and natural habitats,
Candy
Only anecdotal but when the “River Wild” with Meryl Streep and Kevin Bacon was released the whitewater rafting industry in Maine jumped 25%.
I can’t remember ever being influenced by a movie but books and television series have certainly influenced where I’d like to go. ‘Northern Exposure’ makes me want to visit Alaska (even though I know it was filmed in Washington State), ‘Skippy’ made me want to see the weird and wonderful animal life in Australia, which I have been lucky enough to manage twice. I’ve read the Bill Bryson books and they have got me considering parts of the USA.
Yes I do agree that now a days the adventure movies have become a tool for risk taking hobbies.
A spirit of adventure – which innately & necessarily involves risk-taking – is vitally healthy & necessary for the inner growth of the individual & the survival of the group. Tales of adventure have always inspired this virtue among the young.
How anyone can watch the NG earth series and not be inspired to take risks to experience what is out there waiting for us is beyond me. Example: we took a bear-watching trip to Katmai in puddle jumper planes, landing on the beach then hiking into the habitat of grizzlies. We watched them from inside 100 feet; one lumbered upstream right below the bank we were sitting on. I could have hit him with the ball retriever from my golf bag.
Oh, yes, I have traveled many places because of having seen adventure films. From “Lost Horizons” to “The Razor’s Edge” to “Seven Years in Tibet,” I was compelled to go Tibet in 1986 before there were many amenities. “Under the Sheltering Sky” drew me to Agadez, Niger. “The Man Who Would be King” prompted me to travel to India, Pakistan and Afghanistan. “Indochine” led me to Vietnam and Cambodia. And who wasn’t inspired to travel to the deserts of the exotic Middle East after having been imprinted by “Lawrence of Arabia” at a young age??? I made it to Wadi Rum in Jordan but have been unable to penetrate the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. Another film that whet my appetite for desert travel was “the English Patient.”
The adventure bug bites every one once in a while. The frequency of responding to it, and the way we respond to challenges faced in each adventure, or cherish the pleasant experiences cements the occasional attempts into a character trait. While the one time adventurer,who chose not to venture out any further, but is very fond of his experience may still be a motivator, it is the frequent adventure addict who makes for compelling stories which in turn serve to promote the adventure spirit on a larger scale. Such travelogues are then studied for screen treatment suitability and the chosen ones become the Adventure movies. Thus we can say that an Adventure movie is a multiple – distilled experience.It is no wonder it motivates others to go for adventure. Yet,all said and done, only those who respond to the adventure bug with a trial trip end up as adventure travellers.
It takes some character to be an adventurer. With almost sixty years’ experience behind me, I can vouch for that.
Finding these treasures does motivate others to go and do other exploring. I don’t believe it ‘makes’ inspiration, but inspires inspiration. Skill taking is a behavior that i think might be inherent in that person.
A meek, scared person could never be inspired to go to the top of mount ararat, where one who is a thrill seeker will look for thrills
So, i would say it really does depend on the individual characters..
The media has always inspired us. How could you look at the earliest photographs of the American West and not want to visit? In the early 1900’s Scribner’s books and their imaginative words and illustrations brought to life all forms of adventure. Movies combined sight and movement and later sound and color to bring us as close as possible to experience not just what a place looks like, but what it feels like. The desire to travel and see these places for ourselves is fueled by what we’re exposed to, but it must be tempered with an understanding of our own limitations.
MTV’s Jackass seems to have been influential in the same way, as has WCW. Adventure to the infirmary!
Of course they do. I was inspired to visit Arches after seeing Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade. I didn’t take any undue risks however.
I always use movies and videos to get inspired before I go on a planned adventure, usually it is snowboard/skiing related, or at least athletic. I don’t find myself taking risks and stepping outside of my comfort zone just because of a video; I try to realize my limitations though I try harder on the slopes when I see people doing awesome tricks and going really fast. I think it might be the competitive nature in me I want to be better, faster stronger than most or possibly everyone. Everything we experience in our life can be used as inspiration to attempt new things and try to achieve even better or try to have a little more fun in our lives.
I’m sure it does. Even a picture can do that. Consider the following…
The law that Roosevelt signed creating Crater Lake National Park marked the end of a long campaign to preserve the lake and its surrounding forests. A Kansas native named Will Steel started the campaign after he visited the lake in 1885.
Steel liked to tell a story about how he first heard of Crater Lake as a schoolboy on the prairie. One day while eating his lunch, he happened to look at a scrap of newspaper that had wrapped his lunch and discovered a story about Oregon’s natural wonder.
His imagination fired by the newspaper story, Steel moved to Oregon as an adult. After his first visit to the lake, he dedicated himself to preserving it as a national park.
And surely, once in a park people will want to do the “in thing” even if may be considered a tad risky. From the half dome cables in Yosemite to taking a mule ride in grand canyon to posing with alligators in the everglades, media presentations creates a romance about a place we strive to emulate.
Sure, but I believe the quest for adventure is embedded deeply within our genetic endowment; and a film or book simply refines the choices as to destination and activity. I identified most closely with Denys Finch Hatton, the Professional Hunter who was the inspiration for Dinesen’s “Out of Africa”.
Finch Hatton was emblematic of the Professional Hunter as he was perceived in his heyday: Highly Educated, Intelligent, Sophisticated, Compassionate and able to see that Indigenous Culture was as rich, valuable, and worth celebrating as his own European upbringing (if not more so). Dinesen eventually came to understand that.
They still exist, those iconic Professional Hunters, in such names as Harry Selby in Botswana, Ron Thomson in Zimbabwe, and Peter Flack in South Africa … though they are much less appreciated by the general public nowadays.
I am grateful that I have had the opportunity to share some time, some experiences (and some big-game hunting) with men such as these. Thank you: Baroness Karen von Blixen-Finecke.
Life without risk and adventure is trivial; however, I should also state that the threshold for risk is different from one person to the next. The risks I did take when climbing ice or rock in my early days were inspired by books not film, due to the corny and outdated nature of the mainstream films regarding climbing. Currently, when I see climbing films and magazine articles I recognize the hard work, extreme skill, and psychological fortitude of the people doing these very difficult climbs and realize that those climbs are out of the question for me…right now. Always thought that ‘Into the Wild’ was a great film, but I read the book years before and it had inspired me to take on adventures larger than life!
In the near future I hope to do a similar sojourn as Chris McCandless, but for different reasons, and feel that I still need more experience and training under my belt before I embark on my sojourn.
In answer to your title question – only in as much as they provide inspiration secondhand without true interpretation – or the potential of realistic achievement through understanding. If your asking should we risk take? – yes. But stories of old told orally are very different sagas to instant media messages and film. Motivation is within us all, the good or great teacher will tap into that with young people. If motivation is the key to exploration and adventure it must come with eye to eye contact and excitement, generated not through film, or media stimulus, but by seeking to understand and explore from within.
Out of Africa was a definite inspiration for the first trip I took there in 1994. Though I would not say that Into Thin Air prompted me to want to climb Everest. 🙂