He never looked for the spotlight. Unless it was part of a cave mate’s headlamp. “We are very light-shy creatures,” says Thomas Matthalm. And yet he is now standing in front of this big screen and blinking at the spotlight and the audience. Since the spectacular rescue operation of his comrade Johann Westhauser from the deepest cave in Germany, Matthalm has received countless inquiries. And actually, says Matthalm, he also “tried to get rid of this Freddie Röckenhaus from Dortmund”. The filmmaker Röckenhaus, who also works as a freelancer for SZ-Sport, did not give up. In this way it was possible to convince the country’s research group, perhaps the least public, of a documentary film that is now showing in the cinemas. From the shadow of the cave to the cinema.
“The giant thing – 20,000 meters underground” has been running in Bavaria’s cinemas since July. A documentary thriller that takes the viewer into the 1000 meter deep and 20 kilometer long giant thing cave near Berchtesgaden. In 90 minutes, five researchers embark on a mission that is unique in many ways: after 20 years of research, they finally want to discover the exit of the cave that they are convinced exists. To make matters worse, they film themselves with special cameras for a cinema production – without a cameraman in the team. More than 80 percent of the recordings were made by Thomas Matthalm, one of the most experienced speleologists, but a layman. At the Munich premiere, the 44-year-old management consultant explains: “None of us had ever had a camera in hand before.”
Johann Westhauser is part of the crew whose search for the exit of the giant thing cave can now be seen on canvas.
(Photo: Filmwelt Verleihagentur, Wolfgang Zillig)
Five scientists, a director and 80 guests come together for this occasion in the large cinema at Sendlinger Tor. The rate of climbing and mountain outfits is significantly higher than usual in these halls. It’s about the question of how good a film can be without a film crew, especially when the lighting conditions are as complicated as hardly anywhere else. And the question of how the now 60-year-old Johann Westhauser recovered in this cave seven years after his almost fatal accident. He is also part of this mission.
In fact, during the journey deep into the abyss, unprecedented images of surprisingly high quality were created. Sometimes you can see the filmmaker’s shadow on the mountain wall, but never before could you imagine how eerie and beautiful the subterranean parallel world extends in the Untersberg. The researchers guide you through the mysterious world of shadows, which the water washed into the limestone rock and which even the people in the region usually only know from legends. Thanks to special light cameras, you can for the first time get an idea of what awaits you down there.
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The viewer is part of the six-day mission for 90 minutes. It’s like being trapped in a rock, that’s how close the camera is when the researchers crawl through claustrophobically narrow shafts. At most, people speak during the noodle soup in the bivouac, otherwise the adventurers hardly have any energy for words. The film doesn’t need that either, the pictures speak for themselves. The off-screen voice is also holding back. So far that the 2014 accident and the costly rescue operation are only briefly discussed. The question of weighing up is dispensed with: whether there is a relationship between effort, risk and benefit?
A ten-year-old girl in row two raises this question – to some extent: What were the research results of this mission? The film actually answers this question less. But another: Why people rise from light to shadow, where adventures lurk that no one has yet discovered or experienced.