Society of the Snow (2023)

Film and Plot Synopsis

In the early 1970s, a rugby team from Uruguay set out for a match in Chile. Some brought friends or family members, some left them behind. On their small chartered plane, everyone was giddy with excitement. But as they made their way over the Andes, the plane started to descend — far too early. They struck a mountain and broke into pieces. Miraculously, some of the 45 passengers on board survived — but they faced perilous conditions. From Gaudí and Goya award–winning director J.A. Bayona (The Impossible, A Monster Calls), “Society of the Snow” tells the near-impossible true story of the 1972 Andes flight disaster. (Courtesy of Netflix)

‘Society of the Snow’ Movie Summary

The film begins in Montevideo, Uruguay in October of 1972. The Old Christians Club rugby is traveling to their neighboring country of Chile for an upcoming match. The young men are understandably excited about the trip with many of them perceiving the journey as an adventure. The plane for the trip is carrying 40 passengers, including the 19 rugby team members, and 5 crew members. The passengers include Numa Turcatti (Enzo Vogrincic), Roberto Canessa (Matías Recalt), Nando Parrado (Agustín Pardella), Antonio “Tintín” Vizintín (Agustín Della Corte), Gustavo Zerbino (Tomas Wolf), Daniel Fernández Strauch (Francisco Romero), Alfredo “Pancho” Delgado (Valentino Alonso), Diego Storm (Felipe Ramusio), Carlitos Paez (Felipe González Otaño), Javier Methol (Esteban Bigliardi), Enrique Platero (Federico Aznarez), Marcelo Pérez del Castillo (Diego Vegezzi), Adolfo “Fito” Strauch (Esteban Kukuriczka), and Eduardo Strauch (Rafael Federman).

The plane takes off normally from Uruguay. The trip is uneventful until it reaches the Andes Mountain range. The weather changes dramatically while over the mountains with stormy winds and ice. The plane’s flight plan is to take a route away from the high mountains and instead travel through a relatively open pass between two mountain peaks. However, the pilots lost control of the plane, and it crashes into a snowy valley in the Andes. The plane splits in two with the tail end separating from the main fuselage. Twelve of the passengers are killed during the crash, while most of the other passengers are injured. Both pilots are killed. The plane is damaged beyond repair, and the radio is inoperative.

The surviving passengers begin to wait to be rescued, believing that it will only be a matter of hours before help arrives. After help fails to arrive, the survivors learn to huddle together with each other and the dead in the fuselage at night to keep warm and survive the plunging temperatures. The next day, all the survivors work to clear out the fuselage from debris, and they put the dead bodies out in the snow. The passengers scour the plane wreckage for any food that they can find, although they have plenty of water from melting snow. They also find a portable radio in the wreckage and listen to occasional news reports about the search for the plane. The survivors occasionally hear plane engines in the sky, but the white fuselage against the snow-covered valley makes it near impossible for the wreckage to be seen from the sky.

Eventually, after a few days, the food supplies are exhausted, and the survivors begin to starve. The extreme cold of the valley causes there to be no animals or plants for the survivors to consume. Eventually, the survivors conclude that the only way for them to survive is consume the remains of the dead passengers. Many of the survivors object to the idea, for various moral and religious reasons. As the days continue, more survivors continue to perish, either from their injuries from the crash or from hunger. Ultimately, most of the survivors succumb to the unthinkable and begin eating the flesh of the dead to survive. The survivors also begin to give consent to each other to use their bodies for food if they don’t survive.

There is no greater love than that which gives one’s life for one’s friends. Numa Turcatti (Enzo Vogrincic)

The days stretch into weeks and eventually, the survivors hear over the portable radio that the search is being called off and that they are all presumed dead by the search parties. Eventually, the survivors begin branching out and looking for a way off the mountain. Their search finds the tail end of the plane where there are some limited food supplies and some electronic parts that they can use to try to repair the radio.

One night, the fuselage is struck by an avalanche and becomes buried under feet of snow. More survivors are killed, and the remaining passengers are forced to consume the flesh of the dead inside the plane to survive. Eventually, the survivors are able to dig themselves out from under the snow. With no help in the forceable future, some of the rugby team members decide to try to hike out of the valley to find help. Roberto, Nando, Tintín, and Numa begin hiking East believing that they can trek past the mountain ranges and eventually reach Chile. However, Numa has to return to camp by himself after one day due to an infection on his foot that prevents him making the perilous journey.

The three remaining men continue. However, when the journey appears to be longer than any of them thought it would be, Tintín gives Roberto and Nando his food rations and returns to camp, allowing the other two to continue for a few more days. Eventually, Roberto and Nando stumble into an area that would support life. They find a man on horseback who looks at them with confusion. Roberto and Nando inform the man who they are, and they are rushed back to the man’s village. A radio call is sent out about their trek, and police and media reporters descend upon the village and begin taking pictures and asking questions.

Back at the crash site, the remaining survivors hear the news of Roberto and Nando finding civilization and begin waiting for rescue. They clean up the crash site and begin organizing their things. Rescue helicopters arrive and begin loading the survivors on board. One survivor refuses to leave his suitcase behind as it contains various objects belonging to those who had died during the ordeal. The survivor wants to pass on the objects to the deceased’s family members. Everyone is thrilled to be rescued, but each of them carries the knowledge of what they had to do to survive, and they all question what the world will think of them once they learn what they did to stay alive.