August 2007 press release

Big names line up for Kendal 2007.
It's the world's biggest Mountain Film Festival if you count bums on seats, and this year at Kendal we've been pulling in all our favours to get the biggest names involved.

Ranulph Fiennes on the Eiger
We're now able to reveal some early detail for this November's event and the lecture line-up looks set to be the best yet. Names to savour include renowned climbers Greg Child, Thomas Huber, Jack Tackle, Will Gadd, Simon Yates and Neil Gresham while explorer and reluctant mountaineer Sir Ranulph Fiennes headlines the main Saturday evening schedule. Doug Scott and Chris Bonington are also combining for a one-off Kangchenjunga and Kongur lecture.

Will Gadd, Greg Child
Big news on the film premiere front will be the first showing of The Beckoning Silence, a drama-documentary adapted from Joe Simpson's best-selling book and created by the same team that made BAFTA-award-winning Touching the Void. With both Joe and the production team in attendance, expect this to sell out fast! More in-depth detail on films nearer the time. This year's Book Festival is also gathering pace. With the Boardman Tasker Prize for Mountain Literature now hosted in Kendal, a special retrospective is planned including contributions from previous BT winners Al Alverez, Andy Cave and Greg Child chaired by Ed Douglas. There's a new Nature Writing event plus 'Adventure or Madness?' hosted by Terry Gifford and featuring US mountain fiction writer Jeff Long, while Colin Wells chairs a 'New Writing' event featuring Andy Kirkpatrick, Nick Bullock and Jan Levi. Last but definitely not least, Nicholas Crane will be making his first lecture appearance following the forthcoming Great British Journeys TV series, retracing the steps taken by Britain's greatest explorers. Kendal's renowned film-making programme is now known as the Adventure Film Academy - anyone wanting to develop their skills as film makers can enroll for the 4 day-long workshops and 48-hour film 'marathon'. Together with specialist evenings for mountain bike, white water, ski and parapente/BASE, it promises to be another unmissable year for all outdoor enthusiasts.