René Desmaison
Actor · 1930 – 2007 · Bourdeilles, Dordogne, France
René Desmaison, born April 14, 1930 in Bourdeilles (Dordogne) and died September 28, 2007 in Marseille, was a French mountaineer. A high-level mountain guide and climber, René Desmaison, from the mid-1950s and for over 30 years, completed numerous first ascents of great difficulty in the Alps, the Himalayas, and the Andes. A highly publicized mountaineer, he was involved in several controversies. Upon the death of his mother, the young René Desmaison, who was not yet 14, left Marsac near Périgueux and followed his godfather Paul Roze to Antony in the Paris region, where he joined the scout movement. There, he met Pierre Kohlmann, with whom he practiced Sunday climbing in the Fontainebleau forest, along with other young Antony residents, including future mountaineers Bernard Lagesse and André Bertrand. René Desmaison completed his military service in Briançon in a ski scout section. He was a sergeant and participated in the military ski championship. Back in Paris, he married and had two daughters and a son, Pascal. After working as a salesman in a sports store, he became a visiting retailer of household appliances. He spent long weekends in the mountains or went climbing in Fontainebleau and the Saussois rocks, where he met mountaineer Jean Couzy in 1954. This encounter with Jean Couzy was decisive: together, they completed many major ascents, as well as first ascents, until Jean Couzy's death in the mountains four years later. In the early 1960s, he separated from his wife and married Simone Damiani (aka Simone France), an actress and sister of writer and filmmaker José Giovanni, with whom he climbed in Fontainebleau. René Desmaison thus entered the world of film stars. Before becoming a high mountain guide in 1961, he was already a mountaineering professor at ENSA from 1960; attached to his independence, he left ENSA in 1963. Pioneers of great winter mountaineering, René Desmaison climbed both in the Alps and in the Himalayas and found media coverage. A glorious era where it was a question of who would be the first to climb the north faces in winter, but not always virtuous where mountaineers, in cahoots with journalists, maintained sensationalist Paris-Match front pages. In this great game, René Desmaison was the strongest. In Chamonix he became the man to beat. In 1971, René Desmaison nearly died during a winter attempt on a new route on the Walker Spur of the Grandes Jorasses: his climbing partner Serge Gousseault died of cold and exhaustion, while René Desmaison was rescued in the nick of time by rescuers after being trapped 90 meters from the summit. From 1976 onward, René Desmaison devoted himself, notably with his son Pascal, to expeditions in the Peruvian Andes. He became a filmmaker and lecturer and a key figure in Connaissance du Monde. In 1988, he divorced, and with his new partner, he became the father of a daughter, Aurélie, in 1991. René Desmaison died of cancer on September 28, 2007, at La Timone Hospital in Marseille. His ashes were placed on October 28, 2007 in the cemetery of the Gicons chapel, in Saint-Disdier, gateway to the Dévoluy massif.
Movies5
Movie10.0DocumentaryDramaLes Parois de la Mémoire – Le Pilier Central du Frêney is a 25-minute documentary film directed by Jérôme Equer in 1994 and broadcast on the FR3 weekly program Montagne. The film highlights the tragic story of the July 1961 attempt to climb the Frêney Central Pillar (on the Italian side of Mont Blanc), during which a Franco-Italian team—led notably by Pierre Mazeaud and Walter Bonatti—was trapped by a violent, multi-day storm of exceptional intensity, resulting in a tragic retreat and the deaths of four of the seven climbers. It draws on archival footage, excerpts from Lothar Brandler’s film Inferno am Montblanc, and firsthand accounts from the participants, including mountaineer and politician Pierre Mazeaud.
Les Parois de la Mémoire - Le Pilier Central du Frêney
1994 · 1 votes
Movie7.0DocumentaryAdventureLes Etoiles de Midi is an engaging docudrama about some of the more spectacular exploits of French mountain climbers over the last several decades. In one re-enacted story, there is a wartime escape through the mountains, and in another, a daring rescue of a pair of climbers who had been missing. The actors themselves are adept at the sport of climbing, and they give the scenes an immediacy and real daring that brings the stories alive. A combination of their acrobatics and skill and the outstanding episodes in the history of French climbing creates a winning 78 minutes.
Movie10.0DocumentaryAdventureRetrospective of four major peaks climbed by French expeditions: Annapurna (8078m) in 1950; Makalu (8481m) in 1955; Mustagh Tower (7273m) in 1956 and Le Jannu (7710m) in 1962. A film by Lucien Berardini and Jean-Marie Perthus with the support of the French Alpine Club and the FFME (French Mountain and Climbing Federation).
Movie10.0DocumentaryEric Escoffier, la Fureur de Vivre
2019 · 1 votes
Movie10.0DocumentaryAdventureThree years after the 1959 expedition, abandoned 350m from the summit, Lionel Terray leads a new assault on Jannu, one of the most demanding peaks in the Himalayas. At the base camp, equipment and food rations are prepared. The conditions are optimal and the ascent can begin. The camera follows the progress of the mountaineers and Sherpas as closely as possible, from one high-altitude camp to another: installing fixed ropes, progressing over crevasses, in the middle of frozen towers, vertically down immense ice falls or along the edge of sharp ridges. From 7000m, oxygen bottles become essential, as the difficulty of the climb prevents acclimatization. The expedition is a total success: the majority of its members reach the 7710m summit.
Series4
TV6.8Talk ShowChamps-Elysées
1982 · 9 votes
TV10.0DocumentaryPeople experience adventures on mountains all around the world. Personalities, fascinated by the world of the mountains, bring us closer to the freedom many people experience in such breezy hights.
Bergwelten
2012 · 1 votes
TV10.0Documentary"The Climbers" is a six-part documentary series tracing the history of mountaineering. Directed by Chris Bonington and Richard Else, it was produced by the BBC and broadcast in 1992. The series recounts the evolution of mountaineering and the traditions of climbers in Great Britain and on the European continent: the former developed a free climbing technique, while the latter used aids such as keys, pitons, and drills to ascend otherwise inaccessible routes. The program includes archive footage of the pioneers of the sport, from the emergence of free climbing as a distinct discipline in the late 1970s and 1980s to the advent of competitions.
The Climbers
1992 · 1 votes
TV9.0DocumentaryAction & Adventure"Les Coulisses De L'Exploit" was a French television program of sports information created by Jacques Goddet and Raymond Marcillac, and broadcast on RTF Television then on the first channel of the ORTF from December 13, 1961 to August 16, 1972. The principle of this program is to report on sports news but also to meet men and women performing exceptional feats. According to Raymond Marcillac: "Competitive sport is not our only field of action. It never has been. We want to discover beings whose life is enriching, exhilarating; men who have accomplished acts that can be offered to our admiration without reluctance."
Les Coulisses De L'Exploit
2 votes