A 2000 Oscar nominee for Best Foreign Language Film, Himalaya employs a suitably exotic and imposing locale as the setting for a conventional tale of endurance in the face of seemingly insurmountable obstacles. Directed by Eric Valli, who previously explored this brutal but gorgeous terrain as the Himalayan unit director of Seven Years In Tibet, Himalaya stars Thilen Lhondup as a crusty old chieftain intent on maintaining his power and preserving his people's adherence to ancient tradition. But Lhondup's power and authority are challenged by Gurgon Kyap, a younger, more charismatic leader who pursues a code of rugged individualism and doesn't share Lhondup's belief that signs and omens should dictate the community's actions. Convinced that Lhondup's actions will imperil the village's all-important journey to trade salt for grain, Kyap sets out four days early, leaving Lhondup to trail behind with a motley group that includes a mother, a monk, and an adorable child. Valli reportedly drew heavily on the customs of the Dolpopos people to give the film a documentary-like verisimilitude, but his efforts seem like little more than window dressing for a depiction of high-altitude danger only slightly less formulaic than that in Vertical Limit. Kyap and Lhondup lend conviction and authority to their roles, but they're hemmed in by a scrappy-but-loving-mentor/hotheaded-but-goodhearted-protégé dynamic straight out of an early Tom Cruise movie. The titular setting looks predictably awe-inspiring, at once menacing and beautiful, but the film's mixture of inert drama and sweeping, panoramic footage of nature at its least tamed give Himalaya the feeling of an IMAX movie released to the wrong theaters. The script only gives its characters enough personality to adequately drive the plot forward, then divides its cast up into complementary pairs (brusque would-be leader and beatific monk, grandfather and grandchild, new leader and widow) for an arbitrary series of reconciliations and epiphanies. Himalaya is rooted indelibly in a specific place, but the conventions it exploits are universal.