Movie: "Free Solo"

What an amazing film this is from National Geographic. In 2017 Alex Honnold climbed El Capitan in Yosemite without anything except his hands and feet and mind. No ropes, no gear, nothing. And he did it in less than four hours.

As this movie begins, from the first close-ups that pan out to wide angle shots, my stomach was in knots from the fear of falling. The camera work is amazing. But what is more amazing is the simple fact that Alex climbed a shear face of a granite mountain, 3000 feet of straight up rock, all by himself. My hands sweated the entire time.

Alex is charming in his off-putting way. It doesn't hurt that he is cute and frisky but he makes no attempt to be endearing or loveable. In fact, at times he is a bit of an asshole, but we, the viewers, can let that slide a bit because we are sort of on his side. He wants to make this climb, we get that. The fact that he has some sort of armor around himself to make that happen is more difficult to accept, but we do because this is a herculean task, to say the least.

One mistake, one small mistake and he falls and he dies. Alex does the ascent several times with ropes and we see him fall, with the ropes, in the more difficult sections. When we watch him do it solo, it is terrifying.  

This deserves to be seen on a screen larger than one's television. It is a short movie, about 90 minutes or so. Go see it. You don't need to be a climber to like it, you simply need to appreciate drive, dedication and obsession to get it. Yosemite and El Capitan have never looked lovelier.  

Two thumbs up.